Tehran, January 18: Iran has suspended a sentence to hang a woman at the centre of a global outcry about stoning, a member of parliament said.
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani’s sentence to be stoned for adultery was suspended last year after condemnation from several governments, but she had still faced death by hanging for being an accomplice in her husband’s murder . In a letter to Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff, the head of parliament’s human rights committee, Zohre Elahian, said the hanging, too, had been suspended due to pleas from her children.
“Although the stoning sentence has not been finalised yet, the hanging sentence has been suspended due to pardon ,” the letter said, according to news agency ISNA. Ashtiani has been sentenced to 10 years’ jail, Elahian said. She was arrested in 2006.
Ex-Brazilian president Lula da Silva offered Ashtiani asylum in July, prompting an embarrassing public rejection by Iran which said he was not in possession of all the facts.
–Agencies–