Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani will not be stoned. Faced with international pressure, the Iranian authorities have announced that they will not carry out the sentence handed down by the judges.
But wait: Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani is not out of the woods. She still faces the possibility of what is referred to primly in Iran as a substitute punishment. For example, she may be hanged.
What crime did Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani commit? What unthinkable crime caused this 43-year-old mother, four years ago, to receive ninety-nine lashes and later to be sentenced to be buried alive up to the neck while a gang of men pelted her head with rocks until she died? I repeat, what is the crime that, today, after Iran's embassy in London has announced the exceptional commutation of the sentence of stoning, obliges Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to wait on death row in Tabriz prison while the authorities settle on another sentence, one equally horrifying if seemingly less brutal?
Her crime, her only crime -- a crime that she denies having committed and that three of the five judges who have ruled on her case strongly doubt she committed -- that crime, for which, as I write, she may be savagely executed, was to have had extramarital relations with a man ... several years after the death of her husband!
The accusation would be merely grotesque if its consequences were not so abominable.
It might be allowed to pass quietly into the lengthy record of the feckless and foolish acts of totalitarian states were it not for the fact that at least six persons (five men and one woman) have been stoned since 2002, despite a supposed moratorium on that form of punishment.
I would add that this moratorium, one that does not actually prevent stonings from taking place, is deemed null and void by various religious, political, and judicial authorities in Iran. Keep in mind that Ali Reza Jamshidi, spokesman for the Ministry of Justice, declared in January 2009 that the concept of moratorium had no meaning under Iranian law. Remember, too, that the Revolutionary Guards are fighting tooth and nail to keep image-conscious pragmatists from purging stoning from the new penal code. (Yes, stoning is still in the code.)
For all of these reasons the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani is vitally important.
For all of these reasons we must join the wave of opinion that has gathered force in Canada (through the site www.freesakineh.org launched by Heather Reisman, Marie-Josée Kravis, and others), in the United Kingdom (with the appeal that appeared on the front page of the Times of London on July 9, and that I signed), in the United States (thanks to my friend Arianna Huffington and others), and now in Brazil (thanks to the efforts of Luis Schwarcz, head of the Companhia das Letras publishing house).
And it is for all of these reasons that, in Europe, I am urging the friends who have fought alongside me for so many years to join the movement. I am appealing to the readers of my review, La Règle du Jeu and to the men and women of good will who read my weekly columns in the Corriere della Sera, El Pais, the Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung or, of course, The Huffington Post. I ask these readers--I ask you--to contact the Iranian authorities responsible for Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani's case and to request that they rule out execution of the accused by any means, clarify the legal status of the accused and inform her lawyer of that status, and rethink their opposition to removing from the penal code a punishment--stoning--that is a shame for Persian culture, a punishment that enlightened Muslims everywhere know to belong to an age long, long past.
Your appeal should be addressed to Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei, supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, whose e-mail address has been made public by Amnesty International: info_leader@leader.ir. Or you may send a letter through the supreme leader's website.
Letters should also be sent to Iran's minister of justice, Ayatollah Sadegh Ardeshir-Larijani, at the following address, as provided by Amnesty International: Office of the Head of the Judiciary, Pasteur St., Vali Asr Ave., south of Serah-e Jomhouri, Tehran 1316814737, Islamic Republic of Iran.
Copies may be sent to the head of Iran's High Council for Human Rights, Mohammad Javad Larijani, at the same address.
These officials must be inundated with communications.
They must be made aware that the world's eyes are fixed on Iran and on the fate of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and the eleven other individuals (eight women and three men) who wait on death row to know whether they will be stoned.
Iran's officials must be reminded that a great country, one heir to a great culture, cannot cling to punitive practices of such flagrant barbarism, practices that so clearly contravene the international human rights conventions to which Iran is a signatory.
Act quickly, friends, I implore you. We do not have a minute to lose if we wish to save Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and her eleven companions in adversity.
Dr. David Liepert: The Stoning of Women: Quranic Prescription or Barefaced Misogyny?
George Elerick: Stoning Sekinah: The Perversion of the Other
She was involved in killing her husband together with her boy friends.
It is up to Iranian to decide. They are much more politically informed than average Americans.
What gives a non Muslim right to decide which sharia law is good or which one is bad.
Religion is about increasing moral values. In a country like US that their politicians are controlled by money and pass laws against American People left and right, on what moral standing you want to change Iran to better?
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/iran-must-not-execute-woman-spared-stoning-death-any-means-2010-07-09
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.
She has retracted a “confession” made during interrogation, stating that it was made under duress. However, she was convicted by a majority of three out of five trial judges on the basis of the “knowledge of the judge”...
"To punish - and in some cases execute - people for being in consenting relationships is no business of the state. Anyone treated as such is a prisoner of conscience," said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui.
Amnesty International is aware of at least 10 other people (seven women and three men) under sentence of stoning and believes there are likely to be others. Last year, at least three people sentenced to death by stoning were in fact executed by hanging.
