Artists, politicians write letter to free Iran's Ashtiani

More than 80 artists, academics and politicians including US actor Robert Redford, British singer Sting and France's Bernard Kouchner on Monday called for the release of an Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has been accused of adultery and of being complicit in her husband's murder but her sentence to be stoned to death was suspended after an international outcry. "Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has suffered enough," the signatories said in an open letter to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on the front page of The Times newspaper. (Reuters)