TEHRAN (AFP) — Iran has ordered a new trial over the killing of Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi in a Tehran prison four years ago after finding faults in the original case, the judiciary said on Tuesday.
The Iranian supreme court found while reviewing an appeal that the original court was not competent to deal with the case, judiciary spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi told reporters.
"The case has been returned to a competent court which, God willing, will investigate the case and take the final decision," he said.
Lawyers for Kazemi's family have long demanded a fresh probe into what they allege was her "intentional murder" in custody following her arrest for photographing a protest outside Tehran's notorious Evin prison in June 2003.
The family's Canadian lawyer John Terry gave a cool welcome to the announcement of a retrial in the case after repeated disappointments in the past.
"We are, not surprisingly, extremely skeptical," he said after speaking with Kazemi's son Stephan Hachemi.
"It looks like more of the same and we don't have any indication that the Iranian judiciary is going to seriously investigate the death of Zahra Kazemi."
However, if the Iranian judiciary reached out and asked both Ottawa and Kazemi's family to be involved in the new trial, "that might affect our view," he added.
Jamshidi's announcement appears to indicate the supreme court has found the Tehran local court that originally heard the case was too junior and will refer it to a higher criminal court for the retrial.
The decision is the latest episode in the long and painful history of a case which has hugely strained relations between Iran and Canada.
In November 2005, the Iranian judiciary acquitted intelligence agent Mohammad Reza Aghdam Ahmadi who was initially accused of the crime, and ordered a new probe because of the "shortcomings in the investigations."
The Kazemi family's legal team had also argued that Aghdam Ahmadi was a lowly scapegoat who was covering up for the guilt of a higher-ranking official.
The lawyers alleged in court that a senior justice official in Evin prison, Mohammad Bakhshi, killed her, and also accused Tehran's feared public prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi of involvement.
Aghdam Ahmadi was acquitted by a Tehran tribunal on July 24, 2004 -- a decision that was confirmed by the judiciary in November 2005.
The supreme court's decision represents the final confirmation of the invalidity of the previous procedure and the first time the order has been given for a completely new trial.
Iran's former reformist government acknowledged that Kazemi, who was 54, was violently beaten in prison, but the judiciary initially claimed she died of a stroke and went on to say she had been injured in a fall.
Between her arrest and her admission to hospital where she died of a brain haemorrhage, Kazemi was interrogated by rival power centres -- judicial prosecutors, the police and then the intelligence ministry.
The judiciary rejected Canada's request for Kazemi's body -- which was hastily buried in Iran after her death -- to be exhumed and handed over for a new post-mortem.
Iran, which does not recognise dual nationality, insists it is an internal affair and has asked Canada and the international community not to intervene.
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