PM protests over Afghan death sentence

The New Zealand Government has protested to Afghanistan over the death sentence handed down for a Afghan journalism student.

Sayed Parweiz Kambakhsh was sentenced to death last month for distributing a report considered to be blasphemous and offensive to Islam.

"We are deeply concerned by the sentence passed on this young man for exercising freedom of speech," Prime Minister Helen Clark said this morning.

"Mr Kambakhsh's detention and trial have been marked by a number of irregularities, including the fact he had no legal counsel."

Miss Clark said the New Zealand ambassador in Tehran had made representations to the Afghanistan government.

The student had used a report on women's rights in Islam during lectures at Balkh University in Mazar-i-Sharif in northern Afghanistan.

He is appealing the sentence and his case has been taken up by the United States and Britain.

- NZPA