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Tag: Iran

  • In the third week of unrest  protesters gather across Iran following Amini’s demise

    As protests against the murder of a woman in police custody reached their third week, demonstrators protested all throughout Iran on Saturday, and strikes were reported all over the country’s Kurdish region.

    The protests, sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old from Iranian Kurdistan, have spiralled into the biggest show of opposition to Iran’s clerical authorities since 2019, with dozens killed in unrest across the country.

    People demonstrated in London and Paris and elsewhere on Saturday in solidarity with Iranian protesters, some holding pictures of Amini, who died three days after being arrested by the Islamic Republic’s morality police for “unsuitable attire”.

    In Iran, social media posts showed rallies in large cities including Tehran, Isfahan, Rasht, and Shiraz.

    In Tehran’s traditional business district of Bazaar, anti-government protesters chanted “We will be killed one by one if we don’t unite”, while elsewhere they blocked the main road with a fence torn from the central reservation, videos shared by the widely followed Tavsir1500 Twitter account showed.

    Students also demonstrated at numerous universities. At Tehran University, dozens were detained, Tavsir1500 said. The semi-official Fars news agency said some protesters were arrested in a square near the university.

    Tavsir1500 also posted what it said was a video taken at the gates of Isfahan University during which shots could be heard. A separate video showed tear gas being fired at the university, dispersing a group of people.

    The protests began at Amini’s funeral on Sept. 17 and spread to Iran’s 31 provinces, with all layers of society, including ethnic and religious minorities, taking part and many demanding Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s downfall.

    Amnesty International has said a government crackdown on demonstrations has so far led to the death of at least 52 people, with hundreds injured. Rights groups say dozens of activists, students and artists have been detained.

    In London, about 2,500 people staged a noisy protest in Trafalgar Square. Few women among the mostly Iranian crowd agreed to be interviewed on camera, fearful of identification and reprisals by the authorities.

    In central Paris, a crowd of several dozen people gathered to show support for Iranian protesters, holding Iranian flags and pictures of victims who have died in the protests.

    Iran’s battered currency approached historic lows reached in June as desperate Iranians bought dollars to protect their savings amid little hope Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers would be revived and concerns over the economic consequences of the unrest.

    The rial fell to 331,200 per U.S. dollar, compared to 321,200 on Friday, according to the foreign exchange site Bonbast.com. The currency had plummeted to an all-time low of 332,000 per dollar on June 12.

    ATTACK IN ZAHEDAN

    Iranian authorities say many members of the security forces have been killed, accusing the United States of exploiting the unrest to try to destabilise Iran.

    The Revolutionary Guards said four members of its forces and the volunteer Basij militia were killed on Friday in attacks in Zahedan, the capital of the southeastern Sistan-Baluchistan province.

    State television had said on Friday that 19 people, including members of the security forces, had been killed in Zahedan after unidentified individuals opened fire on a police station, prompting security forces to return fire.

    Guards Commander-in-Chief Hossein Salami vowed revenge, calling the dead “martyrs of Black Friday”.

    A lawmaker from Zahedan said security had been restored to the city on Saturday, a semi-official news agency reported.

    Authorities blamed a separatist group from the Baluchi minority for starting the shootout in Zahedan. State media said two prominent militants linked to that group had been killed.

    IRNA posted a video showing destroyed cars, an overturned and burning trailer or bus, and fires in burnt-out buildings and shops, describing it as footage of “what the terrorists did to people’s shops last night in Zahedan”.

    Reuters could not verify the footage.

    Protests have been particularly intense in Iran’s Kurdistan region, where authorities have previously put down unrest by the Kurdish minority numbering up to 10 million.

    Fearing an ethnic uprising, and in a show of power, Iran fired missiles and flew drones to attack targets in neighbouring northern Iraq’s Kurdish region this week after accusing Iranian Kurdish dissidents of being involved in the unrest.

    Shops and businesses were on strike in 20 northwestern cities and towns on Saturday in protest against attacks on Iraq-based armed Kurdish opposition parties by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the Kurdish rights group Hengaw reported.

    It also said security forces had fired at protesters in Dehgolan and Saqez, Amini’s hometown.

  • Pakistan establishes a hotline for transgender harassment

    The move comes as the government faces opposition from conservative clerics to an amendment allowing people to choose their own gender.

    Pakistan has launched a hotline for transgender people in an effort to protect them from discrimination and harassment.

    Salman Sufi, an adviser to Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, revealed on Twitter that the hotline was live and ready to receive calls.

    The calls would be directed to top police officers and the Ministry of Human Rights.

    Almas Bobby, a spokesperson for the Pakistani trans community, said trans people were “glad” the hotline had been set up but still expressed some frustration.

    She said that in most instances of harassment, trans-Pakistanis are either beaten, harangued, or publicly arrested by the police.

    She added: “How can we call on this hotline when our phones are snatched? When we are arrested like a robber from wedding parties where we have to perform and earn?

    “Who harasses us the most? Yes, indeed, the police. And we will have to call the police to seek justice.”

    She estimates there are about 10,000 trans people living in Pakistan.

    The hotline has been announced as the Pakistani government attempts to pass an amendment to a 2018 transgender rights bill to allow people to choose their gender identity for documents such as identity cards and education certificates.

     

     

  • Iran hijab protests: TikToker Hadis Najafi, 23, shot dead

    Hadis Najafi took to the streets of Karaj last week in protest at Iran’s hijab mandate and was shot dead. She was not openly outspoken about women’s liberation but enjoyed sharing her life with her followers on social media.

    She was not an activist or openly outspoken online about women’s liberation, but she was still gunned down in her home city campaigning for her right to live and dress how she wanted.

    Hadis Najafi, 23, took to the streets of Karaj last week to speak out against Iran’s strict hijab mandateand was shot dead.

    Her death has fuelled further anger in a country already reckoning with the strict rule of the so-called morality police.

    Part of Iran’s Generation Z, Hadis was a young woman who grew up in the age of the internet and social media.

    Like Zoomers everywhere, these digital natives are connected to the rest of the world in a way their parents could never have imagined.

    Hopes for a better future

    An avid user of TikTok and Instagram, Hadis enjoyed sharing her life with her followers on social media.

    She was not openly outspoken about women’s liberation, but she posted videos on her TikTok account dancing to the latest viral trend, including to pop music and Iranian singers.

    Her social media would not have looked out of place anywhere in the world. Smiling and pouting at the camera, she danced around her room in bright clothing.

    She worked as a cashier at a restaurant and loved sharing fashion on her Instagram, styling her hair both with and without her hijab – but only in the safety of her home or other private places.

    Hijabs are mandatory in public for all women in Iran, regardless of religion or nationality.

    A close friend described her as “always happy and energetic”.

    But then violence erupted after another young woman, Mahsa Amini, 22, died in police custody on 16 September. She had been detained, allegedly, for wearing her hijab too loosely.

    Outcry over her death has boiled over into some of the biggest protests in the country for years and the anger of a generation of women who had grown used to freedom online poured out on to the streets.

    Women removed their head coverings and burnt them as others recorded the scenes on mobile phones, uploading them to social media where they have been shared worldwide.

    To make it difficult for protesters, the authorities have restricted internet access in several provinces, according to internet blockage observatory NetBlocks.

    Sky News spoke to one of Hadis’s close friends on Instagram and asked if she had been scared when she set off on 21 September.

    “Several nurses… told her family to run, because Hadis had been at the protests so they might also be targeted if the police came,” her friend said.

    “The husband of one of Hadis’s sisters works for the Basij [an Iranian paramilitary volunteer militia], so they let him go into the mortuary to do the formal identification. Only him.

    “They didn’t let her family see her.”

    After two days, the family agreed with authorities not to have a public funeral: “What I tell you now comes from her family,” Hadis’s friend said.

     

    View this post on Instagram

     

    A post shared by HADIS NAJAFI (@hadisnajafi78)

    “On Friday morning they let her crying mother and sisters see her face, to make sure they were burying the right person. There wasn’t a real funeral because of the agreement.

    “After she was buried, her sisters Afsoon and Shirin decided to publish her photos and tell people she was shot. The authorities didn’t want people to say she was shot, they were told to say she’d died in a car crash, or a brain injury, that she’d died a natural death.”

    Masked forces shoot directly at protesters

    Ebrahim Raisi, the Iranian president, has vowed to investigate Ms Amini’s death but said that the authorities would not tolerate any threats to public security.

    He said protesters should be “dealt with decisively” and the subsequent crackdown by authorities has been swift, brutal, and violent.

    On 21 September, the footage was first shared online of masked men shooting directly and from close range at protesters on Eram Boulevard, where her friend said Hadis was last seen alive.

    The location of this clip was verified by Sky News by cross-referencing the car dealership in the background with images of the street shared on Google Maps.

    iran osint

    Although Hadis is not in this clip it indicates it is not the only time Iranian police have been accused of using excessive force on protesters.

    And Hadis is not the only woman to have been killed. The names of at least four other women alleged to have died in the protests have gone viral in the past week.

     

  • Iran protests: Death toll rises to 76 as crackdown intensifies – Rights group

    At least 76 protesters have been killed by Iranian security forces during 11 days of unrest sparked by the death of a woman in custody, activists say.

    Iran Human Rights (IHR), a Norway-based organisation, accused authorities of using disproportionate force and live ammunition to suppress the dissent.

    State media have put the number of dead at 41, including several security personnel, and blamed “rioters”. Hundreds of people have also been arrested, 20 of them journalists. “The risk of torture and ill-treatment of protesters is serious and the use of live ammunition against protesters is an international crime,” said.

    IHR’s director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam. “The world must defend the Iranian people’s demands for their fundamental rights.” The UN human rights office also said it was very concerned by the authorities’ violent response and urged them to respect the right to protest peacefully.

    How Mahsa Amini became a symbol of defiance in Iran The anti-government demonstrations have spread to more than 80 cities and towns across Iran since the funeral of Mahsa Amini on 17 September.

    The 22-year-old Kurdish woman from the north-western city of Saqez had been visiting the capital, Tehran, on 13 September when she was arrested by morality police officers for allegedly violating the strict law requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab, or headscarf.

    She collapsed after being taken to a detention centre to be “educated” and died in hospital following three days in a coma. The police said Ms Amini died after suffering sudden heart failure, but her family have dismissed that and
    alleged that she was beaten by officers.

    Iranian morality officer: Why we tell women what to wear the protests against the morality police and hijab law triggered by her death quickly evolved into the most serious challenge that Iran’s Shia Muslim clerical establishment has faced in years.

    Videos posted on social media have shown women defiantly burning their headscarves on bonfires and cutting their hair in public to cheers and chants of “Women, life, freedom” and “Death to the dictator” – a reference to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

    On Monday, protests were reported in Tehran and a number of other cities, including Yazd, in the centre of the country, and

    Tabriz and Sanandaj, in the north- west. Students and teachers at more than 20 universities also staged a strike and walked out of their classrooms.

    1px transparent line Iran Human Rights said it had recorded the deaths of 76 protesters across 14 provinces as of Monday, including six women and four children, although it warned that restrictions on the internet were causing delays in reporting.

    Thirty-five of the deaths were reported in Mazandaran and Gilan provinces, north of Tehran, and 24 in the Kurdish-populated, north-western provinces of West Azerbaijan, Kermanshah, Kurdistan and Ilam, it added.

    IHR said that videos and death certificates it had obtained confirmed that live ammunition was being fired directly by security forces at protesters – something Iranian authorities have denied.

    Iranian officials have also announced the arrests of more than 1,200 people. The US-based Committee to Protect Journalists demanded the release of at least 20 reporters and bloggers who had been detained, as well as human rights defenders, lawyers and civil society activists.

    “Iranian security forces must drop their repressive measures against the journalists telling this critical story and restore the internet access that is vital to keep the public informed,” the CPJ said.

    The BBC’s Kasra Naji says there are reports that the unrest has stretched the security forces to the limit, with the head of the judiciary seen in one video saying that riot police had been deployed “24 hours a day” and that “they did not sleep last night and the nights before”.

    There are also claims of serious doubts among security personnel about engaging with the protesters, our correspondent adds.

    The commander of the riot police in the capital was filmed telling his men not to hesitate and to fight the protesters, just as Iranians fought invading Iraqi forces in the 1980s.

    President Ebrahim Raisi has meanwhile spoken of the need
    to “take decisive action against opponents of the security and peace of the country”.

     

  • Iran President Raisi to ‘deal decisively’ with widespread unrest

    Iran’s president has vowed to take action against protesters after more than a week of anti-government demonstrations.

    President Ebrahim Raisi pledged to “deal decisively” with the protests, which have now spread to most of Iran’s 31 provinces.

    Officials say some 35 people have been killed since protests broke out over the death of a women in police custody.

    Mahsa Amini died after being detained for allegedly breaking headscarf rules.

    Officers reportedly beat Ms Amini’s head with a baton and banged her head against one of their vehicles. The police have said there is no evidence of any mistreatment and that she suffered “sudden heart failure”.

    And while Mr Raisi says her death will be investigated, his Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi has insisted that Ms Amini had not been beaten.

    “Reports from oversight bodies were received, witnesses were interviewed, videos were reviewed, forensic opinions were obtained and it was found that there had been no beating,” he said.

