Delara Darabi is a 23-year-old Iranian woman who allegedly stabbed her 58-year-old cousin to death when she was 17. However, Delara claims that, at the time, she took the blame for the murder to protect her boyfriend, since she was under age and thought she could not be sentenced to death. The autopsy revealed that the stabber was right-handed. Delara is left-handed. But Delara was nevertheless sentenced to death by hanging, and it is believed that she is scheduled to be executed next Monday, April 20. She will be hanged in public and her body will be exposed for 5 hours.
According to Iranian law, she could have her sentence commuted if the family of the deceased accepts a sum in money given by Delara's family. But they refuse to accept this money. Her only hope now is international pressure, which has been previously found effective.
There are several ways you can try to help Delara have her sentence commuted:
a. You can sign a petition here
b. You can follow this link to Amnesty International UK and send e-mails directly to the Iranian Head of Judiciary and Judiciary Spokesperson.
c. You can follow updates on Delara's case here and here
d. If you are in or near London you can attend the demonstration at the Iranian Embassy organized by Amnesty International
e. You can send e-mails directly to Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khamenei here and to President Mahmoud AhmadiNejad here
Please make sure your letters are polite and respectful, since they could otherwise jeopardize efforts to save Delara. Address the recipients as sensible government leaders who are open to reconsideration of the death sentence.
f. Contact newspapers, TV-channels, blogs and other media and ask them to report this story. US residents can contact local or national media via NOW.org
· Write about Delara in your own blog, homepage, or in internet forums or chat rooms you frequent.
· Contact politicians and government representatives in your country or your embassy in Tehran and ask them to pressure Iran in this case.
There is no time to waste. I truly hope that we can help save that girl from such a horrible fate.
Inara Couto, São Paulo, Brazil
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i did it; and i hate to be a pessimist, but i doubt it will do anything because, as The Offspring put it, "shit is fucked up"...
I tried to send the email through the amnesty international UK site but it kept taking me to a page saying that that page was no longer there when I tried to send it. However, I did sign the petition and send the emails to the email addresses listed in your letter e.
This breaks my heart. It's tommorrow??? And this case has been going on for six years? Where was all of this activism six years ago, when it actually could have made a difference??? What hanging will we be hearing about 5 or 6 years from today?
I heard about Delara for the first time last Friday through a Brazilian news website. Since then I have been contacting as many people as possible who can sign the petition and/or take any other action through one of the channels listed above.
I've also been contacting international media such as the New York Times and The Guardian, which, unlike the Italian press, for instance, are giving no coverage to this story.
If you are interested in taking further action against the execution of minors in Iran you can access http://www.stopchildexecutions.com/