Iranâs supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has told the head of the justice department to re-examine âas quickly as possibleâ the file on dissident intellectual Hashem Aghajari, condemned to death for blasphemy, the student news agency ISNA said yesterday. Giving no source for its report, the news agency spoke of the âsupreme leaderâs serious unhappiness about the delay seen in the case.â Aghajari, a history professor at Tehran University and a disabled war veteran, was convicted of blasphemy by a judge in Hamadan for saying that Muslims were not âmonkeysâ and âshould not blindly followâ religious leaders.
| Can't go saying things like that. It'd lead to unthinkable things, like individual liberty... |
The November 2002 verdict sparked protests in Iran and abroad, and supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei demanded it be reviewed. In January 2003, the Supreme Court ordered a retrial but the same judge in Hamadan confirmed his previous sentence. Iranâs top judicial authorities are thought to be anxious to avoid a repetition of the protests that followed the original death sentence, prompting a call to order from Khamenei. Aghajari is unlikely to be executed although a provincial court has upheld the sentence, his lawyer said yesterday. âThe death sentence will definitely be quashed by the Supreme Court, if legal principles are taken into account,â Aghajariâs lawyer Saleh Nikbakht told Reuters.
| ... which is problematic in a country ruled by divine right. |
Iranian newspapers reported Zekrollah Ahmadi, judiciary chief in the western province of Hamadan where the sentence was reviewed, as saying Aghajariâs case had been sent to the Supreme Court although no appeal had been lodged. ISNA reported that Khamenei, who has the last word on all state matters, was angered by the decision to re-issue the death penalty and called on the judiciary to review the verdict. |