In a unanimous ruling, the law lords ordered the director of public prosecutions to immediately draw up a policy that would spell out when prosecutions would and would not be pursued.
The authorities have shown little sign of leniency since the ship's seizure, despite an international campaign by Greenpeace to draw attention to the prosecutions and even an appeal from Italy's oil giant Eni, a partner of Gazprom, to show clemency for the crew, which includes an Italian, Cristian D'Alessandro.
There is a growing international movement to draw attention to the increasing prosecution and repression of artists, film makers, journalists and academics in Iran.
"The prosecution views this as an effort by the defense to draw out the trial," Mr. Ryaznichenko said.
In the weeks since the Stevens prosecution was dropped over similar issues, Mr. Siegelman's team has made efforts to draw parallels between the two cases.
MOSCOW — Thousands of people turned out Monday for a protest here that was intended to draw attention to what organizers said was the return of political prosecutions in the Russian courts.
The prosecution's case appears to centre on electronic fingerprints left by phones, and is not expected to draw heavily on witnesses.
Fearing a boycott, it helped to draw up industry rules to stop the trade in "conflict diamonds" that has paid for many of Africa's wars.In this section The case against the prosecution A Sovereign remedy?
The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, urged the government to draw up an urgent action plan to tackle the problem after there was a 65% increase in reported child abuse images but a 9% drop in prosecutions for child sex offences.
Kheel aims to draw attention to the amount athletes, playing at the highest levels of their sports, are smoking marijuana and being subjected to game suspensions, and in some cases, even criminal prosecution.
