Canadians vow to keep pressure on Iran over woman's death sentence

By Meagan Fitzpatrick, Canwest News Service

OTTAWA — Canadians taking part in a global Internet campaign to save the life of an Iranian woman sentenced to death for adultery say they intend to keep the pressure on Iran's secretive theocratic government to draw more attention to the plight of Iranian women.
On Thursday, the Iranian embassy in London issued a vague statement saying Iranian authorities had abandoned plans to execute Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani by stoning. It did not say, however, that her conviction had been overturned, which leaves open the possibility that she will be hanged instead of stoned.
Human rights organizations and others have been raising awareness about Mohammadi Ashtiani's case and word is now spreading rapidly on the Internet and through the media. Earlier this week, the founder and CEO of Indigo Books & Music, Heather Reisman, kick-started her own campaign after hearing about the woman's plight.
"This time I just couldn't listen, feel bad and go to bed. I just couldn't do it," Reisman said in an interview Friday. "It was just one of those moments."
Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother, was convicted in May 2006 of having an "illicit relationship" with a man and received 99 lashes as punishment. She was later also convicted of "adultery while being married" and sentenced to death by stoning. Amnesty International warned about a week ago that the jailed woman's execution was imminent and could take place any day.
Reisman said it is abhorrent that a woman would even be jailed for adultery, let alone killed for it, and that Mohammadi Ashtiani's case is an example of "the extraordinary and systematic abuse of women's rights in Iran."
Making use of her wide network of contacts, Reisman e-mailed a group of influential Canadian and American women earlier this week and in less than two days the website www.freesakineh.org was up and running. By the end of the afternoon Friday, the website was crashing because so many people were trying to access it, and a petition on the website had gathered more than 29,000 signatures.
Among the signatories are some well-known Canadians: Prime Minister Stephen Harper's wife, Laureen Harper, retired Supreme Court Justice Claire L'Heureux Dube, filmmaker Deepa Mehta and outspoken author Irshad Manji.
Manji was among those contacted by Reisman for help with the campaign. She had already heard about Mohammadi Ashtiani's case and was raising awareness about it through her Twitter and Facebook accounts.
In a phone interview from New York City on Friday, Manji said social media networks are helping draw the world's attention to injustices in Iran in unprecedented ways.
"Never have I seen a campaign against stoning . . . as international and as accelerated as this one," Manji said. "I really hold out the hope that this time the Iranian government has been called out on its nonsense. Even if somehow passion for this campaign wanes, the Iranian government knows that people are now watching, in a way that they weren't before and in numbers that did not exist before. One way or the other we're not going to let them off the hook."
More than 26,000 people are following a Facebook page created about Mohammadi Ashtiani, protests are being organized this weekend and numerous petitions are circulating that call on the Iranian government to not only halt this particular execution, but the practice of stoning in general.
"A moratorium isn't enough. Sparing individuals on the basis of an international spotlight being shone on them is not enough either. The practice must end," said Manji.
Alex Neve, head of Amnesty International Canada, encouraged Canadians Friday to join the potentially life-saving campaign, which he said is already having some effect.
Neve said the woman's life is still very much in danger and the world must continue to pressure the Iranian government to free her.
"We're convinced that pressure, and the more pressure the better, does make a difference," he said.
Canadian politicians are also speaking up about the case. Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon issued a statement that said Ashtiani was convicted in a judicial process "that lacked transparency" and that her pending execution is part of "an overall deteriorating human rights situation in Iran." Cannon called on Iran to halt the "inhumane practice" of stoning.
Canadian government officials also raised the issue on Monday with the Iranian embassy in Ottawa. On Friday, a spokeswoman for Cannon said officials were working to confirm the status of Ashtiani's sentence.
"We continue to take Iran to task for their egregious abuse of human rights," said Melissa Lantsman.
Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff backed the government's call on Iran to revoke the death sentence. "We are calling on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to rally our UN partners in condemning Iran's actions around Ms. Ashtiani," Ignatieff said in a statement.Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Canadians+keep+pressure+Iran+over+woman+death+sentence/3258461/story.html#ixzz0tNQ22lZw