    Videos circulating on social media have captured violent unrest in dozens of cities across the country, with some showing security forces firing what appeared to be live ammunition on protesters in the north-western cities of Piranshahr, Mahabad and Urmia.

    Amnesty International has warned that evidence it gathered pointed to “a harrowing pattern of Iranian security forces deliberately and unlawfully firing live ammunition at protesters”.

    It added that government forces shot 19 people dead – including three children – on Wednesday night alone. The BBC cannot independently verify this.

    Mr Raisi has dismissed the protests as “riots”. Iran, he said, must “deal decisively with those who oppose the country’s security and tranquillity”.

    Hundreds of people have been detained by security forces, with the police chief in the north-western province of Guilan announcing on Saturday that some 739 people – including 60 women – have been detained in his region alone.

    Government forces have also launched a crackdown on independent media and activists. The US-based media watchdog the Committee to Protect Journalists says 11 journalists have been detained since Monday.

    In the western border town of Oshnavieh, sources told the BBC that demonstrators briefly took control of sections of the town from government forces.

    Locals told the BBC that demonstrators had seized control overnight and that security forces and government officials had fled, before regaining control on Saturday. Videos posted from the town showed large crowds of people marching through city streets with no police presence, while loud explosions could be heard.

    State media denied the reports, but said protesters had stormed three outposts of the Basji Organisation, a paramilitary associated with the government’s Revolutionary Guards.

    The US says it will ease internet curbs on Iran to counter Tehran’s clampdown on the protests, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken pledging to “help make sure the Iranian people are not kept isolated and in the dark”.

    Source: BBC

     

     

  • Iran unrest: What’s going on with Iran and the internet?

    Activists in Iran are expressing concern about widespread internet outages and residents being unable to access social media.

    Anger has circulated online after over a week of protests sparked by the death of a Kurdish woman in police custody.

    Internet monitoring group NetBlocks said Instagram and WhatsApp – two of the major communication tools that Iran usually allows – had been restricted.

    WhatsApp said it was working to keep Iranian users connected.

    The two Meta-owned apps have millions of Iranian users and have become increasingly popular after authorities blocked other platforms in recent years, including Facebook and Twitter.

    Telegram, YouTube and TikTok have also periodically been closed down.

    The latest intermittent blackouts follow the eruption of nationwide protests over Mahsa Amini’s death. The 22-year-old had been detained for allegedly failing to adhere to hijab (headscarf) rules.

    NetBlocks reported that the internet was partially reconnected on Thursday night but that on Friday it was suffering a “nation-scale loss of connectivity” again.

    “People in Iran are being cut off from online apps and services,” Instagram chief Adam Mosseri tweeted, adding that “we hope their right to be online will be reinstated quickly”.

    But others accused Meta of being complicit in disconnecting users.

    Meta has a team of Persian-speaking reviewers who look at and remove content that violates their rules.

    If a post that has broken Meta’s community standards has been reported by users or flagged by technology, it will be taken down.

    Some shared their evidence that content supporting the Iranian protests had been blocked by Meta.

    People also reported not being able to access their WhatsApp accounts even when trying to use a VPN and proxy.

    Ordinarily, website access is heavily restricted by government filters and only those with VPNs can access uncensored content from overseas websites. But this ban seems different.

    So what is really going on?

    The internet blackouts largely come from Iran’s biggest mobile phone operator being offline. Iran Mobile Communications Company has more than 60 million customers.

    Earlier in the week, the communications minister blamed security reasons for the disruption.

    But Isik Mater from NetBlocks told the BBC: “The internet is one of the biggest tools that the Iranian authorities have got in their hands when unrest breaks out on the streets.”

    She says because there is no private broadcast network in Iran, the internet is the “only place” where protesters can share their voice.

    Mahsa Amini
    IMAGE SOURCE,MAHSA AMINI FAMILY Image caption, Mahsa Amini died after she collapsed at a morality police detention centre

    Miss Amini’s death has unleashed anger over issues including personal freedoms and economic challenges in Iran.

    Protesters – many of whom are women who have been waving and burning their veils – say they fear an escalating crackdown.

    “We are worried that the world will forget about Iran as soon as the regime shuts down the internet – which is already happening,” one activist, who wanted to remain anonymous, said.

    Most of the protests and campaigns are organised by people over social media and if they cannot get connected then it becomes much more difficult to mobilise.

    Protesters block a street in Tehran
    IMAGE SOURCE,GETTY IMAGES Image caption, Protests over Mahsa Amini’s death have spread across Iran

    Shayan Sardarizadeh from the BBC’s disinformation unit said: “Shutting down internet connections nationwide is the nuclear option for Iranian authorities, only triggered when they fear protests are on a scale that pose an existential threat to the regime.

    “It is an effective tool that severely harms the ability of protesters to organise, communicate and inform the outside world, but it also carries a huge cost for the Iranian economy, businesses and public services.

    “However, Iranian authorities have shown time and again that when faced with a choice between a severe hit to the economy and cracking down on political unrest at any cost, they will always choose the latter.”

    Clamping down heavily on protesters and internet blackouts has worked to suppress people in Iran in the past.

    But fears are growing that the situation could escalate to something like 2019 protests that erupted over petrol price rises, the bloodiest in the Islamic republic’s history.

    During those protests, the internet was cut off for days at a time.

    Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has said protesting is allowed in the country but “rioting” will not be tolerated.

    “Protests have always happened in Iran. The protesters are heard. However, protests must be distinguished from rioting,” he said.

    Source: BBC

     

     

  • US to ease internet curbs for Iranians amid protest

    The US says it will ease internet curbs on Iran to counter Tehran’s clampdown on protests which were sparked by a woman’s death in police custody.

    “We are going to help make sure the Iranian people are not kept isolated and in the dark,” said US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken.

    The relaxation of software controls will allow American tech firms to expand their business in Iran.

    At least 35 people have been killed in the worst unrest in Iran for years.

    Mahsa Amini, 22, fell into a coma last week, hours after morality police arrested her for allegedly breaking headscarf rules.

    Officers reportedly beat Ms Amini’s head with a baton and banged her head against one of their vehicles. The police have said there is no evidence of any mistreatment and that she suffered “sudden heart failure”.

    Anti-government protests continued for an eight straight night on Friday, while pro-regime rallies also took place in Tehran and other cities.

    Mr Blinken said the partial relaxation of internet restrictions was a “concrete step to provide meaningful support to Iranians demanding that their basic rights be respected”. It was clear, he added, that the Iranian government was “afraid of its own people”.

    The US treasury said the move would help counter the Iranian government’s attempt to “surveil and censor” its people.

    But it is unlikely to have an immediate impact as it “does not remove every tool of communications repression”.

    Billionaire Elon Musk said on Twitter that he would activate his satellite internet firm, Starlink, to provide internet services to Iran in response to Mr Blinken’s announcement.

    Starlink provides internet services via a huge network of satellites and is aimed at people who live in remote areas who cannot get high-speed internet.

    US officials said that the updated license did not cover hardware supplied by Mr Musk but his firm and others were welcome to apply for permission to the treasury.

    Footage shared on social media on Friday showed large crowds of protesters gather in several Tehran neighbourhoods after dark, while other incidents occurred elsewhere the country. In the protests women have defiantly taken off their hijabs and burned them, or cut off their hair in front of cheering crowds.

    While spreading across much of the country, many of the early protests were concentrated in western Iran, particularly areas with large Kurdish populations, the group Ms Amini belonged to.

    On Friday, reports emerged from Oshnavieh, in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province, which borders Kurdistan, showing widespread protests, as well as suggestions demonstrators had taken control of large parts of the city. The BBC was unable to confirm this.

    Videos posted from Oshnavieh showed large crowds of people marching through city streets with no police presence, while loud explosions could be heard.

    Friday also saw pro-regime demonstrations in Tehran and other cities, with those present declaring support for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been a target of anti-government protesters.

    President Ebrahim Raisi spoke at a pro-government event, saying he would not allow the country’s security to be “threatened”.

    “We will not allow people’s security to be put at risk under any circumstances,” he said, shortly after returning from the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

    Stressing that Iran’s “enemies” wanted to exploit the unrest, Mr Raisi said the government would listen to criticism over Ms Amini’s death, but would not be influenced by “rioting”.

    Source: BBC

     

  • Iran is coping with its worst challenge in years

    The most significant challenge Iran’s leadership has faced in recent years is the outbreak of nationwide protests that followed the murder in police custody of a 22-year-old Kurdish woman held for allegedly breaking hijab (headscarf) laws.

    While authorities say Mahsa Amini died from underlying health reasons, her family and countless other Iranians believe she died as a result of having been beaten.

    Protesters say that if they don’t act now, they could fall victim to the same fate.

    It has come at a time when Iranians are feeling particularly fed up. Systematic corruption among Iran’s political elite, growing poverty with inflation at more than 50%, deadlock in nuclear talks, and lack of social and political freedom have left Iran’s young and vibrant population feeling hopeless.

    According to Iran’s Social Security Organization Research Institute, at least 25 million Iranians were living below the poverty line by June 2021. That number is even higher now.

    These are not the first protests in the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran. But many observers believe there is something different about them.

    More than anything, this is a woman’s protest.

    ‘Society has shifted’

    Civil liberties groups continually spotlight the suppression of women in Iran, an entire part of society who have been the biggest losers of the Islamic revolution of 1979.

    Iranian women were forced to wear hijabs (headscarves) soon after the revolution and have lost many of their rights, including the right to travel, the right to work, and the right to child custody over the age of seven. There was little objection to these changes from men at the time.

    “The fact that many men are joining the protests shows that the society has shifted to more progressive demands,” says Mehrdad Darvishpour, an Iranian sociologist based in Sweden.

    The main slogan of protesters is “Woman, Life, Freedom”, a call for equality and a stance against religious fundamentalism.

    Also, these protests are far more inclusive than the previous ones.

    The so-called Green Movement of 2009 saw the middle class protest against alleged election fraud. Although it was large in size, it centered on major cities. Other major protests in 2017 and 2019 were confined to poorer areas.

    But the current protests are now being reported in both middle-class and working-class areas. They seem to have moved from local or ethnic issues to more inclusive ones.

    “We are witnessing the birth of a mega-movement,” says Mr Darvishpour.

    A movement that was being led by women but has managed to bring other movements together. And more importantly, the symbolic value of burning hijabs, has cracked the image of an unbreakable regime.

    According to Mr Darvishpour, there is no going back from this experience.

    Government’s options

    The establishment is in a very difficult place. The death of Mahsa Amini has even shaken some of the hardcore supporters of the government.

    Many of them, including some clerics, are questioning the violent tactics that are being used by morality police against women.

    So, the government has two options: To change its strict hijab rules, which are part of the identity of the Islamic republic. But doing so may encourage protesters to continue until they reach their final demand for regime change.

    Or not to change anything and continue the violent crackdown and killing of protesters, which may briefly calm down the unrest but will only add fuel to their ever-growing anger.

    Many of the riot police that is now suppressing the protests are also suffering from economic difficulties and are not necessarily supportive of the establishment.

    If these protests continue they might switch sides.

    On top of that, the Supreme Leader’s 83 years of age and his ill health is on the mind of many Iranians on both sides.

    It’s unclear whether whoever succeeds him will be able to sustain the support of the regime’s hardcore supporters or not.

    This might not be the final chapter, but it is a very important one.

    Lives are being lost, but more cracks are appearing in a system that is no longer working for many angry Iranians who want a different way of life.

  • Ransomware-style hacking campaign: Three Iranian hackers charged

    In what officials described as a “ransomware-style” cyber campaign, the US Justice Department on Wednesday unsealed a criminal indictment charging three Iranian nationals of hacking the networks of hundreds of victims in the US and abroad.

    Although the indictment does not allege the hackers acted on behalf of the Iranian government, U.S. law enforcement agencies released a joint advisory warning about “continued malicious cyber activity” by actors affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, while the Treasury Department blacklisted bitcoin addresses tied to two of the defendants.

    The cybersecurity advisory was issued jointly by U.S., Australian, British, and Canadian law enforcement agencies.

    In a video statement, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the advisory underscored the “broader threat” posed by Iranian cyber actors.

    “To these sorts of actors, nothing is off limits, not even, for example, Boston Children’s Hospital, which they set their sights on in the summer of 2021,” Wray said in a video statement.

    The three Iranian nationals — identified as Mansour Ahmadi, Ahmad Khatibi Aghda, and Amir Hossein Nickaein Ravari — are accused of carrying out “computer intrusions and ransomware-style extortion” between October 2020 and August 2022, according to a 30-page indictment unsealed Wednesday.

    The men remain at large and are believed to be in Iran, according to U.S. law enforcement officials.

    The State Department’s Rewards for Justice Program announced a reward of up to $10 million for information about the three.

    Although the charging document does not accuse the Iranian government of sponsoring their activity, the Treasury Department said in a statement that all three defendants were affiliated with the IRGC, a branch of the Iranian military that operates a number of cyber threat actors tracked by the FBI.

    “These IRGC-affiliated actors are actively targeting a broad range of entities across multiple U.S. critical infrastructure sectors, as well as organizations in Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom,” a senior FBI official said during a background call with reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

    This is not the first time Iranian hackers have been charged in a broad cybercrime conspiracy. But the indictment comes as the Biden administration has mounted a whole-of-government effort over the past year to combat what is widely seen as a growing threat to U.S. national security: cybercriminals targeting critical infrastructure and services in what are known as “ransomware attacks.”

