Author: Miranda Eeles
Publication: The Times, UK
Date: November 14, 2002
President Khatami of Iran stoked
growing tensions between the country's hardline judiciary and reformists
yesterday, when he condemned the death sentence imposed on a liberal academic
for criticizing the Islamic faith.
Breaking his silence over the case
of Hashem Aghajari, which has pitted reformists against conservatives,
Mr Khatami was quoted as saying: "Such a verdict should never have been
issued and I hope this issue will soon be resolved. The death penalty is
not applicable and will not be applied."
His comments, reported by the state
news agency Irna, came on the fifth day of demonstrations by university
students who have been gathering on campuses across the country, scenes
not witnessed since protests in 1999. Yesterday it was the turn of students
at Amir Kabir University in Tehran and at the Persian Gulf University in
Bushehr.
The dispute centers on a speech
made by Professor Aghajari in June saying that each new generation should
be able to interpret the Islamic faith on its own. He also criticised the
clerical establishment for considering the existing interpretations as
sacred.
He was convicted of insulting the
Prophet Muhammad and for questioning the clergy's interpretation of Islam.
Last week he was told he had been sentenced to death. Chanting slogans
in support of the condemned man, and standing in front of a poster of Mr
Aghajari with a noose around his neck, speakers extolled free speech and
denounced poisonous elements of the regime for stopping the country from
moving forward.
"We actually see the judge's verdict
as a direct insult to the university, to the students, to the teachers.
If something outrageous like this happens, people won't like this, they
will take to the streets, just like they did two years ago," said Hassan
Motazavi, 21, a mechanical engineering student.
The hardline judiciary defended
its decision yesterday to impose the death penalty. In a statement released
by their public relations office, the judges said: "How can one defend
someone who claims to be a Muslim but casts doubt on the principles of
the religion ... and qualifies as monkeys those who follow religious dignitaries?"
But in a defiant challenge to the
courts, Professor Aghajari, a history lecturer and Iran Iraq war veteran
with impeccable revolutionary credentials, has refused to appeal against
-his sentence, saying he was "ready to die". In a letter to his lawyer,
he said: "Twenty years ago, when I was on the front ... during the Iran-Iraq
war, I was already ready to be a martyr. If the head of the judiciary thinks
that this verdict is fair, he should apply it."
In many right-wing papers commentators
have also denounced the verdict, saying it has played into the hands of
the reformers.
On Monday night Ayatollah Khamenei,
the country's supreme leader, in an apparent reference to Professor Aghajari's
penalty, called on judges to pay attention to the sentences they hand down.
He also asked the feuding politicians to end their differences.
If they failed to do so, he added,
he might have to turn to "popular forces" to tackle Iran's problems. "Popular
forces" are taken to be the Revolutionary Guard, who are ideologically
committed to the Islamic revolution.
Many see his intervention not only
as a warning to the President and his reformist allies but as a threat
to the students not to leave their campuses and take their demonstrations
to the streets, as they did two years ago when security forces, killed
several people in a week of student unrest.
