“The verdict regarding the extramarital affairs has stopped and it’s being reviewed,” foreign ministry Ramin Mehmanparast told Iran’s state-run English-language Press TV. The statement came a day after European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso called the sentence “barbaric beyond words”.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani was convicted of adultery — a capital crime in the Islamic Republic — in 2006. She also has been charged with involvement in her husband’s murder. In an interview, Mehmanparast said the charge was “being investigated for the final verdict”.