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| Axis of Evil |
| Iran Death Sentence May Be Reviewed |
| 2002-11-17 |
| Iran's top leader has ordered the country's chief judge to review a reformist scholar's death sentence that has prompted Iran's largest protests in years, a lawyer for the scholar said Sunday. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's order likely means university professor Hashem Aghajari's death sentence will be overturned. He issued the order after hundreds of university teachers wrote to Khamenei asking him to intervene, lawyer Saleh Nikbakht told The Associated Press. The riots in the streets probably had something to do with it, too... In the past, Khamenei has intervened in judicial matters only after political crises deepen or when he felt Iran's national unity or security endangered. The last time he intervened in a judicial matter was in January when he ordered the judiciary chief to release a reformist lawmaker convicted of insulting the judiciary, defusing a political crisis between the parliament and the judiciary. Wonder how many times crises can be defused without the process either becoming routine, or being viewed as weakness? |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |