HUMAN RIGHTS campaigners have condemned the announcement of an Iranian television programme showing Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a woman sentenced to death by stoning, at her home apparently discussing her part in the murder of her husband.
The release on Thursday of photographs of Ms Ashtiani at her home in Osku prompted speculation that she had been freed. But hopes for her release were dashed when Iran’s state English-language channel said she had been taken home to make a television programme on her alleged crime.
In a report on its website, Press TV said Ms Ashtiani had accompanied a film crew to her house “to recount details of killing of her husband at the crime scene”.
The Italian foreign minister, Franco Frattini, and Maureen Harper, the wife of the Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper, were among those who had welcomed the unconfirmed reports of her release.
But Press TV said yesterday the visit was part of a programme to be broadcast last night.
The channel said: “Contrary to a vast publicity campaign by western media that confessed murderer Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has been released, a broadcast production team with the Iran-based Press TV has arranged with Iran’s judicial authorities to follow Ashtiani to her house to produce a visual recount of the crime at the murder scene.” Ms Ashtiani has appeared on state television three times, but activists say her apparent confessions had been coerced.
Clare Bracey of Amnesty International said: “International standards for fair trial, to which Iran is a state party, guarantee the right not to be forced to incriminate oneself or to confess guilt. The judiciary is in charge of this case and would have to have given permission for such an interview to take place. To organise a televised ‘confession’ midway through a judicial review of a serious case – where a woman’s life hangs in the balance – makes a mockery of Iran’s legal system.”
She added: “That judicial review [for Ms Ashtiani] is further hampered by the fact that Sakineh’s son and lawyer have been detained. If Sajjad Qaderzadeh and Javid Houtan Kian are being held solely for peacefully highlighting Sakineh’s case, they should be released immediately and unconditionally.”
Ms Ashtiani’s son Sajjad was arrested in October along with her lawyer Mr Kian and two German journalists who were detained after trying to interview her family.
Mina Ahadi of the International Committee Against Stoning also condemned the programme, saying: “Press TV is acting as if it is the intelligence service of Iran, it has forced a woman to confess against herself on TV.”
Ms Ashtiani was convicted in May 2006 of conducting an illicit relationship outside marriage. She was given a sentence of 99 lashes, but her case was reopened when a court in Tabriz suspected her of murdering her husband.
She was acquitted, but the adultery charge was reviewed and a death penalty handed down on the basis of “judge’s knowledge” – a process that allows for subjective judicial rulings where no conclusive evidence is present.
Embarrassed by international condemnation of the stoning sentence, Iran has tried to distract attentions from Ms Ashtiani’s initial charge of adultery by introducing new charges against her and portraying her as a murderer who killed her husband.
Press TV announced its intention to broadcast an interview with Ms Ashtiani on its Iran Todayprogramme last night.
Iran rarely carries out stonings. It executed 388 people last year, more than any other country apart from China, according to Amnesty International. Most were hanged.
Ten Iranian women and four men are on death row awaiting execution by stoning. – (Guardian service)