Iran's most popular woman politician went on trial in a Revolutionary Court yesterday, a day after the prosecutor said he was seeking a possible death penalty for a co-defendant.
Jamileh Kadivar, the number two vote-getter in this year's parliamentary elections, faces charges of violating state security and insulting Islam for her part in a conference in Berlin in April on the future of Iran's reform movement.
A senior judicial official later denied reports that the court had indicted a German, identified as Thomas Hartmann, for organising the conference, Iran's news agency IRNA reported.
The official's remarks came after Germany's Foreign Ministry summoned Iran's ambassador in Berlin over the case, in which a translator of the German embassy in Tehran has been charged.
Also in the dock with Kadivar - second only to President Mohammad Khatami's brother in the polls, with 1.37 million votes - were student leader Ali Afshari and authors Mahmoud Dowlatabadi and Mohammad Ali Sepanlou.
"The conference was held with the aim of changing Iran's system of religious government, insulting the sanctities, and rejecting Islamic judgments," Ahmad Sharifi, acting prosecutor, told the court.
Kadivar told the court she had checked with the Foreign Ministry and security services before attending the event. "Participating in conferences is not a crime, and if going to the Berlin conference was to be constituted as such, then the Intelligence Ministry should have barred us from going. "I do not accept any of these accusations. I expect to be found innocent and my name cleared," said Kadivar, as her husband, Minister of Culture Ataollah Mohajerani, looked on.
Seventeen people, including newspaper editors and lawyers, face trial in the case that has dealt a heavy blow to reformers. The Berlin conference was organised in April by the Heinrich Boell Foundation to assess Iran's parliamentary elections, which saw the defeat of hardline conservatives.
Held in the euphoria that swept the reformist movement after the February polls, the conference and its aftermath soon dissolved into a show of strength by the hardline establishment, which still controls the judiciary and other levers of power.
Iranian exile groups opposed to Iran's Islamic system disrupted the conference in a bid to discredit the reform movement. One man stripped naked in protest, while a woman in short sleeves danced, in violation of Iran's Islamic norms.
Conservatives pounced on the ensuing scandal, repeatedly broadcasting videos of the event on television to embarrass the reform movement grouped around President Khatami. Participants say they boycotted sessions in protest at the disruptions or vigorously defended Iran and the Islamic system.
But participants were arrested on their return. Hassan Yousefi-Eshkevari, the only cleric among them, has already been convicted but his sentence has been kept secret, pending appeal.
The case threatens to damage Iran's ties with Germany, a key trade partner, which had begun to warm after years of friction. Authorities have said they would charge the German embassy translator, Saeed Sadr, with "waging war on God", a charge which could carry a death penalty under Iran's Islamic laws.
IRNA had on Monday quoted an unnamed "reliable source" as saying the court had also indicted Hartmann, and four Iranians living abroad for allegedly helping organise the conference.
Yousefi-Eshkevari, who has advocated greater pluralism and tolerance, was triedlast month by a separate clerical court on charges including apostasy, spreading corruption on Earth and waging war against God. All three carry the death penalty.