By SAEED KAMALI DEHGHAN - THE GUARDIAN
Added: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 16:54:12 UTC

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani. Photograph: Vahid Salemi/AP

An Iranian woman whose sentence of death by stoning for adultery provoked an international outcry could be executed by hanging instead, the country's judicial authorities have indicated.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 44-year-old mother of two, was convicted of conducting an "illicit relationship outside marriage" in 2006 and has since been kept in Tabriz prison in the west of Iran.

Malek Ajdar Sharifi, the head of the judiciary in East Azerbaijan, said on Sunday that the prison does not have the "necessary facilities" to carry out the sentence of stoning. Therefore, he said, authorities are considering hanging as an alternative.

According to Sharifi, an investigation has been launched to determine whether it is legally and religiously possible to go ahead with the hanging instead of stoning. "As soon as the result of the investigation is obtained, we will carry out the sentence," he said in quotes carried by the semi-official Isna news agency.

Mohammadi Ashtiani's sentence was temporarily halted in response to international protests, and Iranian officials have since made confusing and often contradictory comments about her fate. In 2010 President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denied she had been given a sentence of stoning, while a senior adviser to Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, signalled her life could be spared.

Mina Ahadi, a member of the International Committee against Stoning, said Sharifi's remarks proved that international pressure had succeeded, but warned that execution was still a real possibility.

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TAGGED: CAMPAIGNS, HUMAN RIGHTS, ISLAM, RELIGION