"We can say I worked as shepherd," he smiles. "I was in charge of a herd of goats in northern Morocco." Until he crossed the Straits and settled in the province of Tarragona. Unemployed, handicapped by the lack of training and a chronic disease for many years improvised direction of prayers in several mosques in the vicinity of Valls and Torredembarra. Rachid H. worked as an imam. "Not really, but I know Islam better than others", said after admitting that no studies that Muslim countries call for the task.

What kind of prayers were performed by this improvised imam? "I talked about everything: the relationship between men and women, life's problems," he says. Witnesses say those prayers castigated women and young Muslims who were related to people outside this belief. Rachid denies without elaborating. But at home, he stores magazines, recordings and videos that shed some clue to his speeches. The material supports that an adulterous wife should be punished with death and supports other repressive behaviors on the role of women relative to men, according to the report of the register details of the property conducted by the Autonomous Police in 2009. Rachid, who asked not to reveal his name for his legal situation, only occasionally leads prayers, due to his poor state of health and also because he is on probation after being charged with promoting violence linked to radical Salafism, Islam's ultra-conservative current.

Image by • Bruce via Flickr

European parliament vice-president Roberta Angelilli intends to help organise a Italian and European networks of women in support of an Iranian woman death-by-stoning has been suspended.

"We decided to build a network of women for Sakineh," Angelilli told Adnkronos International (AKI) in an interview on Friday. "It would be a bipartisan grouping of diverse political interests on the European and national level.

"All politicians would be involved to keep interest going in this case and to try to bring forward a motion by the European Parliament that would guard the rights of women and all the people in Iran."

AKI's newly launched 'Flowers not Stones!' campaign aims to save the life of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, 43, a mother of two who has been sentenced to death by stoning for adultery and helping kill her husband.