    In a ransomware attack, cybercriminals encrypt a victim’s computer files and then demand payments in cryptocurrency in exchange for decrypting them.

    U.S. law enforcement officials described the Iranian campaign of hacking and extortion as a “ransom-related cyberattack.”

    Among the victims were a New Jersey township, two accounting firms, two power companies, a housing authority in Washington state, and a domestic violence shelter in Pennsylvania.

    Wray said many of the victims of the hacking campaign “offer critical services we all rely on every day.”

    “I’m talking about health care facilities, power companies, local governments in communities across the United States and around the globe,” he said.

    In some cases, the hackers demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in payment, a Justice Department official said. Some victims made ransom payments. The domestic violence shelter paid $13,000 to restore access to its systems and data, according to the indictment.

    Law enforcement officials said the victims were “targets of opportunity,” identified because of vulnerabilities in their computer systems.

    In addition to targeting victims in the U.S., the hackers targeted companies and organizations in the United Kingdom, Iran, Israel, and Russia.

    “No form of cyberattack is acceptable, but ransomware attacks that target critical infrastructure services, such as health care facilities and government agencies, are a threat to our national security,” said U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger for the District of New Jersey.

  • Mahsa Amini: Women in Turkey protest death

    In an effort to draw attention to the death of Mahsa Amini, 22, while in the custody of the Tehran police on Wednesday, a group of Iranian residents of Istanbul and residents of Turkey assembled in front of the Iranian Consulate in Istanbul.

    The activity was observed from a distance by Istanbul police, who on Tuesday repeatedly dispersed groups assembled in Taksim Square.

    During the demonstration, at least three women cut their hair to protest the treatment of Amini, who was detained by Iran’s morality police because she didn’t wear her headscarf correctly and therefore her hair was showing. She later died while in custody.

    Protesters shouted slogans in Persian, Turkish and Kurdish. The Turkish chants included, “We do not keep silent, we do not fear, we do not obey,” and “My body, my decision.”

    The Persian and Kurdish slogans included, “Women live freely” and “We do not want a mullah regime.”

    Banners carried by the group of about 300 people included harsh criticism against Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and the Iranian regime.

    Mahdi Sağlar, one of the Iranians who participated in the protest, has been living and working in Turkey for 20 years.

    “They beat a girl to death because her hair was showing,” Sağlar told VOA Turkish. “Their own children dress as they want in Europe and America, they behave as they want, but in Iran, they arrested her because her hair is out, and they killed her by causing a brain hemorrhage with a blow to the brain at the police station. We are here to protest this. Our citizens in Iran are protesting here on the street as well.”

    Gelare Abdi, another Iranian protester, said that although she loves her homeland very much, she can’t live in her country due to heavy pressure.

    “I need freedom,” she said. “But I have no freedom in Iran. I have been here in Turkey for two years out of necessity. … They killed Mahsa because her hair was showing a small forelock. She was just 22 years old. I am also a woman and I want freedom.”

  • Iran protests: Mahsa Amini’s death draws attention to morality police

    The death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was detained by Iran’s so-called morality police has sparked angry protests, with women burning their headscarves in a defiant act of resistance against the Islamic Republic’s strict dress code and those enforcing it.

    The Gasht-e Ershad (Guidance Patrols) are special police units tasked with ensuring the respect of Islamic morals and detaining people who are perceived to be “improperly” dressed.

    Under Iranian law, which is based on the country’s interpretation of Sharia, women are obliged to cover their hair with a hijab (headscarf) and wear long, loose-fitting clothing to disguise their figures.

    Ms Amini allegedly had some hair visible under her headscarf when she was arrested by morality police in Tehran on 13 September. She fell into a coma shortly after collapsing at a detention centre and died three days later in hospital. The force denied reports that officers beat her head with a baton and banged it against one of their vehicles.

    In a rare interview, one morality police officer spoke anonymously to the BBC about his experience working in the force.

    “They told us the reason we are working for the morality police units is to protect women,” he said. “Because if they do not dress properly, then men could get provoked and harm them.”

    He said they worked in teams of six, comprising four men and two women, and focused on areas with high foot traffic and where crowds gather.

    “It’s weird, because if we are just going to guide people why do we need to pick somewhere busy that potentially means we could arrest more people?”

    “It’s like we are going out for a hunt.”

    The officer added that his commander would tell him off or say he was not working properly if he did not identify enough people violating the dress code, and that he found it particularly difficult when people resisted arrest.

    “They expect us to force them inside the van. Do you know how many times I was in tears while doing it?”

    “I want to tell them I am not one of them. Most of us are ordinary soldiers going through our mandatory military service. I feel so bad.”

    Post-revolutionary decree

    The Iranian authorities’ fight against “bad hijab” – wearing a headscarf or other mandatory clothing incorrectly – began soon after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, a major aim of which was to make women dress modestly.

    While many women were doing so at the time, miniskirts and uncovered hair were not uncommon sights on the streets of Tehran before the pro-Western Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was overthrown. His wife Farah, who often wore Western clothing, was held up as an example of a modern woman.

    Women protesting in Iran in March 1979 with their hair uncovered
    IMAGE SOURCE,GETTY IMAGES Image caption, The anti-hijab protests that erupted in Iran in March 1979 carried on for several days

    Within months of the founding of the Islamic Republic, the laws protecting women’s rights that had been established under the Shah began to be repealed.

    “It didn’t happen overnight, it was a step-by-step process,” said Mehrangiz Kar, 78, a human rights lawyer and activist who helped organise the first anti-hijab protest.

    “Right after the revolution there were men and women on the streets offering out free headscarves to women wrapped in gift paper.”

    A group of women protest against wearing the Islamic veil, while waving their veils in the air outside the office of the Prime Minister, Tehran, Iran, 6th July 1980
    IMAGE SOURCE,GETTY IMAGES Image caption, Women were waving headscarves in the air in resistance in the earlier anti-hijab protests of the 1980s

    On 7 March 1979, the leader of the revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, decreed that hijabs would be mandatory for all women in their workplaces and that he considered uncovered women to be “naked”.

    “That speech was received by many revolutionaries as an order to force the hijab on women’s heads,” said Mrs Kar, who is now based in Washington DC. “Many thought this was going to happen overnight, so women started resisting.”

    They responded immediately. More than 100,000 people, mostly women, gathered in the streets of Tehran the following day – International Women’s Day – to protest.

    ‘We got creative’

    Despite Ayatollah’s Khomeini’s decree, it took some time for authorities to decide what was considered “proper” clothing for women.

    “There were no clear instructions, so [they] came up with posters and banners showing models, which were hung on office walls. They said women should follow these instructions [about wearing a hijab] or they cannot enter,” explained Mrs Kar.

    Woman holding hijab above her head
    IMAGE SOURCE,BBC PERSIAN Image caption, Pictures posted after Mahsa Amini’s death showed women taking off their headscarves in a nod to the earlier protests
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    By 1981, women and girls were legally required to wear modest “Islamic” clothing. In practice this meant wearing a chador – a full-body cloak, often accompanied by a smaller headscarf underneath – or a headscarf and a manteau (overcoat) covering their arms.

    “But the fight against the mandatory hijab continued on individual levels. We were creative in wearing the headscarf or not covering our hair properly,” Mrs Kar said.

    “Every single time they were stopping us, we were fighting.”

    In 1983, parliament decided that women who did not cover their hair in public could be punished with 74 lashes. More recently, it added the punishment of up to 60 days in prison.

    Authorities have nevertheless struggled to enforce the laws since then, and women of all ages are frequently seen pushing the boundaries in public by wearing tight-fitting, thigh-length coats and brightly coloured headscarves pushed back to expose plenty of hair.

    Heavy-handed approach

    The extent to which these rules have been enforced and the severity of punishments handed down have varied over the years according to which president has been in power.

    The ultra-conservative then-mayor of Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, sought to appear more progressive on the issue when he was campaigning for the presidency in 2004. “People have different tastes, and we have to serve them all,” he said in a television interview.

    An Iranian morality policewoman walks past police vehicles ahead of a crackdown on women violating Iran's Islamic dress code in Tehran, Iran (23 July 2007)
    IMAGE SOURCE,AFP Image caption, Gasht-e Ershad officers have been accused of verbally and physically harassing women

    But soon after his election victory the following year, the Gasht-e Ershad were formally established. Until then, the dress codes had been policed informally by other law enforcement and paramilitary units.

    The morality police are often criticised by the public for their heavy-handed approach, and women are frequently detained and only released when a relative appears to provide assurances they will adhere to the rules in the future.

    “I was arrested with my daughter when we were stopped because of our lipstick,” one woman from the central city of Isfahan told the BBC.

    “They took us to the police station and asked my husband to come and sign a piece of paper that he would not let us out without a hijab.”

    Iranian newspapers on sale in Tehran show photographs of Mahsa Amini on 18 September 2022
    IMAGE SOURCE,WANA NEWS AGENCY Image caption, Questions about Mahsa Amini’s death dominated the front pages of Iranian newspapers on Sunday

    Another woman, from Tehran, told the BBC that a female officer said her boots could be “too erotic” for men and detained her.

    “I called my husband and asked him to bring me a pair of shoes,” she said.

    “I then signed a paper admitting I was wearing inappropriate clothing and I now have a criminal record.”

    Other reports of experiences with the morality police, which have been shared with the BBC, include beatings and more cruel and unusual punishments.

    One woman said the police threatened to put cockroaches on her body during one of her arrests.

    New crackdown

    President Ebrahim Raisi, a hard-line cleric who was elected last year, signed an order on 15 August to enforce a new list of restrictions.

    They included the introduction of surveillance cameras to monitor and fine unveiled women or refer them for “counselling”, and a mandatory prison sentence for any Iranian who questioned or posted content against the hijab rules online.

    Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi speaks at a news conference in Tehran (29 August 2022)
    IMAGE SOURCE,REUTERS Image caption, President Ebrahim Raisi issued a decree in August further curtailing women’s freedom of dress

    The restrictions led to an increase in arrests but also sparked a surge in women posting photos and videos of themselves without headscarves on social media – something that has only intensified in the days following Ms Amini’s death.

    Masih Alinejad, a journalist and activist now based in the US, says the protests which have erupted since the death of Ms Amini feel deeply personal.

    Over the years, she has run several viral campaigns against the hijab laws, including #mystealthyprotest and many, including the government, see her as an instrumental force behind the current unrest.

    Women began removing their headscarves and waving them in the air at Ms Amini’s funeral in western city of Saqez on Saturday.

    Source: CNN

     

  • Iran protests: Women burn headscarves in anti-hijab protests

    Female protesters have been at the forefront of escalating protests in Iran and have been burning headscarves, after the death in custody of a woman detained for breaking hijab laws.

    Demonstrations have continued for five successive nights, and reached several towns and cities.

    Mahsa Amini died in hospital on Friday after spending three days in a coma.

    In Sari, north of Tehran, large crowds cheered as women set their hijabs alight in defiant acts of protest.

    Ms Amini was arrested in the capital last week by Iran’s morality police, accused of breaking the law requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab, or headscarf, and their arms and legs with loose clothing.

    She fell into a coma shortly after collapsing at a detention centre.

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    There were reports that police beat Ms Amini’s head with a baton and banged her head against one of their vehicles, Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Nada al-Nashif said.

    The police have denied that she was mistreated and said she suffered “sudden heart failure”. Ms Amini’s family has said she was fit and healthy.

    The 22-year-old was from Kurdistan Province in western Iran, where three people were killed on Monday as security forces opened fire on protesters.

    Mahsa Amini
    Image source, Mahsa Amini family. Image caption, Mahsa Amini, 22, died in hospital in Tehran on Friday

    “Mahsa Amini’s tragic death and allegations of torture and ill-treatment must be promptly, impartially and effectively investigated by an independent competent authority, that ensures, in particular, that her family has access to justice and truth,” Ms Nashif said.

    She noted that the UN had received “numerous, and verified, videos of violent treatment of women” as morality police expanded their street patrols in recent months to crack down on those perceived to be wearing “loose hijab”.

    “The authorities must stop targeting, harassing, and detaining women who do not abide by the hijab rules,” she added, calling for their repeal.

    An aide to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei paid a visit to Ms Amini’s family on Monday and told them that “all institutions will take action to defend the rights that were violated”, state media reported.

    Senior MP Jalal Rashidi Koochi publicly criticised the morality police, saying the force was a “mistake” as it had only produced “loss and damage” for Iran.

    What are Iran’s hijab laws?

    Following the 1979 Islamic Revolution, authorities in Iran imposed a mandatory dress code requiring all women to wear a headscarf and loose-fitting clothing that disguises their figures in public.

    Morality police – known formally as “Gasht-e Ershad” (Guidance Patrols) – are tasked, among other things, with ensuring women conform with the authorities’ interpretation of “proper” clothing. Officers have the power to stop women and assess whether they are showing too much hair; their trousers and overcoats are too short or close-fitting; or they are wearing too much make-up. Punishments for violating the rules include a fine, prison or flogging.

    In 2014, Iranian women began sharing photos and videos of themselves publicly flouting the hijab laws as part of an online protest campaign called “My Stealthy Freedom”. It has since inspired other movements, including “White Wednesdays” and “Girls of Revolution Street”.

