June 19, 2007

Dear Friends, Please spread the word as widely as possible!
Man and woman scheduled to be stoned Thursday

Stop Stoning Forever Campaign
Urgent Press Release [Persian]

The news about the scheduled stoning of a man and a woman in Takistan, Ghazvin, on Thursday June 21, 2007, was spread through mobile phone messages and the Internet. The office of Showraye Tameen of Ghazvin province has issued the order to stone and man and a woman in public.

The judge of Branch 1 of the Criminal Court of Takistan will be present in person to throw the first stone.

This was scheduled to be done on Sunday, June 17, but the Office of Showraye Tameen of Ghazvin province postponed it to Thursday, June 21.

Mokarrameh Ebrahimi is a 43 year old woman and mother of an 11 year old who has spent the past 11 years in Choubin prison in Ghazvin after being sentenced to stoning. The father of the child has also been in prison for 11 years and is scheduled to be stoned with her.

According to the Meydaan, the official site of the Stop Stoning Forever Campaign, an informed source has verified the news and added that "the pits are dug and prepared in Behesht Zahra cemetery to implement the sentence."

This source also added that the sentence has been issued solely based on the judge's knowledge, and there have been no witnesses to the so called crime of adultery and having a child out of wedlock. It seems that the couple have lived together for a while and shortly after been imprisoned.

There are different rumors about the woman's past. Some say that her husband had thrown her out of the house and she had been living with her mother for two years. Both the man and the woman have children from their previous marriages.

Mokarrameh, who is the mother of three children, is very distressed and in sever disarray in prison. It seems that after the appeal to the Judicial Commission for Amnesty and Clemency had been rejected, it is going to be carried out as the result of the perseverance of one of the judiciary officials in Ghazvin.

The official announcement about the stoning is going to be posted at the site of execution in order to invite the public to participate in the process in Takistan. This is while the Iranian officials continue to deny any stoning sentence.

The Stop Stoning Forever Campaign activists plea to the citizens of the world to take any actions they possibly can in order to stop the stoning of this couple from taking place. Further detailed information will be provided as campaign activists are trying to obtain more knowledge about the case in Takistan.

To contact campaign activists in the US or Iran please email Soheila Vahdati <soheilavahdati@gmail.com> or Shadi Sadr <shadisadr@gmail.com>.

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