What? The Iranian Guardians Council thinks that measures to make their penal code more humane are contradictory to Islam? Apparently the mullahs are Islamophobes!
“Iran stays execution of two minors: lawyer,” from AFP, May 6 (thanks to James):
TEHRAN (AFP) “” Iran has ordered a stay of execution for two young convicts sentenced to death for crimes committed when they were under the age of 18, their lawyer told AFP on Wednesday.
The move came days after the Islamic republic sparked international outrage by executing a woman, Delara Darabi, for a murder committed when she was 17.
Amir Khaleqi, now 20, and Safar Angooti, 19, had been due to be hanged on Wednesday in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison, in a move that rights group Amnesty had denounced as a “total disregard” for international law….
Under Islamic sharia law, retribution in murder cases is considered a private right and a victim’s family can spare a murderer from execution by accepting blood money, leaving the convict to serve a prison sentence instead.
Iranian rights advocates — and on several occasions movie makers and artists — have sought to negotiate with victims’ families to forgive convicted juvenile murderers.
Their action has at times led to saving lives but also angered some families demanding justice for the loss of their loved ones….
Iran’s judiciary has drawn up a bill that aims to make it difficult for the courts to sentence minors to death.
The bill has been approved by parliament’s judicial commission and appears to be an improvement on the existing penal code under which the age of legal responsibility is nine for a girl and 15 for a boy.
However, despite its adoption by the house, the bill has yet to be rubber-stamped by conservative watchdog the Guardians Council before being written into law.
The council has in past binned several reform-oriented bills after ruling them contradictory to Islam and the Iranian constitution….
Crimes including murder, drug trafficking and rape are punishable by death under the Sharia-based law practised in Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
So far this year, Iran has hanged at least 85 people, according to an AFP count, compared with 246 in 2008.
Amnesty has said that Iran applied the death penalty more than any other country apart from China in 2007, executing 335 people….