    Ms Nashif also condemned “the reported unnecessary or disproportionate use of force” against the thousands of people who have taken in part in protests against the morality police and the hijab since Mahsa Amini’s death.

    Hengaw, a Norway-based organisation that monitors human rights in predominantly Kurdish areas, said 38 people were injured on Saturday and Sunday when riot police fired live ammunition, rubber bullets and tear gas at protests in Saqez and Sanandaj, the capital of Iran’s Kurdistan province.

    The group reported that three male protesters were shot and killed in clashes with security forces on Monday – one in Saqez and two others in the towns of Divandarreh and Dehgolan – as the unrest escalated. It had previously reported the death of a second man in Divandarreh, but relatives said he was in a critical condition in hospital.

    In Tehran, videos posted online showed women taking off their headscarves and shouting “death to the dictator” – a chant often used in reference to the Supreme Leader. Others shouted “justice, liberty, no to mandatory hijab”. In the northern province of Gilan, protesters also clashed with police.

    A woman who took part in a protest on Monday night in the northern city of Rasht sent BBC Persian photographs of what she said were bruises she suffered as a result of being beaten by riot police with batons and hoses.]

    “[The police] kept firing tear gas. Our eyes were burning,” she said. “We were running away, [but] they cornered me and beat me. They were calling me a prostitute and saying I was out in the street to sell myself.

    Another woman who protested in the central city of Isfahan told the BBC’s Ali Hamedani: “While we were waving our headscarves in the sky I felt so emotional to be surrounded and protected by other men. It feels great to see this unity. I hope the world supports us.”

    Tehran Governor Mohsen Mansouri tweeted on Tuesday that the protests were “fully organised with the agenda to create unrest”, while state TV alleged that Ms Amini’s death was being used as an “excuse” by Kurdish separatists and critics of the establishment.

    Source: BBC

     

  • Anti-hijab demonstrations: UN alarm as Iran cracks down on anti-hijab protests

    Concern over the Iranian government’s handling of demonstrations caused by the death in detention of a woman being held for violating hijab laws has been expressed by the UN.

    As men, women, and children took to the streets of Kurdistan province for a fourth day on Monday, security personnel reportedly opened fire, killing three people, according to human rights organizations.

    Tehran also saw demonstrations.

    The UN urged Iran’s leaders to allow peaceful demonstrations and launch an impartial probe into the woman’s death.

    Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old ethnic Kurd from the western city of Saqez, died in hospital on Friday after spending three days in a coma.

    She was with her brother in Tehran on Tuesday when she was arrested by the morality police, who accused her of breaking the law requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab, or headscarf, and their arms and legs with loose clothing. She fell into a coma shortly after collapsing at a detention centre.

    Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Nada Al-Nashif said there were reports that Ms Amini was beaten on the head with a baton by morality police officers and that her head was banged against one of their vehicles.

    The police have denied that she was mistreated and said she suffered “sudden heart failure”. But her family has said she was fit and healthy.

    Mahsa Amini
    IMAGE SOURCE, MAHSA AMINI FAMILY Image caption, The acting UN rights chief called for Mahsa Amini’s family to get “access to justice and truth”

    “Mahsa Amini’s tragic death and allegations of torture and ill-treatment must be promptly, impartially, and effectively investigated by an independent competent authority, that ensures, in particular, that her family has access to justice and truth,” Ms Al-Nashif said.

    She noted that the UN had received “numerous, and verified, videos of violent treatment of women” as morality police expanded their street patrols in recent months to crack down on those perceived to be wearing “loose hijab”.

    “The authorities must stop targeting, harassing, and detaining women who do not abide by the hijab rules,” she added, calling for their repeal.

    An aide to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei paid a visit to Ms Amini’s family on Monday and told them that “all institutions will take action to defend the rights that were violated”, state media reported.

  • Queiroz to lead Iran at World Cup vs. England, U.S

    Iran will have a familiar face back at the helm for the 2022 FIFA World Cup following the reappointment of former Carlos Queiroz.

    Queiroz, who originally gained prominence for being Sir Alex Ferguson’s righthand man at Manchester United but then had a spell in charge of Real Madrid, remains Iran’s longest-serving coach from his previous stint between 2011 and 2019.

    After his departure in January 2019 following Team Melli’s disappointing semifinal exit at the most recent edition of the AFC Asian Cup, the Portuguese has had spells in charge of Colombia and Egypt — parting ways with the latter back in April following a failure to qualify for this year’s World Cup.

    Nonetheless, it has now been confirmed that Queiroz will be at Qatar 2022 following his return as Iran coach — where he will lead his side against England (Nov. 21), Wales (Nov. 25) and United States (Nov. 29).

    The move, which was heavily speculated since Mehdi Taj was elected as president of Iranian Football Federation on Tuesday, was confirmed by Team Melli media officer Jamaat Mohamad and will see Queiroz replaced Dragan Skocic.

    “Thanks to Dragan Skocic’s efforts to advance to the World Cup,” tweeted Jamaat.

    “Based on the decision of the Football Federation’s Executive Board, Carlos Queiroz will be the head coach of Iran’s national football team in the Qatar World Cup.”

    While Skocic successfully guided the Iranians to World Cup qualification with an impressive 25-point haul from ten matches, his two-and-a-half year reign was constantly blighted by reported conflict with key players.

    Most notably, Porto striker Mehdi Taremi was dropped from the squad for two qualifiers back in November, although both parties were said to have buried the hatchet since.

    Still, the return of Queiroz is likely to be widely welcomed given his standing among players and fans alike.

    Source: espn.co.uk

  • Cyberattack: Albania ends diplomatic relations with Iran

    Albania has severed diplomatic ties with Iran and ordered Iranian embassy staff to leave, accusing it of orchestrating a major cyber-attack.

    Prime Minister Edi Rama said a review had discovered “incontrovertible evidence” that Iran “hired four organizations to mount the attack on Albania” on 15 July.

    The hackers tried to paralyse public services, delete and steal government data, and incite chaos, he added.

    Mr Rama described Albania’s response as “extreme… but entirely forced on us”.

    The United States said it strongly condemned the cyber-attack on a Nato ally and vowed to hold Iran accountable for actions that threatened Albania’s security and “set a troubling precedent for cyber-space”.

    There was no immediate comment from the Iranian government. But relations between Tirana and Tehran have been tense since Albania offered asylum to thousands of Iranian dissidents nine years ago.

    Mr Rama said the goal of the hacking groups had been “the destruction of the digital infrastructure of the government of the Republic of Albania, as well as the theft of data and electronic communications of governments systems”.

    But he added: “The said attack failed its purpose… All systems came back fully operational and there was no irreversible wiping of data.”

    The prime minister nevertheless said the Albanian government’s decision to sever diplomatic relations with Iran was “proportionate to the seriousness and danger posed by the cyber-attack”.

    US National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said American experts had also concluded that Iran “conducted this reckless and irresponsible cyber-attack” and that it was “responsible for the subsequent hack and leak operations”.

    Iran’s conduct, she warned, “disregards norms of responsible peacetime state behaviour in cyber-space”, including one on refraining from damaging critical infrastructure providing public services.

    Earlier this month, US cyber-security firm Mandiant said it had concluded “with moderate confidence” that “one or multiple threat actors who have operated in support of Iranian goals” were involved in the attack.

    Mandiant noted that the disruption had come days before the start of a conference in the Albanian town of Manez that was affiliated with the exiled Iranian opposition group Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK). The event was subsequently postponed following warnings of “terrorist” threats.

    The firm likewise cited a video featuring the Albanian residence permits of purported MEK members that was posted on the Telegram channel used by a group named “HomeLand Justice” to claim credit for the cyber-attack.

    It said a ransomware sample also included the text: “Why should our taxes be spent on the benefit of DURRES terrorists?” Manez is a town in Durres County and is the location of a camp where about 3,000 MEK members have been allowed to live since 2013 at the request of the US and United Nations.

  • Israel: Nuclear deal would give Iran $100 billion to destabilise region

    A new nuclear deal between world powers and Iran would allow other nations to avoid sanctions and give Teheran $100 billion a year to destabilize the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said on Wednesday.

    The United States aims to respond soon to a draft accord proposed by the European Union that would restore the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, under which it curbed its disputed uranium enrichment programme in exchange for sanctions relief.

    The deal was abandoned in 2018 by then-U.S. President Donald Trump. Current President Joe Biden has sought to revive it. Iran has demanded that crippling U.S. financial and trade sanctions reimposed on it by Trump be scrapped as part of any new deal.

    “On the table right now is a bad deal. It would give Iran a hundred billion dollars a year … that will be used to undermine stability in the Middle East and spread terror around the globe,” Lapid said. Iran denies fomenting terrorism.

    “The sweeping removal of sanctions on sectors like banking – against financial institutions designated today as supporting terrorism – means the Iranians will have no problem whatsoever laundering money … Iran will assist other nations facing sanctions to evade them.”

    Lapid did not provide details of what his $100 billion figure was based on, or name nations that could dodge sanctions.

    Some critics of the draft deal point to the possibility of Russia – a party to the 2015 pact with Iran but now under severe Western sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine – stepping up transactions with Iran, including oil and weapons.

    On Wednesday, Iran launched exercises to test its combat and reconnaissance drones, state media reported, amid U.S. concerns over the possible supply of Iranian-made unmanned aircraft to Russia for use in its invasion of Ukraine.

    Israel is not a party to the ongoing nuclear negotiations. But its worries about its arch-enemy and veiled threats to take pre-emptive military action against Iran if it deems diplomacy a dead end have kept Western capitals attentive.

    Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz is expected to travel to Washington on Thursday, his office said, following other Israeli security officials this week who held discussions with U.S. officials about Iran.

    Source: Reuters

  • Salman Rushdie: Iran blames writer and supporters for stabbing

    Instead of placing the blame on the author Salman Rushdie, Iran has “categorically” rejected any connection with the assailant.

    During a performance in New York, Mr. Rushdie, 75, was stabbed on stage and suffered serious injuries. He can now breathe on his own.

    Because of his 1988 book The Satanic Verses, he has endured years of death threats.

    Earlier, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken accused Iran’s state media of gloating about the attack, calling its behavior “despicable”.

    Iranian media have extensively commented on the attack, calling it “divine retribution”.

    Iran’s state broadcaster daily Jaam-e Jam highlighted the news that Rushdie might lose an eye following the attack, saying “an eye of the Satan has been blinded”.

    As news emerged of Friday’s attack, eyes turned to Tehran where the fatwa – religious edict – calling for the writer’s assassination was first issued more than three decades ago.

    But on Monday, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani Tehran “categorically” denied any link, adding “no one has the right to accuse the Islamic Republic of Iran”.

    However, he said freedom of speech did not justify Mr. Rushdie’s insulting religion in his writing.

    “In this attack, we do not consider anyone other than Salman Rushdie and his supporters worthy of blame and even condemnation,” the spokesman said during his weekly press conference in Tehran.

    “By insulting the sacred matters of Islam and crossing the red lines of more than 1.5 billion Muslims and all followers of the divine religions, Salman Rushdie has exposed himself to the anger and rage of the people.”

    Iran had no other information about Rushdie’s assailant except what has appeared in the media, he added.

    Mr. Blinken had earlier denounced Iran’s state institutions for inciting violence against the author.

    He said in a statement that Mr. Rushdie had “consistently stood up for the universal rights of freedom of expression, freedom of religion or belief, and freedom of the press”.

    “While law enforcement officials continue to investigate the attack, I am reminded of the pernicious forces that seek to undermine these rights, including through hate speech and incitement to violence.

    “Specifically, Iranian state institutions have incited violence against Rushdie for generations, and state-affiliated media recently gloated about the attempt on his life. This is despicable.”

    Mr. Blinken added the US and its partners would use “every appropriate tool” at their disposal to stand up to what he called “these threats”.

    On Sunday, Mr. Rushdie’s son said the author was still in a critical condition: “Though his life-changing injuries are severe, his usual feisty and defiant sense of humor remains intact,” he said.

    The family was “extremely relieved” when Mr. Rushdie was taken off a ventilator on Saturday, he said, adding that his father was able to “say a few words”.

    The author’s agent Andrew Wylie said the celebrated novelist suffered severed nerves in one arm, damage to his liver, and would likely lose an eye.

    The man charged over Friday’s attack – named Hadi Matar, aged 24 – has pleaded not guilty to charges of attempted murder and assault. He is accused of running onto the stage and stabbing Mr. Rushdie at least 10 times in the face, neck, and abdomen.

    The novelist was forced into hiding for nearly 10 years after The Satanic Verses was published in 1988. Many Muslims reacted with fury to it, arguing that the portrayal of the Prophet Muhammad was a grave insult to their faith.

    Mr. Rushdie faced death threats and the then-Iranian leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, issued a fatwa – or decree – calling for Mr. Rushdie’s assassination, placing a $3m (£2.5m) bounty on the author’s head.

    The fatwa remains active, and although Iran’s government has distanced itself from Mr. Khomeini’s decree, a quasi-official Iranian religious foundation added a further $500,000 to the reward in 2012.

  • Iran: Ex-child bride among three women executed in one day – report

    Protesters in London campaign against Iran’s use of the death penalty in 2020

    Iranian authorities put three women to death on Wednesday for murdering their husbands, a human rights charity says.