The reality and propaganda have nothing in common.
West is directly responsible for suppression of women in Arab countries by installing extremist puppets in Arab countries.
Iran is much more democratic than all the Arab countries in ME and still west pick on Iran for human rights violations.
The propaganda against Iran has a political agenda, since Shah of Iran was ten times worse than Islamic Republic of Iran, but west was ok with Shah because he was our puppet.
If you want to know Iran beyond western propaganda watch some videos about Iran here.
http://www.presstv.com/programs/detail.aspx?sectionid=3510506
You might learn a few things about US economy nobody tell you in west here.
http://www.presstv.com/programs/detail.aspx?sectionid=3510532
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE13/063/2010/en/ed7c649f-ba4e-46e6-821b-aae9bc1d6921/mde130632010en.html
Saeed Torabian and Reza Shahabi, leading members of a trade union which is not recognized by the authorities in Iran, have been arrested and are held at unknown locations. Their arrests may be connected to the anniversary of the disputed 2009 presidential election, which fell on 12 June. The two detained men are at risk of torture or other ill-treatment.
Saeed Torabian, the Public Relations Officer for the Board of the Union of Workers of the Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company (Sherkat-e Vahed), was arrested at his home on 9 June, by security officials who also confiscated his computer and mobile phone. Reza Shahabi, the Treasurer of the Union, was arrested on 12 June. When he arrived at work he was summoned to the headquarters of the Bus Company, where he was arrested by security officials. They took him to his house, which they searched, and confiscated his computer.
Amnesty International believes that both men are very likely to be prisoners of conscience, held solely on account of their peaceful trade union activities and is concerned that they are held in conditions amounting to enforced disappearance, which facilitates the use of torture or other ill-treatment.
Oh poor IRI. Picked on just because it does:
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE13/069/2010/en/c641aad2-f56a-4d62-a363-ba834ec21578/mde130692010en.html
Iranian student leader and prisoner of conscience Majid Tavakkoli, who is serving an eight and a half year prison sentence, has been moved to a section of Tehran’s Evin prison where conditions are particularly harsh and unsanitary. He is still suffering from a serious respiratory condition, and his health is likely to deteriorate further if he does not receive specialist medical care.
Majid Tavakkoli was arrested on 7 December 2009 after making a speech at a student demonstration. His lawyer was not permitted to attend his trial, which took place in January 2010. Majid Tavakkoli has been sentenced to five years in prison for “participating in an illegal gathering”, one year for “propaganda against the system”; two years for “insulting the Supreme Leader” and six months for “insulting the President”. The verdict also included a five-year ban on participating in political activities, as well as a ban on his leaving the country. Amnesty International considers Majid Tavakkoli to be a prisoner of conscience who should be released immediately and unconditionally.
Henri should be brought before the board of philosophers and charged with bad practice.
Oh, that's right, there isn't one....
Iran says that she has no ally in the world and should be independent of the rest of the world because there is no benefit for Iran to welcome critic and hostility.
US creates another Cuba in ME.
Some of this mentality stem from Shia being under attacks from majority Sunni Muslims for 1300+ years.
Iran is use to be in minority position in her recent Islamic history.
Also Iran's position is, Iran is not a donkey and that's why will not respond to sticks.
http://www.iranmilitaryforum.net/index.php?topic=4588.msg37834#msg37834
If order to be able to affect Iran, she should have some relationship with west and risk to lose it. Right now there is little intensive for Iran to listen to anything and as a matter of fact Iran does sometimes exact the opposite to point out that she can defy the west, you can see it clearly in her defiance in regard to Iran's medical research reactor. When west denies to supply Iran with fuel for her medical reactor, Iran announces that she will build four new medical research reactors.
Also we should not credit all these propagandas against Iran to concern of west about human rights. There are much worse human right violators in ME like Israel and Saudi Arabia, but because they have special relationship with US, there is no news about their violations. Propaganda and sanctions are for wars.
http://www.iranmilitaryforum.net/index.php?topic=4591.msg37852#msg37852
Sharifi declined to outline Ashtiani's role in her husband's death, saying it would be just too darn shocking for the public.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2010/07/iran-stoning-sakineh-ashtiani.html
The Islamic law allows the children to pardon the woman for murder of their father by their murders, but does not give them the same authority when it comes to adultery.
This causes outraged from west, but she would be sentenced to death of life even in US for the same crimes.
Read a few articles about special relationship of west and Saudi Arabia to see that west concern is OIL not human rights.
http://www.iranmilitaryforum.net/index.php?topic=4591.msg37852
http://www.care2.com/news/member/901922468/1702641
Do not allow our nightmare become a reality,
Protest against our mother’s stoning!
Today we stretch out our hands to the people of the whole world. It is now five years that we have lived in fear and in horror, deprived of motherly love. Is the world so cruel that it can watch this catastrophe and do nothing about it?
