Monday, Dec 20, 2004
Teenage sex slave faces death in Iran
By David Smith
LONDON, DEC. 19. Two women convicted of crimes against morality in Iran are facing imminent execution, one by being buried up to her chest and stoned, Amnesty International said last night.
One of the women, a 19-year-old with a mental age of eight who was forced into prostitution by her mother, is to be flogged and hanged for "morality-related" offences. The other was convicted of adultery and is due to be stoned to death this week in accordance with Iran's severe penal code. Amnesty issued an urgent warning that time was running out for both women and urged the international community to tackle Iran over its executions of women and child offenders. In August another mentally ill girl, 16-year-old Atefeh Rajabi, was hanged in a street for having sex before marriage.
The 19-year-old, known as `Leyla M', was a prostitute by the age of eight and was raped repeatedly, according to a Teheran newspaper report. She gave birth when aged nine and was sentenced to 100 lashes for prostitution at about the same time.
Sold again
When she was 12 her family sold her to an Afghan to be his "temporary wife," while her mother became her new pimp, "selling her body without her consent," the report said.
At 14 she became pregnant again, receiving a further 100 lashes before going into a maternity ward to give birth to twins. When her temporary marriage ended, her family sold her again, to a 55-year-old man who was married with two children and did not object to Ms. Leyla's clients coming to his house. Last month Ms. Leyla, appearing at a court in the city of Arak, was sentenced to death on charges of "acts contrary to chastity" by controlling a brothel and giving birth to an illegitimate child. The sentence has now been passed to Iran's Supreme Court for confirmation. She apparently `confessed' and faces being flogged before hanging.
Child offenders
Iran has executed at least three child offenders in 2004 and 11 others are believed to have been sentenced to death. Under the penal code, girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15 can be executed.
Interviewed by an Iranian journalist in her cell, Ms. Leyla was asked if she understood she was to be put to death. "Yes, that is what they are saying," she replied. "But people in prison say this is a lie. They want to frighten you a bit. I have not done anything. My mother told me to go to a man's house and I did. If she said do not, I would not have. I listened to whatever she said. If I did not listen to her, she would have harmed me. She beats me — my father, too.."Campaigners are compiling a petition against the execution.—
© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Copyright © 2004, The Hindu.