    According to the Iran Human Rights Group, they were among 32 people executed in the past week alone.

    A former child bride, convicted of later killing the man she had married at the age of 15, was among them.

    Authorities are believed to have substantially stepped up their use of the death penalty, executing twice as many people so far this year than last.

    Rights groups report that Iran also executes more women than any other country, the majority of whom are thought to have been found guilty of killing their husbands.

    On Wednesday, the Iran Human Rights Group says former child bride Soheila Abadi was hanged in prison after being convicted of killing her husband after marrying him 10 years previously when she was 15 years old.

    The sentencing court reportedly said the motive for the murder had been “family disputes.”

    Two other women executed on Wednesday had also been convicted of murdering their husbands, the group said.

    Activists say many of the cases involve accusations of domestic violence but that Iranian courts frequently do not take that into account.

    Precise figures on execution numbers are not available as Iranian authorities do not officially announce every case where the death penalty has been carried out.

    According to research published in April by two rights groups, only 16.5% of executions believed to have been carried out in Iran last year were announced by officials.

    Reports this year suggest the use of the death penalty has spiked even further since.

    Human rights group Amnesty International this week accused Iran of having embarked upon a “horrific” execution spree in recent months, reportedly putting more than 250 people to death in the first six months of 2022 – more than double the number executed over the equivalent period in the previous year.

    “The state machinery is carrying out killings on a mass scale across the country in an abhorrent assault on the right to life,” said Diana Eltahawy, deputy regional director at Amnesty International.

    Some of those convicted have been put to death in mass executions, the rights group reports, including a dozen people in one prison on 15 June and the same number in a separate prison on 6 June.

    Ethnic minorities are also overrepresented in the statistics.

    Despite making up around 5% of Iran’s general population, members of the Baluchi minority made up more than one in four of those believed by Amnesty International to have been executed so far this year.

    Official and unofficial reports of executions in Iran during 2021. Ebrahim Raisi was elected president in June and took office in August. Official and unofficial reports of executions in Iran during 2021 .
    Source: bbc.com

  • Dozens feared trapped after 10-storey building collapses in Iran

    Five people have been killed and dozens more are thought to be trapped after an unfinished building collapsed in south-west Iran, state media report.

    The Iranian Red Crescent said rescue teams were searching for at least 80 people in the rubble of the 10-storey Metropole office block in Abadan.

    Pictures showed that concrete floors and steel beams had fallen on to the street below, crushing several cars.

    Officials said the cause of the collapse was under investigation.

    State news agency Irna reported that the Metropole building was located on Abadan’s busiest commercial street, and that the incident happened at about 12:30 (08:00 GMT) on Monday.

    Rescue workers and bystanders search through the rubble of a collapsed building in Abadan, Iran (23 May 2022)TASNIM NEWS/AFP
    The Metropole building was located on one of Abadan’s busiest commercial streets

    Twenty-five injured survivors had so far been pulled from the rubble along with the five dead, it said.

    The hardline Tasnim news agency cited an official in Abadan’s fire department as saying that between 100 and 150 people are thought to have been inside the building at the time of the collapse despite it being under construction.

    Source: BBC 

  • Two Iranians sentenced to 10 years for spying

    Iran has sentenced two men to 10 years imprisonment for allegedly spying for foreign governments.

    Massud Mossaheb was convicted of spying for Israeli and German intelligence over his senior role in the Austrian-Iranian Society, judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili said.

    The other man, Shahram Shirkhani, was accused of working for UK intelligence.

    Five other Iranians have been arrested on charges of espionage in recent months, according to Mr Esmaili.

    International rights organisations regularly raise issues about the justice system in Iran, with Human Rights Watch noting that the country “regularly fell short of providing fair trials and used confessions likely obtained under torture as evidence in court”.

    Speaking on Tuesday, the spokesman said Mr Shirkhani had attempted to recruit others to Britain’s MI6 agency. He was also accused of passing information about Iranian banks and the defence ministry “to the enemy”.

    The length of his sentence was not confirmed by Mr Esmaili, but a state-run news outlet said Mr Shirkhani had received a 10-year sentence.

    Mr Mossaheb, meanwhile, holds both Austrian and Iranian citizenship and was arrested after travelling to Tehran in January 2019, according to Austria’s Der Standard newspaper.

    He was also sentenced to 10 years, according to Mr Esmaili, for “spying for Mossad and Germany” in the guise of the general secretary of the Austrian-Iranian Society.

    Austria called for Mr Mossaheb’s release last year, but Iran does not recognise dual citizenship and denies Iranians access to consular assistance from their other country.

    Around a dozen foreign and dual nationals are currently being held by Iran, according to Human Rights Watch, which says they are deprived of due process.

    They include British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was jailed for five years in 2016, and Kylie Moore-Gilbert, a British-Australian academic serving a 10-year sentence for espionage

    The Iranian government spokesman gave no further details about the five other men arrested for spying.

    In July, Iran executed two men for espionage.

    Mahmoud Mousavi-Majd was accused of reporting on the movements of Iranian forces in Syria and of spying on the Revolutionary Guards commander, Qasem Soleimani, for the CIA and Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency.

    Earlier the same month, former defence ministry worker Reza Asgari was executed for allegedly passing on details of Iran’s missile programme to the US.

    Iran’s intelligence ministry said last year that it had arrested 17 people accused of collecting information on the country’s nuclear and military sectors for the CIA. The ministry said some had been sentenced to death but did not name them.

    US President Donald Trump dismissed that announcement as “totally false”.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran cover-up of deaths revealed by data leak

    The number of deaths from coronavirus in Iran is nearly triple what Iran’s government claims, a BBC Persian service investigation has found.

    The government’s own records appear to show almost 42,000 people died with COVID-19 symptoms up to 20 July, versus 14,405 reported by its health ministry.

    The number of people known to be infected is also almost double official figures: 451,024 as opposed to 278,827.

    The official numbers still make Iran the worst-hit in the Middle East.

    In recent weeks, it has suffered a second steep rise in the number of cases.

    The first death in Iran from COVID-19 was recorded on 22 January, according to lists and medical records that have been passed to the BBC. This was almost a month before the first official case of coronavirus was reported there.

    Daily number of deaths from COVID-19 in Iran
    Official figures vs uncovered data, 22 January to 20 July 2020

    Since the outbreak of the virus in Iran, many observers have doubted the official numbers.

    There have been irregularities in data between national and regional levels, which some local authorities have spoken out about, and statisticians have tried to give alternative estimates..

    A level of undercounting, largely due to testing capacity, is seen across the world, but the information leaked to the BBC reveals Iranian authorities have reported significantly lower daily numbers despite having a record of all deaths – suggesting they were deliberately suppressed.

    Where did the data come from?

    The data was sent to the BBC by an anonymous source.

    It includes details of daily admissions to hospitals across Iran, including names, age, gender, symptoms, date and length of periods spent in hospital, and underlying conditions patients might have.

    The details on lists correspond to those of some living and deceased patients already known to the BBC.

    The source says they have shared this data with the BBC to “shed light on truth” and to end “political games” over the epidemic.

    The discrepancy between the official figures and the number of deaths on these records also matches the difference between the official figure and calculations of excess mortality until mid-June.

    Excess mortality refers to the number of deaths above and beyond what would be expected under “normal” conditions.

    What does the data reveal?

    Tehran, the capital, has the highest number of deaths with 8,120 people who died with COVID-19 or symptoms similar to it.

    The city of Qom, the initial epicentre of the virus in Iran, is worst hit proportionally, with 1,419 deaths – that is one death with COVID-19 for every 1,000 people.

    It is notable that, across the country, 1,916 deaths were non-Iranian nationals. This indicates a disproportionate number of deaths amongst migrants and refugees, who are mostly from neighbouring Afghanistan.

    The overall trend of cases and deaths in the leaked data is similar to official reports, albeit different in size.

    The initial rise of deaths is far steeper than Health Ministry figures and by mid-March it was five times the official figure.

    Lockdown measures were imposed over the Nowruz (Iranian New Year) holidays at the end of the third week in March, and there was a corresponding decline in cases and deaths.

    But as government restrictions were relaxed, the cases and deaths started to rise again after late-May.

    Crucially the first recorded death on the leaked list occurred on 22 January, a month before the first case of coronavirus was officially reported in Iran.

    At the time Health Ministry officials were adamant in acknowledging not a single case of coronavirus in the country, despite reports by journalists inside Iran, and warnings from various medical professionals.

    In 28 days until the first official acknowledgement on 19 February, 52 people had already died.

    Who were the first whistleblowers?

    Doctors with direct knowledge of the matter have told the BBC that the Iranian health ministry has been under pressure from security and intelligence bodies inside Iran.

    Dr Pouladi (not their real name) told the BBC that the ministry “was in denial”.

    “Initially they did not have testing kits and when they got them, they weren’t used widely enough. The position of the security services was not to admit to the existence of coronavirus in Iran,” Dr Pouladi said.

    It was the persistence of two brothers, both doctors from Qom, which forced the health ministry to acknowledge the first official case.

    When Dr Mohammad Molayi and Dr Ali Molayi lost their brother, they insisted he should still be tested for COVID-19, which turned out to be positive.

    In Kamkar hospital, where their brother died, numerous patients were admitted with similar symptoms to COVID-19, and they would not respond to the usual treatments. Nevertheless, none of them were tested for the disease.

    Dr Pouladi says: “They got unlucky. Someone with both decency and influence lost his brother. Dr Molayi had access to these gentlemen [health ministry officials] and did not give up.”

    Dr Molayi released a video of his late brother with a statement. The health ministry then finally acknowledged the first recorded case.

    Nevertheless state TV ran a report criticising him and falsely claiming the video of his brother was months old.

    Why the cover-up?

    The start of outbreak coincided both with the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution and with parliamentary elections.

    These were major opportunities for the Islamic Republic to demonstrate its popular support and not risk damaging it because of the virus.

    Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, accused some of wanting to use the coronavirus to undermine the election.

    In the event, the election had a very low turnout.

    Before the global coronavirus pandemic hit, Iran was already experiencing a series of its own crises.

    In November 2019, the government increased the price of petrol overnight and cracked down violently on protests which followed. Hundreds of protesters were killed in a few days.

    In January this year, the Iranian response to the US assassination of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, seen as one of the most powerful figures in Iran after its Supreme Leader, created another problem.

    Then Iranian armed forces – on high alert – mistakenly fired missiles at a Ukrainian airliner only minutes after it had taken off from Tehran’s international airport. All 176 people on board were killed.

    The Iranian authorities initially tried to cover up what happened, but after three days they were forced to admit it, resulting in considerable loss of face.

    Dr Nouroldin Pirmoazzen, a former MP who also was an official at the health ministry, told the BBC that in this context, the Iranian government was “anxious and fearful of the truth” when coronavirus hit Iran.

    He said: “The government was afraid that the poor and the unemployed would take to the streets.”

    Dr Pirmoazzen points to the fact that Iran stopped international health organisation Médecins Sans Frontières from treating coronavirus cases in the central province of Isfahan as evidence of how security-conscious its approach towards the pandemic is.

    Iran was going through tough times even before the military showdown with the US and coronavirus hit.

    The sanctions which followed Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal in May 2018 hit the economy hard.

    Dr Pouladi says: “Those who brought the country to this point don’t pay the price. It is the poor people of the country and my poor patients who pay the price with their lives.”

    “In the confrontation between the governments of the US and Iran we are getting crushed with pressures from both sides.”

    The health ministry has said that the country’s reports to the World Health Organization regarding the number of coronavirus cases and deaths are “transparent” and “far from any deviations”.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran cover-up of Coronavirus deaths revealed by data leak

    The number of deaths from coronavirus in Iran is nearly triple what Iran’s government claims, a BBC Persian service investigation has found.

    The government’s own records appear to show almost 42,000 people died with Covid-19 symptoms up to 20 July, versus 14,405 reported by its health ministry.

    The number of people known to be infected is also almost double official figures: 451,024 as opposed to 278,827.

    Iran has been one of the worst-hit countries outside China.

    In recent weeks, it has suffered a second steep rise in the number of cases.

    The first death in Iran from Covid-19 was recorded on 22 January, according to lists and medical records that have been passed to the BBC. This was almost a month before the first official case of coronavirus was reported there.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran issues arrest warrant for Trump over drone strike that killed Qasem Soleimani

    Iran has issued an arrest warrant for US President Donald Trump over the drone strike that killed a top Iranian general in January, the semi-official Fars news agency reported Monday.

    Trump is one of 36 people Iran has issued arrest warrants for in relation to the death of Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC), according to Fars, but the Tehran attorney general Ali Alqasi Mehr said Trump was at the top of the list.

    Mehr claimed Trump would be prosecuted as soon as he stands down presidency after his term ends, Fars reported.

    Iran also said it had asked Interpol to issue a Red Notice for these 36 individuals, semi-official state news agency ISNA reported, though it was unlikely that Interpol would grant the request.

    In a statement to CNN, Interpol said it “would not consider requests of this nature.” It explained that it was not in accordance with its rules and constitution, which states “it is strictly forbidden for the organization to undertake any intervention or activities of a political, military, religious or racial character.”

