The Qur'an on lashes: "Let no compassion move you" (24:2). No worries there in Iran. After all, Ashtiani has already received 99 lashes once before. "Iran stoning woman 'to be lashed over photograph'," from BBC News, September 5: Stoning isn't off the table. Anything is possible at any time after Ramadan. You do not have the right to a phone call: Per the instructions of the aforementioned Qur'an 24:2: "The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication,- flog each of them with a hundred stripes: Let not compassion move you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if ye believe in Allah and the Last Day: and let a party of the Believers witness their punishment." You do not have the right to remain silent, and anything you are forced to say will undoubtedly be used against you: More on stoning in Islam can be found here. An update on this story. Just yesterday, reports said the sentence was pending, but authorities acted much more quickly -- more eagerly -- than that. The swiftness with which this ridiculous sentence was carried out suggests authorities are in a hurry: either they wanted to carry out the penalty before questions about the picture gained traction, or they have something else in mind. Perhaps both. "Lawyer: Iran woman could be stoned to death soon," by Nasser Karimi for the Associated Press, September 6: Until it does. And Ramadan ends this week.An Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning for adultery now faces being whipped for indecency, her son says.
Iranian authorities sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to 99 lashes after the Times newspaper published a picture purportedly of her without a headscarf.
The Times later published a correction, saying the photograph was of a different Iranian woman.
After an international outcry, Iranian officials temporarily halted Ms Ashtiani's stoning sentence in July.
There are fears the death sentence could still be carried out by hanging.
Contested confessions
Ms Ashtiani's son has given several interviews saying he was told of the new sentence of 99 lashes by people who have recently been released from the prison in Tabriz where his mother is being held.
On 28 August, the Times published a picture it said was of Ms Ashtiani that it had obtained from one of her lawyers.
The lawyer, Mohammad Mostafei, who has fled Iran, said he received the picture from her son, Sajad Ghaderzadeh - a claim Mr Ghaderzadeh denies.
Mr Ghaderzadeh said the new sentence was "an excuse to increase [the authorities'] harassment of our mother".
In an open letter, he said his mother had been sentenced to receive 99 lashes "on false charges of spreading corruption and indecency by disseminating this picture of a woman presumed to be her without hijab".
He said he did not believe the sentence had been carried out but that her family and lawyer had not been allowed to visit her for two weeks and she had not been allowed to use a telephone.
Mr Ghaderzadeh said the family was appealing against the sentence.
In May 2006, a criminal court in East Azerbaijan province found Ms Ashtiani guilty of having had an "illicit relationship" with two men following the death of her husband. She was given 99 lashes.
But that September, during the trial of a man accused of murdering her husband, another court reopened an adultery case based on events that allegedly took place before her husband died.
Despite retracting a confession she said she had been forced to make under duress, Ms Ashtiani was convicted of "adultery while being married" and sentenced to death by stoning....
TEHRAN, Iran - The lawyer for an Iranian woman sentenced to be stoned on an adultery conviction said Monday that he and her children are worried the delayed execution could be carried out soon with the end of a moratorium on death sentences for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
In an unusual turn in the case, the lawyer also confirmed that Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani was lashed 99 times last week in a separate punishment meted out because a British newspaper ran a picture of an unveiled woman mistakenly identified as her. Under Iran's clerical rule, women must cover their hair in public. The newspaper later apologized for the error.
With the end of Ramadan this week, the mother of two could be executed "any moment," said her lawyer, Javid Houtan Kian.
The sentence was put on hold in July after an international outcry over the brutality of the punishment, and it is now being reviewed by Iran's supreme court.
Ashtiani was convicted in 2006 of having an "illicit relationship" with two men after the murder of her husband the year before and was sentenced at that time to 99 lashes. Later that year, she was also convicted of adultery and sentenced to be stoned, even though she retracted a confession that she says was made under duress.
"The possibility of stoning still exists, any moment," Kian told The Associated Press. "Her stoning sentence was only delayed; it has not been lifted yet."
Italy is among several countries pressing for Iran to show flexibility in the case. The country's foreign minister, Franco Frattini, said the Italian ambassador in Iran met with authorities in Tehran who "confirmed to us that no decision has been made" about the stoning sentence.
"I interpret that in the sense that the stoning, for now, won't take place," Frattini said in an interview on Italian state TV.
After putting the stoning sentence on hold, Iran suddenly announced that the woman had also been brought to trial and convicted of playing a role in her husband's 2005 murder. Her lawyer disputes that, saying no charges against her in the killing have ever been part of her case file.
In early August, Iranian authorities broadcast a purported confession from Ashtiani on state-run television. In it, a woman identified as Ashtiani admits to being an unwitting accomplice in her husband's killing.
Kian says he believes she was tortured into confessing.
In the latest twist, authorities are said to have flogged her for the publication of a photo of a woman without her hair covered in the Times of London newspaper. The woman in the photo was misidentified as Ashtiani.
She was lashed on Thursday, Kian said, citing information from a fellow prisoner who was released last week. Kian has been allowed no direct contact with his client since last month....
Tuesday 7 September 2010
Woman facing stoning in Iran sentenced to 99 lashes -- not even in place of stoning, but for new alleged offense
Iranian woman facing death by stoning has already been flogged over a photo of a different woman, could face execution any time after Ramadan
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