Iran's 'stoning to death' woman, son to sue two Germans for 'illegal' interview attamepts

Tehran, Jan 3 (ANI): Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning for adultery charges, and her son have said that they would sue the two German nationals for trying to conduct an 'illegal' interview with the son.

Xinhua quoted Ashtiani's son Sajjad Qaderzadeh as saying that he would sue the Germans who, posing as tourists and journalists, tried to interview him without any authorization.

Qaderzadeh also threatened to sue his lawyers who encouraged him to agree to the conduct the interview, the report said.

In October last year, Iranian judiciary spokesman Gholam-Hosein Mohseni- Ejei said that Iran had arrested two foreigners who interviewed the son of Ashtiani, adding that the Germans were not journalists, or did not carry any document to prove they were journalists.

On Saturday, Ashtiani was taken out on prison leave to have dinner with her daughter and son, hours after he had appealed to the judiciary to spare her life. She had then reportedly asked her son to sue the two Germans for the interview attempts.

She also claimed that the reason for her planned lawsuit against those two foreigners was that they duped her son into accepting the interview, leading to his arrest, the report added.

After having dinner with her children on Saturday, Ashtiani had said that she was not tortured while in prison, adding that: "these are all rumors".

Ashtiani, a mother of two, was originally convicted in May 2006 after being found guilty of having had an "illicit relationship" with two men following the death of her husband and reportedly received 99 lashes in front of her son.

Later that year, as a result of information that surfaced during the trial of a man accused of murdering her husband, her adultery case was re-opened. Despite retracting a confession she said she had made under duress in August, Ashtiani was convicted of adultery and sentenced to death by stoning.

The Iranian government also claims that she had a hand in the murder of her husband. (ANI)