    A September 2013 photo of Qasem Soleimani

    ‘Political stunt’: US official

    US Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook called the move a “political stunt” during a joint press conference with the Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir on Monday.

    “It’s propaganda that we’re used to,” Hook said. “This has nothing to do with national security, international peace or promoting stability, so we see it for what it is — it’s a propaganda stunt that no one takes seriously and makes the Iranians look foolish,” he added.

    Soleimani was killed in a US drone strike at Baghdad International Airport in January along with five others, including Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy head of the Iran-backed Iraqi Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).

    The strike, condemned by Iran and its allies as an “assassination,” raised the specter of further regional destabilization.

    A spokesman for Iran’s judiciary, Gholam-Hossein Esmaili, announced in early June that an Iranian citizen had been sentenced to death for allegedly working for foreign intelligence agencies. Esmaili claimed that Seyed Mahmoud Mousavi Majd disclosed the whereabouts of Soleimani to US intelligence officials.

    Barr and Pompeo shift justification for Iran strike from 'imminent' threat to deterrence

    The Trump administration viewed Soleimani as a ruthless killer, and the President told reporters in January that the general should have been taken out by previous presidents.

    The Pentagon blamed Soleimani for the deaths of hundreds of Americans and US allies in the months leading up to his killing.

    “General Soleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region,” the Pentagon said at the time, calling the strike “decisive defensive” action aimed at deterring future Iranian attacks.

    Source: cnn.com

  • Iran issues arrest warrant for Trump

    Iran has issued an arrest warrant and asked Interpol for help in detaining US President Donald Trump and dozens of others over the drone strike that killed a top Iranian general in Baghdad.

    Tehran prosecutor Ali Alqasimehr said on Monday, June 29, that Trump and more than 30 others who Iran accuses of involvement in the January 3 strike that killed General Qassem Soleimani face “murder and terrorism charges”, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported.

    Apart from Trump’s name, Alqasimehr did not identify the other suspects. He stressed that Iran would continue to pursue Trump’s prosecution even after his presidency ends.

    Alqasimehr also was quoted as saying that Iran requested a “red notice” be put out for Trump and the others, which represents the highest level arrest request issued by Interpol.

    Local authorities end up making the arrests on behalf of the country that request it. The notices cannot force countries to arrest or extradite suspects, but can put government leaders on the spot and limit suspects’ travel, according to Al Jazeera.

    In January, the US killed General Soleimani, who oversaw the Revolutionary Guard’s expeditionary Quds Force, and others in an air strike near Baghdad International Airport.

    The air strike came after months of incidents raising tensions between the two countries.

    Following Soleimani’s murder, Iran retaliated with a ballistic missile strike targeting American troops in Iraq.

    Source: Aljazeera

  • Iran says virus cases top 180,000

    More than 180,000 people have been infected in Iran’s coronavirus outbreak since it first emerged nearly four months ago, an official said on Thursday.

    As the figures were announced, President Hassan Rouhani called on Iranians to stick to guidelines aimed at stopping the spread of COVID-19.

    “If everyone follows the health instructions exactly, then all jobs can be reopened,” he said in remarks broadcast on state television.

    “We are progressing slowly and step by step (because we don’t want) our people to think that the coronavirus era has passed.

    “This would pose a major health problem for us,” Rouhani said.

    Health ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said 2,238 new infections in the past 24 hours took the total to 180,156.

    She said 78 new deaths brought the overall toll to 8,584.

    Iran reported its first COVID-19 cases on February 19 – two deaths in the Shiite holy city of Qom.

    The government has struggled to contain what quickly became the Middle East’s deadliest coronavirus outbreak.

    Since April, however, it has gradually lifted health protocols in order to reopen its sanctions-hit economy.

    That has coincided with a fresh surge in cases, which the government denies amounts to a second wave, saying they are due to increased testing.

    Source: punchng.com

  • One in five Iranians may have had the coronavirus – Health official

    Nearly one in five Iranians may have been infected with the novel coronavirus since the country’s outbreak started in February, a health official said Tuesday.

    “About 15 million Iranians may have experienced being infected with this virus since the outbreak began,” said Ehsan Mostafavi, a member of the task force set up to combat COVID-19.

    This meant the virus was “much less lethal than we or the world had anticipated”, the semi-official ISNA news agency quoted him as saying.

    The figure represents 18.75 per cent of the more than 80 million population of Iran, which on Tuesday announced another 74 deaths from the coronavirus.

    Mostafavi said it was derived from serology tests to identify antibodies in patients who have recovered from the illness.

    These differ from polymerising chain reaction (PCR) tests, which detect the presence of an antigen.

    Iran says it has carried out more than one million PCR tests to “confirm” infections and report them so far.

    Health ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said 74 new coronavirus fatalities in the past 12 hours had raised the overall death toll to 8,425.

    Cases of infection rose by 2,095 over the same period to total 175,927, she added.

    Lari replaced Kianoush Jahanpour as the health ministry’s spokesperson on Tuesday, according to a ministry statement.

    Health Minister Saeed Namaki called on her to “avoid politicisation” of issues and to coordinate with him “before making any remarks on social media or to the press,” it added.

    Jahanpour had come under fire in March after saying China’s reporting of its COVID-19 figures was a “bitter joke”.

    He was slammed on Twitter by the Chinese ambassador to Tehran, Chang Hua, and later retreated by praising Beijing for its support of Tehran during the pandemic.

    Iran-China relations are usually warm as Beijing is one of Tehran’s top trade partners, especially in oil.

    Source: france24.com

  • Iran says virus uptick due to increased testing

    Iran’s health ministry said Sunday a surge in new reported Coronavirus infections was due to increased testing rather than a worsening outbreak.

    After hitting a near two-month low in early May and a lifting of tough movement restrictions, cases of the COVID-19 illness have been rising in Islamic republic which is battling the Middle East’s deadliest outbreak of the disease.

    “The main reason for rising numbers is that we started identifying (infected people) with no or light symptoms,” said Mohammad-Mehdi Gouya, the health ministry’s head epidemiologist.

    He added that the gradual easing of lockdown measures had also contributed to higher infections “which has more or less happened all over the world,” ISNA news agency reported.

    Authorities have progressively lifted restrictions imposed to tackle the virus, and activity has almost returned to normal in most of the country’s 31 provinces.

    Ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said the situation had steadily improved with fewer hospitalisations, critical cases and deaths.

    “It is only normal for infections to slightly grow after reopenings,” he said in televised remarks Sunday.

    He confirmed 2,364 new infections in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number to 171,789.

    Yet 2,596 of total patients hospitalised were in “critical” condition on Sunday, with the number seemingly on a rising trajectory since Thursday, when Iran reported record high daily infections.

    Jahanpour noted that 72 more people had died in the same period, raising the overall toll to 8,281.

    There has been scepticism at home and abroad about Iran’s official figures, with concerns the real toll could be much higher.

    Rising infection figuress since a low in early May and lax observance of social distancing have worried authorities, which have reiterated calls for strict adherence to health protocols.

    Source: france24.com

  • Floyd killing shows ‘true face’ of US: Iran’s Khamenei

    The police killing of unarmed African-American George Floyd shows the “true face” of the United States and its oppression of the peoples of the world, including its own, Iran’s supreme leader said Wednesday.

    “The fact that a policeman has cold-bloodedly pressed his knee on the throat of a black man until he died and that other policeman watched on without doing anything is nothing knew,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a televised speech.

    “It is the truce face of America, it’s what it has always done all over the world — in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and other countries, and before that in Vietnam.

    “It is the normal course of action of the United States, it’s the truce face of their regime,” Khamenei said.

    “These are realities that have always been camouflaged or hidden, but they are not new,” he said in a speech on the 31st anniversary of the death of his predecessor, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

    Protests sparked by Floyd’s killing by a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, have raged across the United States for a week and President Donald Trump has ordered the military to intervene.

    The once-in-a-generation unrest has coincided with the world’s deadliest coronavirus outbreak in the United States.

    Epidemiologists have voiced concern that the thousands of people protesting at close quarters, coughing violently when hit by police tear gas, will lead to a new upsurge in infections.

    “Thank God, (US leaders) have already been discredited by their actions — their handling of the coronavirus has discredited and shamed them around the world,” Khamenei said of the 106,000 deaths from COVID-19 already registered in the United States.

    Iran had itself faced strong criticism from its arch-foe the United States when it was reeling from one of the world’s highest COVID-19 death tolls earlier this year.

    As of Wednesday, Iran’s health ministry declared a total of 8,012 deaths, although that figure has been dismissed by some as underreported, including by Washington.

    Tensions between Tehran and Washington escalated sharply in 2018, after

    Source: france24.com

  • Iranian scientist acquitted of stealing research deported by US

    An Iranian scientist detained in the United States has left the country and is on his way back to Iran, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said.

    Sirous Asgari, a materials science professor from Tehran, was charged in 2016 with trying to trade secrets research from an American university.

    He was acquitted by a federal court in November.

    It was reported last month that Mr Asgari would be deported once he had recovered from a Covid-19 infection.

    The US and Iran have denied that he is part of a prisoner swap.

    In a post on Instagram on Tuesday morning, Mr Zarif welcomed what he described as the “good news” of Mr Asgari’s return on a flight to Iran, but accused the US of holding “hostage” several other Iranian scientists.

    The 59-year-old professor at Sharif University of Technology was accused by US prosecutors of stealing trade secrets from a research project being carried out by Case Western Reserve University in Ohio for the US Navy.

    He denied the charge and a judge eventually threw out the prosecution’s case.

    His return to Iran led to speculation that he could be part of another prisoner swap.

    At least six US citizens are currently imprisoned in Iran or out on bail. They include US Navy veteran Michael White, who was temporarily released from prison in March on medical grounds and is in the care of the Swiss embassy in Tehran.

    In response to Mr Zarif’s Instagram post, Acting US Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli tweeted that Mr Asgari and Mr White’s cases had “never been related”.

    “We have been trying to deport Asghari since last year, being stalled every step of the way by the Iranian government. We wish Iran was so enthusiastic to get its illegal nationals back as they would have us all believe…”

    He added: “… so how about the Iranians take the other 10 currently in custody with removal orders? You haven’t heard much about that, have you? If #Zarif wasn’t blowing smoke, they would’ve already made arrangements for these other 10. But instead, they stall.”

    Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Abbas Mousavi also said talk of a swap was “groundless”, noting that Mr Asgari was “released on the basis of being acquitted”.

    In December, the US and Iran conducted a prisoner swap in a rare sign of co-operation. Chinese-American researcher Xiyue Wang and Iranian scientist Massoud Soleimani were freed.

    Relations between the US and Iran have become increasingly hostile since 2018, when President Donald Trump abandoned the Iran nuclear deal.

    Earlier this year, the US assassinated top Iranian commander Gen Qasem Soleimani in a drone strike in Iraq. Iran retaliated by launching ballistic missiles at Iraqi military bases hosting US forces.

    Disclaimer : “Opinions expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author(s) and do not in any way reflect those of tigpost.co. Our outfit will hereby not be liable for any inaccuracies contained in this article.”

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran says 230 killed in November protests

    A senior Iranian lawmaker said Monday that 230 people were killed and thousands injured in November protests sparked by a petrol price hike, state news agency IRNA reported.

    It is the first time that an official in Iran has given overall casualty figures for the street violence.

    “During these events 230 people were killed, six of whom were official agents and security forces,” said Mojtaba Zolnour, head of the parliament’s national security and foreign affairs committee.

    “Twenty percent of them were forces keeping order and peace,” he added, noting that they included “the police, security and intelligence forces, and the Basij” militia, some of which are not under government control and considered unofficial.

    Those injured included about 2,000 people and 5,000 forces deployed to ensure law and order, the report added.

    The demonstrations erupted on November 15 in a handful of cities before spreading to at least 100 urban centres across the Islamic republic.

    Petrol pumps were torched, police stations attacked and shops looted, before security forces stepped in amid a near-total internet blackout.

    Officials had repeatedly rejected death tolls given by foreign media and human rights groups as “lies” and passed responsibility of reporting on it between different state bodies.

    London-based human rights group Amnesty International has put the number at 304, and a group of independent UN rights experts said in December that 400 including at least 12 children could have been killed based on unconfirmed reports.

    The United States has claimed that more than 1,000 were killed in the violence.

    According to Zolnour, seven percent of the 230 were “those killed in direct confrontations with security forces” and were mostly “rioters armed with semi-automatic weapons and machineguns”.

    He added that 26 percent “were not among the rioters and killed over unknown reasons” such as “being shot from seven metres to the heart or to the temple from three metres away”.

    The lawmaker insisted that the security forces were too far away from the protesters to have done this.

    “A high percentage were killed by bullets that are not used” in Iranian standard-issue weapons, he said.

    Of the remainder, 16 percent died while attacking military bases and police stations, and 31 percent at public places such as malls, banks and fuel stations.

    Zolnour alleged that those behind the violence had aimed to use the unrest to “overthrow” the system.

    Iran at the time blamed the violence that broke out during the protests on “thugs” backed by its foes the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

    It has singled out exiled royalists and the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran (MEK), an exiled former rebel group which it considers a “terrorist cult”.

    Source: france24.com

  • US hits top Iranian officials for human rights abuses

    The US government imposed sanctions on Wednesday on an Iranian government minister and senior law enforcement and military officials over human rights abuses.

