Iran women activist gets suspended jail sentence

TEHRAN (Reuters) - A prominent Iranian women's rights activist said on Monday she had received a two-year suspended jail sentence, the latest such punishment for a campaigner in favor of greater female rights in the Islamic Republic.

Parvin Ardalan, who said in March she was barred from leaving Tehran to accept a Swedish human rights award, said a branch of Iran's Revolutionary Court last week announced the sentence for her role in a gathering by activists last year.

She said this was her second sentence, following a partly suspended three-year jail term for involvement in another banned demonstration in 2006.

"Many women activists have this kind of (suspended) sentence. Some...don't do anything, some of them are very quiet, very careful about what they do," the 41-year-old journalist said.

Western diplomats see the detention of women activists in Iran as part of a wider crackdown on dissent, which they say may be in response to international pressure over Iran's nuclear work. Iran rejects accusations it wants to build an atomic bomb.

The women activists say they face institutionalized discrimination that makes them second-class citizens in divorce, inheritance, child custody and other aspects of life.

Iran rejects accusations it discriminates against women, who are legally entitled to hold most jobs and can also vote.

Clerics say women in Iran are protected from the sex symbol status they have in the West and that the country is implementing what it calls God's divine law.

Ardalan was the fifth campaigner to receive a suspended sentence over the incident in March 2007, when about 30 activists gathered outside a court to show solidarity with her and four others on trial inside.

She said she was detained when she went outside to defend fellow activists against police arresting them.

Those detained were charged with taking part in an illegal gathering and collusion with the intent to disrupt national security, disruption of public order and refusal to follow police orders, another rights campaigner said late last month.

Ardalan said she was told about her sentence when she went to the court to ask about her passport, which was seized by police two months ago as she was about to fly to Stockholm to receive a $75,000 human rights award, the Olof Palme Prize.

She is a leading figure in a campaign to collect 1 million signatures in favor of more women's rights in Iran.

Activists say many of them have been detained since the drive began in 2006. Most were freed within a few days or weeks.

(Editing by Ralph Boulton)