Death sentence on German friend of Muslim woman is upheld by Iranian court

A 57-year-old German businessman who fell in love with a younger Iranian woman was yesterday facing death by hanging after a Tehran court upheld a conviction against him for unlawful sexual relations with a Muslim woman. Germany warned that its relations with Iran would be seriously damaged if the sentence, which was passed in February, is carried out.

Mr Helmut Hofer was arrested stepping off a plane at Tehran airport in September last year, after religious police questioned a woman who was waiting to meet him there. Ms Vahideh Ghassemi (27) had attracted police attention because her headscarf was tied more loosely than they deemed appropriate. Mr Hofer admits that he fell in love with the woman but insists that the couple never had sex and only kissed once.

Ms Ghassemi, who is a medical student, insists that they slept together a number of times after they met in the eastern Iranian city of Mesched, where Mr Hofer was trading in dried fruits. She also maintains that the German businessman promised to marry her.

German newspapers claimed that the woman, who was sentenced to 99 lashes, had undergone three medical tests, two of which found that she was still a virgin. They also suggested that Mr Hofer's conviction was invalid under Islamic law because the alleged offence had not been witnessed by at least four people.

Mr Hofer, who married a Turkish woman four years ago, has since claimed that he converted to Islam after his marriage. He says he would be willing to marry Ms Ghassemi in order to regularise their relationship.

Germany's relations with Iran have been improving steadily since last April when Bonn led the European Union in withdrawing its ambassador from Tehran. The reason for that diplomatic standoff was a court ruling in Berlin which established that the Iranian authorities ordered the murder of four Iranian dissidents in the city in 1992.

Bonn hoped to resume its policy of "critical dialogue" with Iran and to encourage reformers around President Mohammed Khatami. German diplomats see the decision to uphold the death sentence against Mr Hofer as an attempt by Iranian hardliners to sour relations between Tehran and Germany's new centre-left government.

An acquittal would have been seen as a gesture of goodwill towards the incoming German chancellor, Mr Gerhard Schroder. Reformers hope that Mr Schroder will strike off some of Iran's debts to Germany, thus helping President Khatami to achieve the economic success he needs to shore up his political position.

The German government was shocked by the decision to uphold the sentence against Mr Hofer, as was the businessman's Iranian lawyer, Mr Malek-Hushang Ghahari. "We were expecting an acquittal with 100 per cent certainty. I am totally shocked," he said.

Mr Ghahari added that Iran's Supreme Court could yet overturn the verdict but he is bitterly disappointed that Mr Hofer's ordeal has not yet come to an end. "I don't want to imagine how he took the verdict," he said.

An agreement between the British and Iranian governments lifting the threat of a Tehran-sponsored assassination of British writer Salman Rushdie still stands, London insisted yesterday, despite an Iranian foundation increasing the bounty on Rushdie's head to $2.8 million. Iranian newspapers reported that the Khordad-15 foundation had offered an extra $300,000 for the execution of the 1989 fatwa issued by the late Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, against Rushdie for his book, The Satanic Verses.

A Foreign Office spokesman insisted there was no indication the threat "is in any way supported by the Iranian authorities ".

The last three bodies of Iranian diplomats killed by Afghan Taleban militiamen were flown home on Sunday. The diplomats were killed by fighters who seized the Iranian consulate in the Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif in August. The bodies of seven other Iranians killed by the militia were repatriated last month.