Yousef Nadarkhani story: true or hoax?

[lonelocust]

A (Christian) cousin of mine posted about an alleged Christian preacher named Yousef Nadarkhani who had been sentenced to death in Iran for not renouncing Christianity. The link this friend pointed to was for an e-petition asking that he be spared or some sort. Quite aside from the fact that e-petitions are generally useless, I would of course support such a cause in the name of religious freedom. I just wondered if the story were true as I hadn't heard of it in my millions of blogs that touch on these subjects.

I searched, and found a lot of stories on google news. But they were ALL on Christian religion-based news sites. Does anyone know if this story is true? It seems like the sort of thing the mainstream news would report on, especially in the US, with its rampant Islamaphobia and mainstream embracing of Christianity.

 

[Welshidiot]

I searched, I found this article by David Allen Green, but it has to be admitted that he sites as a source an organisation called Christian Solidarity Worldwide.
He also wrote this other article, which seems to show no religious bias.

I'm not sure about Yousef Nadarkhani, but The New Statesman is a respected publication, and David Allen Green appears to be a journalist with integrity.

I'll keep searching.


EDIT: I just found this Amnesty International report, Yousef Nadarkhani is mentioned on page 7.

 

[Prolescum]

They've just (moments ago) had a long segment on this case on BBC Radio 4's PM news programme. The dude is, according to the Iranian courts, guilty of apostasy. What seems rather odd is that it was said Iran doesn't apply the death penalty for apostasy. The Archbishop of Canterbury and other Christian leaders have been talking to the Iranian government, so it's definitely genuine.

 

[RichardMNixon]

His wikipedia page is nearly a year old.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youcef_Nadarkhani

 

[Aught3]

I saw this on Richard Dawkins' site. Probably legit.