Khamenei Orders Judiciary to Reconsider Aghajari's Sentence - 2002-11-17

According to a report from a newspaper in Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei has instructed the head of the judiciary to reconsider the case of Hashem Aghajari, a government-opposing professor who has been sentenced to death for blasphemy and insulting the Prophet of Islam. The conservative newspaper, Jomhouri Eslami, reports today that this order was issued after hundreds of university professors in Iran signed a letter protesting the judiciary's ruling against Aghajari. The order for reconsideration comes at a time when student protests have been ongoing for a week. Last Friday night, the grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, sided with the protesters. Another report indicates that Hojjatoleslam Khomeini visited the imprisoned professor's family and expressed his regret over the issued sentence. The ruling clerics in Iran accused Aghajari of blasphemy after he questioned the monopoly of clerical rule in Iran during a speech earlier this year. Aghajari, who is a war veteran, has not yet agreed to request a reconsideration. A court in Hamedan sentenced the professor to death on November 6 for stating that Muslims are not monkeys to blindly imitate clerics. Meanwhile, in Tehran, twenty heads of teacher training colleges resigned, stating that they do not feel safe following the ruling against Aghajari. The only demonstration in support of the death sentence occurred last Friday with about a thousand participants outside Tehran University, where demonstrators called for Aghajari's execution. Earlier in the week, Iran's reformist president stated that the issuance of this sentence was wrong and such a ruling should never have been made.