Sunday's international day of protest a chance to speak out against barbaric torture still practised in a handful of countries around the world.
It seems incredible that in the 21st century there's still a need for an international day of protest against stoning to death.
But there is. Over the past decade, Iran, Pakistan, Somalia and Nigeria have all publicly executed people by stoning.
And Sunday is the day when, worldwide, people are being urged to gather stones and take them to public gathering places with messages to stop this barbaric practice.
On Friday, the Women's Action Forum in Lahore expressed outrage at reports that a Pakistani man and woman have been sentenced to death by stoning for having had "illicit relations."
Also on Friday, and after a week of intensive international pressure including pleas from Canada, the European Union, other governments and a wide array of human rights groups, the Iranian government commuted Sakine Mohammadi Ashtiani's death by stoning.
What remains unclear is whether the 43-year-old mother of 2 will be killed by some other means.
Ashtiani has been in jail since her arrest in 2006 following her husband's murder. She was convicted of having had "an illicit relationship."
Under Iran's strict interpretation of Shariah law, the penalty was 99 lashes.
Her husband's murder case was subsequently reopened and, while Ashtiani was absolved of his murder, she was convicted of having committed adultery before her husband's death. According to the Guardian newspaper, the judge invoked the "judge's knowledge" rule that allows convictions without conclusive evidence of a crime.
Although both men and women have been stoned to death, the penalty is disproportionately given to women.
Women are buried up to their shoulders; men are buried to their waists.
The spectators are then invited to throw rocks that, by law, must be large enough to cause pain, but not so large that one or two of them can kill.
It's torture that can last as long as 20 minutes.
There is one faint hope clause: If you can escape, you can live.
Iran reinstated this public torture after the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
In the last decade, at least 12 Iranian women and a handful of men have been stoned to death. As many as 50 may be in prison awaiting death, according to human rights groups.
Among them are 2 other women in the same jail as Ashtiani -- Marian Ghorbanzadeh, 25, and Azar Bagheri, 19, who was arrested at 15 and has already been subjected to mock stonings.
This is communal killing; terrorism committed by a government on its own people.
"Stoning to death is not simply a judicial punishment," Mina Ahadi, who fled an Iranian death sentence almost 30 years ago, told the Guardian.
"It's a political means in the hands of the Iranian regime to threaten people. It has more function than just a simple punishment for them."
Stoning to death may be the most vile and repugnant form of execution, but it is far from the only one.
Although there are no reports of stoning there, China leads the world in executions with more than 1,000 a year.
Amnesty International ranks Iran 2nd with 388 last year, most of them hangings.
But among them were children.
Every international convention condemns executing minors (including at least one that Iran has ratified).
Yet, on Friday the fate of 19-year-old Mohammad Reza Haddadi rested in the hands of a victim's family.
He's 1 of at least 135 juvenile offenders on Iran's death row, having confessed at 15 to murder after he was hanged from a tree and beaten.
Pleas to commute his death sentence were made by many of the same countries (Canada included) in concert with those to spare Ashtiani from stoning.
Among those asking for Haddadi's clemency is Iranian Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi.
The former judge, who was dismissed following the Islamic Revolution, has represented the family of slain Canadian photo-journalist Zahra Kazemi, as well as several murderers whose confessions were forced from them.
Ebadi has asked the victim's family to go to the Islamic Court and ask that Haddadi's life be spared. They are considering it.
Publ ic pressure saved Ashtiani from death by stoning this week. But it may have only spared her for some other cruel and inhumane punishment.
Iran is one of the 139 nations (including the United States) that have retained the death penalty.
So place a rock in a public space Sunday, but consider the message.
Rather than demanding that stoning be stopped, wouldn't it be better to demand an end to all death penalties in every country?
Source: Daphne Bramham, The Vancouver Sun, July 9, 2010
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