Iran's judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi ordered a full investigation into the case of a U.S.-Iranian reporter, the official IRNA news agency reported on Monday.

The judiciary chief, in an order to the chief of Tehran's Administration of Justice Ali Reza Avaiee, has asked him to make a careful, speedy and just investigation into different dimensions of the case of Roxana Saberi during her appeal, Ali Reza Jamshidi, the spokesman of the judiciary said.

On Sunday, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called on the judiciary to respect the jailed U.S.-Iranian reporter's rights.

In a letter issued by Ahmadinejad's office to Tehran's prosecutor, Ahmadinejad asked the judiciary to preserve justice in considering the accusations directed against the U.S.-Iranian journalist.

Iran's revolutionary court sentenced the U.S.-Iranian journalist to eight years in jail on charges of espionage, her lawyer Abdolsamad Khorramshahi said on Saturday.

"According to Iran's law, an appeal can be made against the verdict within 20 days and I will act on this in due course," Khorramshahi was quoted by IRNA.

Saberi, 31-year-old, was arrested in the second half of January 2009, on charges of espionage for the United States.

(Xinhua News Agency April 20, 2009)