The body of the Iranian princess Leila Pahlavi, who was found dead in her London hotel room on Monday, has been flown to France for burial. Dressed in deepest mourning and with her eyes reddened from weeping, the princess’ mother, Empress Farah received the 31-year-old’s remains at a Paris airport. She was accompanied by her US-based son, Reza Pahlavi, the Shah-in-exile, and his wife.
The princess’ casket was transferred to the Paris district of Bagnolet where it will remain until Saturday. She will not be interred in her beloved homeland, nor in Egypt at the side of Shah Mohammad Reza, the father she worshipped, but in Paris' Passy cemetery where her grandmother, Farideh Diba, was recently buried.
The youngest of the Shah’s five children, Leila never recovered from her family’s enforced exile from Iran – they fled from the Islamic revolution of the ayatollahs in 1979 when she was nine years old. She was troubled by chronic depression and an eating disorder, for which she was being treated by a Harley Street specialist.
“She suffered from many things,” said one of her Iranian friends. “There were food intolerances and allergies and the eating disorder. Sometimes she would just drink water.”
Photo: © Alphapress.com
Photo: © Alphapress.com
Photo: © Alphapress.com
