KEY POINTS:
The Iranian hunger striker released on bail yesterday was admitted to hospital overnight.
Ali Reza Panah was taken to Auckland City Hospital because of problems eating following his 53-days without food, his supporters said.
Rev Sperring told Radio New Zealand Mr Panah "had a very bad night" and
was in a lot of pain.
"He didn't want to come back into hospital but eventually, at about 6am, he was in such terrible pain that we called an ambulance."
Rev Sperring is currently paying all medical and living costs for Mr Panah, but is confident of his parish's support and ultimately that of the wider Christian community.
Already a new lawyer has come forward and offered to take up the case free of charge.
Mr Panah was taken to Auckland Hospital where he is undergoing a battery of tests.
"Hopefully they'll be able to give him some pain relief and help him get back to eating again," Rev Sperring said.
"They don't know whether it is his liver or his heart, but there is something seriously wrong at the moment."
Only one Iranian Christian now remains in an Auckland jail after the Government yesterday bowed to the risks of Mr Panah dying in custody, releasinng him on bail indefinitely.
Mr Panah, 40, was released on condition that he stays with Orakei Anglican vicar Clive Sperring, is subject to a curfew from 10pm to 8am and "resumes a normal diet under medical supervision".
He remains subject to an order removing him from New Zealand, but will stay on bail indefinitely until Immigration New Zealand obtains a passport or travel document for him to return to Iran.
He and two other Iranian Christians, Thomas Yadegary and Amir Mohebbi, have been held in Auckland Central Remand Prison for 30 and 44 months respectively because Iran refuses to accept its citizens being repatriated unless they sign applications for a passport or travel documents.
Mr Yadegary was released on bail at Easter after the High Court ruled that it was unreasonable to keep him in jail after 30 months, because he had an unblemished record, had made a contribution to the community and did not pose any risk to society.
The High Court heard a similar appeal for Mr Mohebbi on August 23 and its judgment is expected soon.
Mr Panah, 40, who has not eaten for 53 days, sat in a wheelchair with his head lying to one side during the brief court hearing in the North Shore District Court yesterday.
He said afterwards that he would eat or fast as Jesus directed.
Clutching a Bible and a Bible study booklet, he said: "I'm never alone because He is always with me. I can stay in the fasting if He wants me to stay in the fasting."
His lawyer, Grant Illingworth, QC, said Mr Panah had agreed to resume eating. Mr Illingworth drove him from the court to a doctor, where Mr Sperring picked him up.
Labour Department lawyer Shona Carr told the court the department now accepted that "exceptional circumstances" justified Mr Panah's bail. These were:
* His health.
* A proposed change to the Immigration Act that would impose a six-month limit on the time that any asylum-seeker could be detained pending deportation unless a judge wassatisfied that the person was being detained by his or her own action orinaction.
* Ongoing negotiations with Iranto get it to accept its citizens without signed applications for traveldocuments.
* The length of his detention - currently 18 months.
Immigration Minister David Cunliffe said the Government had proposed the terms and conditions of Mr Panah's release in what was a "unique" case.
He emphasised the costs of looking after Mr Panah, including his medical care, would be paid by the Anglican Church, not the taxpayer.
What happens to Mr Panah now is unclear. The Government will continue negotiations with the Iranian Government to try to cut through the issue of Mr Panah needing to sign a document before he is deported.
Mr Panah could also potentially have a successful appeal and be granted refugee status, or he could mount a successful appeal for ministerial discretion on his case, said Mr Cunliffe.
Mr Mohebbi's lawyer, Isabel Chorao, said her client, aged 34, had been in jail more than twice as long as Mr Panah - three years and nine months, believed to be a record for any asylum-seeker held on remand in this country.
A District Court judge declined to follow the Yadegary precedent in his case because Mr Mohebbi had previous convictions for bigamy and breaching a protection order granted to his former wife, an Iranian with NZ citizenship whom he married in New Zealand a year or two after arriving here in 1997.
Panels didn't believe Panah
Immigration Minister David Cunliffe says Iranian hunger striker Ali Panah has been through every legal avenue to stay in New Zealand and has failed each time.
His humanitarian circumstances have been given a "full and fair" hearing through multiple appeals to independent bodies, the minister says, but one rejected his evidence as implausible and another suggested Mr Panah was not credible.
"However, this is a unique case as Mr Panah's state of health has reached such a parlous state that in our view intervention is required," Mr Cunliffe said yesterday.
In a June 2004 decision, the Refugee Status Appeals Authority said he:
* Supplied a baptism certificate from a church in Korea in November 2000, despite claiming that he was not baptised until he arrived in New Zealand in May 2002.
* Claimed that Iranian authorities intercepted a parcel that he sent to his mother with a video of his adoption into the church in Korea in April 2001, putting his mother apparently at risk from the authorities, yet he continued to send further material about his conversion to his mother after that date.
* Claimed that the authorities finally visited his mother's home and briefly arrested his brother eight or nine weeks after intercepting the first parcel - coincidentally just a week after Mr Panah returned to Iran to see his mother because she was ill.
* Claimed initially that he did not contact his mother for 30 days after hearing that she was unwell, then claimed under questioning that he did ring but no one was home.
Eighteen months after the appeal authority rejected his first application, Mr Panah applied for refugee status again on the grounds that he had been sentenced to death for blasphemy by an Islamic court in Tehran in March 2005 and that a cousin had threatened to kill him if he returned to Iran.
The appeal authority refused to believe these claims, noting that he had failed to mention either the death sentence or his cousin's threat while his previous case was being appealed.
It also concluded that documents purporting to show the death sentence were not genuine.
- with NEWSTALK ZB, NZPA
