Death by stoning – Ashtiani
Iran hits back: US also executes women
Iranian officials slam US 'double standards,' media criticism of Iranian woman's stoning sentence
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad slammed the US media Tuesday, arguing that it provided wide coverage of the case of an Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning, while ignoring the case of a recently executed American woman.
Ahmadinejad condemned the "media campaign against Iran," claiming that millions of web pages are dedicated to the planned stoning of Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, while nobody protestes Lewis' planned execution.
"A woman was executed in the US but nobody cares," the Iranian president said, referring to Teresa Lewis' upcoming execution, scheduled for Thursday, for orchestrating her husband's and stepson's murder in 2002.
Global Criticism
Associated Press
In its first public statement on case, Catholic Church raises possibility of using behind-the-scenes diplomacy to try to spare life of widow sentenced to be stoned for adultery
The British Guardian reported that media outlets in the Islamic republic dedicated great attention in recent days to the story of Lewis, the first woman to be executed in Virginia in more than 100 years.
The human rights committee in Iran's parliament argued that the case reflects the "double standards" adopted by the US Administration. An Iranian parliament member vowed to file an official complaint against the US with international bodies should it go ahead and execute Lewis. Other parliament members expressed their concern over the execution and asked the US to mitigate the death sentence.