We are Sakine Mohammadi e Ashtiani’s children, Fasride and Sajjad Mohamamadi e Ashtiani. Since our childhood we have been acquainted with the pain of knowing that our mother is imprisoned and awaiting a catastrophe. To tell the truth, the term “stoning” is so horrific that we try never to use it. We instead say our mother is in danger, she might be killed, and she deserves everyone’s help...
Help to save our mother. Write to and ask officials to free her. Tell them that she doesn’t have a civil complainant and has not done any wrong. Our mother should not be killed. Is there any one hearing this and rushing to our assistance?
Faride and Sajjad Mohammadi e Ashtiani
Her children could forgive the murder of their father by their mother, which they did and she was not sentenced for that crime.
The children have no jurisdiction for adultery case. In west she would be convicted for murder because in west private persons could not forgive murder.
Understand the laws and then post.
She would be sentence to death or life in west for the murder case.
In the USt, as blood thirsty as our laws can be, she would not have been jailed for adultery.
Tell that to her children. They wrote that appeal above. You do not understand how cruel, unwise, and unjust letting religio-crazies write and enforce the laws is.
My fervent hope is that you will see beyond the hue and cry of the least competent of your judiciary and end such practices which threaten to cast your leadership, your culture and in fact your entire country in the role of recalcitrant deniers of basic justice and common sense.
Should you fail to find the wisdom to abolish such abominations from your system of jurisprudence then all one can hope is that God has an equal lack of compassion when you are summoned to answer for the inhumanity that your interpretation of your faith causes you to inflict on the weakest of your wards.
Your authority resides not in your scholarly work, but if you are right, it is a mandate from God; and if your understanding of God’s love and compassion is in error, you will have the rest of eternity to learn the lessons you will have failed to learn while you still had a mortal core to absolve yourself of.
Stoning anyone to death is immoral, and it is archaic, and this is the moment to show the world that the Leadership of Iran is neither.
The stoning has rarely used in Iran and is not a common way of punishment, for adultery of married men and married women.
This is a witch hunt, She was convicted for murder of her husband.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2010/07/iran-stoning-sakineh-ashtiani.html
There was a charge of being an accomplice to murder which was a ten year sentence- again based on testimony the IRI cops manged to get out of the accused. The death by stoning was given for adultery.
Two of the five judges found her not guilty, pointing to the lack of evidentiary proof in the case against her, and noting that she had already suffered 99 lashes due to her previous sentencing.
Mohammadi-Ashtiani was sentenced to death by stoning on 10 September 2006.
The Supreme Court confirmed her death sentence on 27 May 2007. "
Thank you, wereeverywhere
Then, this human "package" is buried in a hole, with only the victims heads showing above the ground. If its a woman, she is buried up to her shoulders.
After the individual is secured in the hole, people start chanting "Allah hu Akbar" and throw palm sized stones at the head of the victim from a certain distance (a circle is drawn).
The stones are thrown until the person dies.
Here's something to think about and be very ashamed.
Actual footage of Iranian execution by stoning posted on LiveLeak:
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=44a_1176709269
Any comments?
Lemme guess-- you support Iranian theocracy and all of it policies but prefer oblique methods of expressing it.
Levy's name added was not needed and was harmful. You can tell it was amateur or that those who started said campaign didn't THINK clearly about what adding warhawks to the campaign would do.
File this decision under the ETHICS and SELF-INTEREST of involvement. Had they thought this through, they'd have realized Henri's name hurts her chances.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2010/07/iran-stoning-sakineh-ashtiani.html
In a surprise announcement, a judiciary official in provincial Iran said a woman who had been convicted and sentenced to stoning for adultery had also been convicted of murder.
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother of two in the Tabriz area, had been convicted of cheating on her late husband, apparently a murder victim, and sentenced to die by stoning, a ruling that is officially under review, according to Iranian judiciary officials.
But on Sunday, Malek Ejdar Sharifi, head of East Azerbaijan Province's judiciary, told the official Islamic Republic News Agency (in Persian): "Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has not been convicted of illicit sex only," he said. ""She has been found guilty of numerous and extremely heavy offenses. She was sentenced to capital punishment [in 2006] in the criminal court in Tabriz.
Fanned for investigative journalism, which is very rare in west nowadays.
"According to Iranian and foreign press, Zhila Izadi, a 13 year old girl from the north-western city of Marivan had been condemned to death by stoning after being found that she had been pregnant from her 15 years-old brother.
While Zhila as been sentenced to stoning, her brother, jailed in Tehran, is to receive only 150 lashes, in accordance with Islamic laws."
"That's fresh news. Up until Sharifi's comments, Iranian officials and her lawyer said she was only convicted of adultery. Her lawyer, Mohammad Mostafai, said his client had been convicted of having a hand in her husband's death but that the charge played no role in the death sentence against her, especially since her children did not want to pursue the murder charge against their mother. She was handed a 10-year sentence for the murder, her lawyer said."
So an IRI official from Tabriz, after the international outcry, changes the story to whatever. Who were the witnesses to these events? She retracted her confession given under duress.