    “The Iranian regime violently suppresses dissent of the Iranian people, including peaceful protests, through physical and psychological abuse,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a statement.

    “The United States will continue to hold accountable Iranian officials and institutions that oppress and abuse their own people.”

    The sanctions, the latest in a series of measures against the Iranian regime, target Interior Minister and chair of Iran’s National Domestic Security Council (NDSC), Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli, seven law enforcement officials and an IRGC commander.

    The Treasury alleged that Rahmani Fazli has issued orders authorizing Iran’s Law Enforcement Force to use “lethal force in response to the November 2019 protests, resulting in violence against peaceful protestors and bystanders. His orders led to the killing of many protestors, including at least 23 minors.”

    Washington also targeted IRGC Brigadier General Hassan Shahvarpour Najafabadi, Law Enforcement Force Commander Hossein Ashtari Fard, and Deputy Commander Ayoub Soleimani.

    The sanctions block all US assets and property of the officials and prevent US financial institutions from dealing with them.

    The steps also have implications for foreign banks and businesses which can run afoul of US authorities if they engage in transactions with sanctioned officials or firms.

    The State Department also sanctioned Rahmani Fazli for “his involvement in gross violations of human rights,” barring him and his family from entering the United States.

    The US government said the LEF was “responsible for or complicit in serious human rights abuses that have occurred since the disputed June 2009 presidential election and ensuing protests.”

    The LEF also operates detention centers associated with physical and psychological abuses, and was implicated in the torture and drowning of Afghan nationals attempting to cross into Iran, according to the US government.

    Source: france24.com

  • Virus-hit Iran to reopen mosques for holy nights

    Virus-hit Iran will reopen its mosques for three nights over the next week so that worshippers can pray during one of the holiest times of year, a minister said Tuesday.

    The Islamic republic shut its mosques and shrines in March as part of its efforts to contain the Middle East’s deadliest outbreak of the novel coronavirus.

    The reopening was granted for Laylat al-Qadr – a high point during the fasting month of Ramadan that marks when the Koran was revealed to Prophet Mohammed.

    But Health Minister Saeed Namaki sounded a note of caution as he announced that worshippers would be allowed to attend mosques and ceremonies for three of the next five nights.

    “The biggest strategic mistake is to think that coronavirus is finished,” he said in remarks broadcast on state television.

    “At any time, we can go back to bad circumstances” due to “negligence”, said Namaki.

    “Our priority is to hold ceremonies outdoors” such as “in stadiums”, he said, “so that social distancing is properly observed.”

    Namaki said his ministry agreed in a meeting to help “organise ceremonies from midnight to 2:00 am during the nights of Qadr”.

    Supreme leader ‘concern’

    He said the move came in response to “concern” expressed by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but stressed the supreme leader “always supports all measures” to contain the virus.

    All gatherings would need to respect “sanitary protocols to the maximum”, he added.

    But he warned: “They shouldn’t blame the health ministry and say they wanted to open mosques but didn’t care about people’s health”.

    Iran has struggled to contain its outbreak of the virus that causes COVID-19 since announcing its first cases in the Shiite holy city of Qom on February 19.

    The government closed schools, postponed major events and banned inter-city travel but it has eased restrictions gradually since April 11.

    It allowed mosques to reopen on May 4 in 132 counties where the virus was deemed to be under control.

    And on Friday last week worshippers were able to attend the main weekly prayers for the first time in more than two months, except for in the capital.

    The government warned on Monday of a setback in its efforts to contain the virus as the official death toll hit 6,685.

    “We have regressed in Khuzestan due to (people) not observing health protocols,” Deputy Health Minister Alireza Raisi said, referring to a southwestern province that is now the epicentre of the country’s outbreak.

    “This can happen to any other province if we are not careful,” he added, noting that tighter measures would be reimposed in other places too if needed.

    Experts inside and outside Iran have cast doubt on the country’s official COVID-19 figures, and say the real toll could be much higher.

    Source: france24.com

  • Iran’s mosques temporarily reopen

    All mosques in Iran are due to reopen temporarily on Tuesday, as part of the government’s plan to ease Coronavirus restrictions.

    They will be open for three days to commemorate specific nights during the holy month of Ramadan, and have been asked to comply with strict health protocols.

    It is unclear whether they will stay open, according to the Fars news agency.

    Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei on Monday called on officials to pay attention to people’s need for prayers during this critical time and particularly in the fasting month of Ramadan.

    Last week, mosques in low-risk areas reopened in more than 160 cities and towns, but most have been shut for almost two months since the beginning of Iran’s outbreak.

    Iran has seen 109,286 diagnosed cases, and a total of 6,685 deaths.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran warns of virus resurgence after 51 new deaths

    Iran warned Sunday of a resurgence of the novel coronavirus as it reported 51 new deaths, almost a month after it started to relax a nationwide lockdown.

    Authorities reimposed more stringent measures in the southwestern Khuzestan province, reversing a phased return to work meant to revitalise the battered economy.

    “The situation should in no way be considered normal” in Iran, health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said in televised remarks.

    “This virus will be present” for the time being, he added, in the country that has suffered the most deadly outbreak in the Middle East.

    The new fatalities raised the overall confirmed death toll to 6,640 since the country reported its first cases in February 19.

    Iran has allowed a phased return to work since April 11 and has since also reopened mosques in parts of the country deemed to be at low risk.

    But Jahanpour said Iran was “witnessing a critical situation in Khuzestan province and to an extent in Tehran”.

    Both the capital Tehran and Khuzestan remained at “red”, the top level of its colour-coded risk scale.

    In the capital, a member of the virus taskforce warned that current health protocols could not contain the spread of the illness in Tehran.

    “With businesses reopening, people have forgotten about the protocols,” Ali Maher told ISNA news agency.

    “Maybe it was too soon” for a return to normal life, Maher said.

    Over 100,000 cases

    The situation in Khuzestan meanwhile quashed hopes that the virus would die in warmer climates.

    Khuzestan’s governor Ali Shariati said that state bodies, banks and non-essential businesses in nine counties would be shut down again and inter-city movements limited.

    This aimed to “prevent the coronavirus’ spread from getting out of hand” and would remain in force until further notice, state news agency IRNA quoted him as saying.

    President Hassan Rouhani meanwhile said in a televised meeting that schools would partially reopen next Saturday.

    This applied only “for students seeking to meet and talk to their teachers” and attendance would not be mandatory, he said.

    Cinemas, stadiums and universities remain closed across Iran.

    Jahanpour also said that 1,383 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed in the past 24 hours, raising total infections to 107,603.

    Out of those hospitalised, 86,143 had recovered and were discharged, but 2,675 were in critical condition.

    Experts and officials both in Iran and abroad have cast doubt over the country’s COVID-19 figures, saying the actual number of cases could be much higher.

    Source: france24.com

  • Syria strikes kill 14 Iranian

    Overnight strikes on positions held by Iranian-backed militias and their allies in eastern Syria killed 14 fighters, a war monitor said on Tuesday.

    It was not immediately clear who carried out the strikes in the desert near the town of Mayadin, which came minutes after Syrian air defences intercepted Israeli strikes over the north of the country, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

    A spokesman for the US-led coalition battling the Islamic State group said it was not responsible for the strikes.

    Observatory head Rami Abdul Rahman said it was “likely” that Israel mounted the operation, which killed several Iraqi as well as Iranian fighters.

    State media did not report the strikes.

    Iranian-backed militias and their allies command a significant presence in eastern Syria south of the Euphrates Valley. The region lies close to the Iraqi border.

    Israel has launched hundreds of strikes in Syria since the start of the civil war in 2011, targeting government troops, allied Iranian forces and Hezbollah fighters.

    It rarely confirms details of its operations in Syria but says Iran’s presence in support of President Bashar al-Assad is a threat and that it will continue its strikes.

    An Israeli diplomatic official, who asked that their name be withheld, did not comment on the strikes but said “Iran was only country still shipping missiles and missiles technologies to their proxies in the region” amid the global health crisis.

    Just before midnight on Monday, Syrian air defences intercepted Israeli missiles targeting a research facility in Aleppo province, state media said.

    State news agency SANA said the intercepted missiles targeted several “military depots” in the Al-Safira area southeast of Aleppo, Syria’s government-held second city.

    On Friday, Israeli forces hit a missile depot in central Syria used by Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah, another Iran ally, hours after Israeli helicopters fired missiles at other targets in southern Syria.

    Commenting on the apparent intensification of Israeli raids, Yoram Schweitzer of Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies told AFP the Jewish state might be reacting to increased hostile action from Iran and Hezbollah.

    It is also possible that Israel is trying to apply added pressure as its rivals endure the fallout of the coronavirus crisis, he said.

    “I don’t know which one of the two it is, but might be a combination of the two,” Schweitzer said.

    Source: france24.com

  • Iranian airline fuelled virus spread in Middle East

    An Iranian airline with links to the country’s Revolutionary Guards fuelled the spread of the virus in the Middle East, a BBC investigation has found.

    Mahan Air flew infected passengers from Iran to Lebanon and Iraq – leading to the first official cases in both countries.

    Sources within Mahan Air told the BBC that cabin crew were silenced by the airline when they tried to raise concerns about its handling of the virus and the lack of protective equipment.

    Flight tracking data also shows that the airline repeatedly flew to China despite a flight ban by Tehran.

    Mahan Air has refused to comment.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran reopens mosques as virus deaths rise by 74

    Iran on Monday reopened mosques in parts of the country deemed at low risk from the novel coronavirus as it announced another 74 deaths from the disease.

    Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said the new fatalities brought to 6,277 the total number officially recorded in Iran since it reported its first cases in mid-February.

    That was a jump in deaths compared with 47 on Sunday, which was the lowest daily count that Iran has recorded in 55 days.

    Another 1,223 cases of COVID-19 infections were recorded in the past 24 hours, Jahanpour said, raising the total to 98,647.

    Mosques were allowed to reopen to worshippers in 132, or around a third, of Iran’s administrative divisions which are considered low-risk.

    The country has started using a colour-coded system of “white”, “yellow” and “red” for different areas to classify the virus risk.

    Worshippers have to enter mosques with masks and gloves, can only stay for half an hour during prayer times and must use their personal items, said the health ministry.

    Mosques must also refrain from offering food and drinks, offer hand sanitisers and disinfect all surfaces, it said in a statement published by ISNA news agency.

    According to Jahanpour, 79,397 of those hospitalised with the disease since Iran reported its first cases in mid-February have been discharged, while 2,676 are in critical condition.

    He declared that Iran was among “top five countries in the world” with the highest number of recoveries, without elaborating.

    Experts and officials both in Iran and abroad have cast doubts over the country’s COVID-19 figures, saying the real number of cases could be much higher than reported.

    Source: france24.com

  • Coronavirus kills more than 6,000 in Iran

    The death toll in Iran from the coronavirus surged to 6,028 as 71 new deaths were reported, state media said on Thursday.

    A total of 983 more people tested positive for COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, bringing the total infections to 94,640, Iran’s state broadcaster reported, citing a statement by the Health Ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour.

    Jahanpour said 75,103 people have recovered so far and been discharged from hospitals, while 2,976 patients are in critical condition.

    A total of 463,295 tests have been conducted in the country, he added.

    In Iran, one of the Middle Eastern countries hardest hit by the pandemic, COVID-19 was first detected in the city of Qom on Feb. 19, and then spread throughout the country.

    The government refrained from imposing a total lockdown as seen in many other countries, but extended closure of educational institutions and banned cultural, religious, and sports gatherings.

    Authorities, meanwhile, have in phases since April 11 allowed the reopening of businesses which have been closed as part of measures to contain the spread of the virus. The state also plans to reopen mosques in parts of the country that have been consistently free of the virus.

    After originating in China last December, the coronavirus has spread to at least 185 countries and regions. Europe and the US are currently the worst-hit regions.

    The pandemic has killed nearly 228,000 people, with total infections exceeding 3.2 million, while more than 983,500 have recovered so far, according to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University in the US.

    Source: aa.com.tr

  • Iran tells US not to ‘plot’ against it amid Gulf tensions

    Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday told the United States it “should not plot against the Iranian nation every day”, amid fresh tensions between the arch foes in the Gulf.

    Tehran and Washington have traded barbs over a spate of incidents in the past year involving their forces in the sensitive waters of the Gulf.

    Their latest high-seas confrontation came on April 15, when the United States said 11 Iranian boats harassed its navy ships in what it described as the international waters of the “Arabian Gulf”.

    President Donald Trump then tweeted that he had ordered the US Navy to “shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea”.

    Iran’s president on Wednesday replied that “the Americans should know that this gulf is called the Persian Gulf, not the New York Gulf or the Washington Gulf”.

    “They must understand the situation by that name and by the coastal nation that has protected this waterway for thousands of years,” Rouhani said in a televised address during a cabinet meeting.

    “The soldiers of our armed forces in the guardians of the Revolution, the army, Basij (paramilitary organisation) and the police have always been and will be the guardians of the Persian Gulf.”

    Iran and the United States have been at loggerheads for decades.

    Tensions between them have escalated since 2018 when Trump unilaterally withdrew the US from a multinational accord that froze Iran’s nuclear programme and reimposed crippling sanctions on its economy.

    The arch enemies have appeared to come close to a direct military confrontation twice since June last year, when Iran shot down a US drone in the Gulf.

