FU on UA: 211/09 Index: MDE 13/077/2010 Iran Date: 15 July 2010
URGENT ACTION
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother of two, is held on death row in Tabriz Prison, north-west Iran, and could still face execution. Around 7 July, following international protests, officials in Tabriz asked the head of Iran’s judiciary to agree that her sentence of stoning to death be converted to execution by hanging.
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani was convicted in May 2006 of having an “illicit relationship” with two men and received 99 lashes as her sentence. Despite this, she was then also convicted of “adultery while being married", which she has denied, and sentenced to death by stoning.
Following an international outcry in recent weeks against her sentence of death by stoning, the Iranian Embassy in London stated on 8 July that “Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani would not be executed by stoning" but made no mention of other possible means of execution. On 10 July, the head of Iran’s High Council for Human Rights said that her case would be reviewed, although he affirmed that Iranian law permits execution by stoning. However, on 11 July, the head of the provincial judiciary in East Azerbaijan, Malek Ezhder Sharifi, said that the stoning sentence was still in place and could be implemented at any time by decision of the Head of the Judiciary, Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani. Malek Ezhder Sharifi also said that Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani had been sentenced to death in connection with the murder of her husband but this has been disputed by one of her lawyers, who says that she was pardoned by the dead man’s family but was sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment as an ‘accessory’ to the crime.
On 14 July Sajjad Qaderzadeh, Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani’s son, was summoned to Tabriz’s Central Prison, and is believed to have been questioned by Ministry of Intelligence officials who possibly threatened him not to give further interviews about his mother’s case.