    On that occasion, Trump cancelled retaliatory air strikes at the last minute.

    Trump also opted not to take any military action in January after Iran fired a barrage of missiles at US troops stationed in Iraq.

    Iran launched the missiles after a US drone strike near Baghdad airport killed Qasem Soleimani, the general who headed the Revolutionary Guards’ foreign operations arm, the Quds Force.

    Source: france24.com

  • Iran plans to reopen mosques in areas free of coronavirus

    Iran plans to reopen mosques in parts of the country that have been consistently free of the coronavirus outbreak as restrictions on Iranians gradually ease.

    Iran, one of the Middle Eastern countries hardest hit by the pandemic, will be divided up into white, yellow, and red regions based on the number of infections and deaths, President Hassan Rouhani said, according to the presidency’s website.

    Activities in each region will be restricted accordingly, so an area that has been consistently free of infections or deaths will be labeled white and mosques could be reopened and Friday prayers resumed, Rouhani said on Sunday.

    He said the label given to any region in the country could change and he did not specify when the color-coding program would come into force.

    Deputy Health Minister Iraj Harirchi said in an interview with state TV that 116 counties in the country could be considered white at the moment and 134 yellow.

    Battered economy

    Iranians have returned to shops, bazaars, and parks over the past week as the country eases coronavirus restrictions, with the daily increase in the death toll below 100 since April 14.

    The death toll rose by 60 over the past 24 hours to 5,710, with 90,481 confirmed cases, Health Ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpur told state TV.

    Seeking a balance between protecting public health and shielding an economy already battered by sanctions, the government has refrained from imposing the kind of wholesale lockdowns on cities seen in many other countries.

    But it has extended closures of schools and universities and banned cultural, religious, and sport gatherings.

    Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif had a phone call with United Arab Emirates Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Sunday and discussed the battle against the spread of the coronavirus and regional developments, along with passing on a congratulatory message for the beginning of the holy month of Ramadan.

    Source: Aljazeera

  • Virus-hit Iran urges IMF to approve its loan request

    Iranian President Hassan Rouhani urged the International Monetary Fund on Wednesday to give the sanctions-hit country a $5 billion emergency loan to combat its novel coronavirus outbreak.

    The Islamic republic is battling one of the world’s deadliest coronavirus outbreaks which it says has killed more than 3,800 people and infected more than 62,500.

    There has been speculation abroad that the real number of deaths and infections could be higher.

    Iran has said it needs the funds to continue fighting the virus.

    But its arch enemy the United States, which effectively holds a veto at the IMF, is reportedly set to block the loan, arguing Iran will use the funds for military purposes.

    “I urge all international organisations to fulfil their duties,” Rouhani said during a cabinet meeting.

    “We are a member of the IMF… if there’s going to be any discrimination between Iran and others in giving loans, neither we nor world opinion will tolerate it.”

    Iran announced on March 12 that it had requested the loan.

    The country has not received assistance from the IMF since a “standby credit” issued between 1960 and 1962, according to IMF figures.

    According to the IMF’s website, a Rapid Financial Instrument “is available to all member countries facing an urgent balance of payments need”.

    “If they do not act on their duties in this difficult situation, the world will judge them in a different way,” Rouhani said.

    ‘Maximum pressure’

    US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a recent interview that Iran would use any economic relief to pursue nuclear weapons and back Shiite militias in Iraq that the administration blames for a wave of attacks on bases used by US troops.

    “You see the way… the regime is treating their people in this time of enormous crisis. You see the way that they continue to spend money,” Pompeo told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt.

    US President Donald Trump’s administration has waged a campaign of “maximum pressure” on Iran since it withdrew from a landmark nuclear deal in 2018.

    It has since imposed wave after wave of crippling sanctions that target key sectors of Iran’s economy such as oil sales and banking.

    Iran has repeatedly called on the Trump administration to reverse its sanctions policy, which has been opposed even by US allies, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

    Medicines and medical equipment are technically exempt from the US sanctions but purchases are frequently blocked by the unwillingness of banks to process purchases for fear of incurring large penalties in the United States.

    “It will go down in history that the White House, which was engaged in economic terrorism so far, is now a terrorist in health issues too,” Rouhani said.

    European nations have delivered medical goods to Iran in the first transaction under the Instex financing mechanism set up to get round US sanctions.

    But it is more than a year since Britain, France and Germany announced the creation of Instex and Iran has questioned European governments’ commitment to seeing it through in defiance of the Trump administration.

    Source: France24

  • Iran hits out at US as virus death toll passes 3,000

    Iran’s death toll from the coronavirus has passed 3,000, the health ministry said on Wednesday, as President Hassan Rouhani accused Washington of missing a “historic opportunity” to lift sanctions.

    Tensions between the arch-foes have soared since President Donald Trump abandoned a landmark nuclear agreement in 2018 and reimposed sweeping sanctions.

    Tehran has repeatedly called on Washington to reverse its policy, which has been opposed by US allies, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

    Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said the coronavirus death toll in Iran now stood at 3,036 following 138 new fatalities in the past 24 hours.

    He added that 2,987 new cases had been confirmed, bringing the total to 47,593, with 15,473 of those hospitalised having recovered and been discharged.

    “This was the best, historic opportunity for the Americans to reverse their wrong path and for once, tell their nation they are not against the Iranian people,” Rouhani said in televised comments at a cabinet meeting.

    They “did not learn their lesson even during this difficult global situation,” he said.

    “This was a humanitarian issue. No one would have blamed them for retreating.”

    Medicines and medical equipment are technically exempt from the US sanctions but purchases are frequently blocked by the unwillingness of banks to process purchases for fear of incurring large penalties in the United States.

    Countries including Azerbaijan, Britain, China, France, Germany, Japan, Qatar, Russia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates have all sent shipments of medical aid to Iran.

    European nations have also delivered medical goods to Iran in the first transaction under the Instex financing mechanism set up to get round US sanctions, Germany said on Tuesday.

    It is more than a year since Britain, France and Germany announced the creation of Instex, a delay that has prompted Iran to question European governments’ commitment to seeing it through in defiance of the Trump administration.

    Source: AFP

  • Iran rejects ‘foreign’ help as virus death toll nears 2,000

    Iran ruled out “foreign” help on the ground to deal with the coronavirus pandemic after an offer from a France-based medical charity, as the country’s death toll from the contagion neared 2,000.

    “Due to Iran’s national mobilisation against the virus and the full use of the medical capacity of the armed forces, it is not necessary for now for hospital beds to be set up by foreign forces, and their presence is ruled out,” Alireza Vahabzadeh, adviser to Iran’s health minister, said on Tuesday.

    Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Sunday it planned to send a nine-member team and equipment to set up a 50-bed hospital, stirring opposition from ultra-conservative circles in the Islamic Republic who alleged MSF staff would serve as “spies”.

    Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour earlier said a record 1,762 new cases were confirmed in Iran over the past 24 hours with 24,811 people infected.

    He announced 122 new deaths from the virus, raising the official toll to 1,934 in one of the world’s worst-hit countries.

    MSF said on Tuesday it did not understand a decision by Iranian authorities to cancel a mission it had prearranged to set up a facility to fight coronavirus in Isfahan.

    “We are surprised to learn that the deployment of our treatment unity is cancelled,” Michel-Olivier Lacharite, who is in charge of Medecins Sans Frontieres crisis response team, said in a statement.

    He said the group had been given prior approval and were ready to set up the 50-bed unit at the end of the week. He said they were still ready to deploy on Iran or elsewhere on the region.

    Stay home

    Iran has the fifth-highest official death toll from the coronavirus after Italy, China, the US and Spain but, unlike those countries, it has yet to impose any lockdown on its citizens.

    On the contrary, the country is celebrating its two-week Persian New Year holiday when the country’s roads fill with people visiting family.

    Despite the authorities’ appeals for people to stay home and the closure of shopping and leisure centres, many people have taken to the roads as usual this year.

    Jahanpour, however, announced when government offices reopened on Tuesday, many civil servants will be working from home.

    “Only around a third of government staff are authorised to work in the office and only for administrative tasks vital to the public,” he said, adding all offices would practise “social distancing”.

    The country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has urged Iranians to follow state instructions “so that Almighty God will put an end to this calamity for the Iranian people, for all Muslim nations and for all mankind”.

    ‘Sanctions should be eased’

    On Tuesday, the UN rights chief called for any sanctions imposed on countries like Iran facing the new coronavirus pandemic to be “urgently re-evaluated” to avoid pushing strained medical systems into collapse.

    Iran has been under crippling US sanctions in connection with its nuclear programme.

    “At this crucial time, both for global public health reasons, and to support the rights and lives of millions of people in these countries, sectoral sanctions should be eased or suspended,” UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said.

    Even before the pandemic, she pointed out that human rights reports had repeatedly emphasised the impact of sectorial sanctions on access to essential medicines and medical equipment in Iran, including respirators and protective gear for healthcare workers.

    Bachelet’s office stressed more than 50 Iranian medics had died since the first COVID-19 case was detected in the country five weeks ago.

    Source: aljazeera.com

  • 103-year-old Iran woman survives coronavirus

    A 103-year-old woman in Iran has recovered after being infected with the new coronavirus, state media reported, despite overwhelming evidence the elderly are most at risk from the disease.

    The unnamed woman had been hospitalised in the central city of Semnan for about a week, IRNA news agency said.

    But she was “discharged after making a complete recovery”, Semnan University of Medical Sciences head Navid Danayi was quoted as saying by IRNA late Tuesday.

    The woman was the second elderly patient in Iran to have survived the disease.

    The other was a 91-year-old man from Kerman, in the southeast of Iran, the news agency said.

    After being sick for three days, he recovered on Monday despite having pre-existing medical conditions including high blood pressure and asthma, it added.

    The report did not say how the pair were treated.

    Since Iran announced its first deaths on February 19, the novel coronavirus has spread to all of the country’s 31 provinces and killed nearly 1,000 people.

    The elderly are the most vulnerable to the disease, which first emerged in China late last year.

    The World Health Organization this month estimated the novel coronavirus kills 3.4 percent of all those infected.

    But for people aged over 80 the fatality rate was 21.9 percent, according to a report the WHO carried out with the Chinese authorities.

    Source: France24

  • Iran urges people to stay home as virus claims 113 lives

    Iran on Sunday urged its citizens to stick to guidelines and stay at home to stop the new coronavirus spreading, as it announced another 113 deaths from the outbreak.

    The latest death toll announced by the health ministry took to 724 the official number of people to have been killed by the disease since last month.

    People “should cancel all travel and stay at home so that we may see the situation improving in the coming days,” ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said in a televised news conference.

    Jahanpour also reported 1,209 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 infection, raising the total to 13,938.

    “The good news is that more than 4,590 of the overall confirmed cases have recovered” and the patients have been discharged from hospitals, he added.

    Tehran province had the highest number of new infections with 251 fresh cases.

    Khorasan Razavi province, home to the holy Shiite city of Mashhad, followed with 143 cases.

    “The cases there will probably increase,” the official said, calling on everyone to cease from travelling to the northeastern province.

    Mashhad’s Imam Reza shrine receives many devout Iranians every year, especially around the country’s New Year holidays which start on March 20.

    The outbreak in Iran is one of the deadliest outside of China, where the disease originated.

    Jahanpour called on Iranians to “take the coronavirus seriously” and especially be mindful of elderly relatives who are most vulnerable to the infection.

    Source: France24

  • Iran frees 54,000 prisoners to combat Coronavirus

    Iran has temporarily released more than 54,000 prisoners in an effort to combat the spread of the new coronavirus disease in crowded jails.

    Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili told reporters the inmates were allowed out of prison after testing negative for Covid-19 and posting bail.

    “Security prisoners” sentenced to more than five years will not be let out.

    The jailed British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe may be freed soon, according to a British MP.

    Tulip Siddiq cited the Iranian ambassador to the UK as saying that Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe “may be released on furlough today or tomorrow”.

    Her husband said on Saturday that he believed she had contracted Covid-19 at Tehran’s Evin prison and that authorities were refusing to test her.

    But Mr Esmaili insisted on Monday that Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe had subsequently been in contact with her family and “told them about her good health”.

    Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was jailed for five years in 2016 after being convicted of espionage charges that she has denied. The UK has also insisted she is innocent.

    A Foreign Office spokesman said: “We call on the Iranian government to immediately allow health professionals into Evin prison to assess the situation of British-Iranian dual nationals there.”

    On Tuesday, the health ministry said the number of confirmed cases had risen by more than 50% for the second day in a row. It now stands at 2,336, although the real figure is believed to far higher.

    Cases linked to Iran have also been reported by Afghanistan, Canada, Lebanon, Pakistan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Iraq, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

    A number of senior Iranian officials have contracted the virus. Among the latest is the head of the emergency medical services, Pirhossein Kolivand.

    Twenty-three of the 290 members of parliament have also tested positive.

    On Monday, a member of the Expediency Council, which advises Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, died as a result of Covid-19 in Tehran. State media said Mohammad Mirmohammadi, 71, had a close relationship with Ayatollah Khamenei.

    At a tree-planting ceremony to mark World Wildlife Day on Tuesday, the supreme leader urged the public to observe the health ministry’s hygiene guidelines and ordered all government bodies to provide any necessary help to the health ministry.

    Ayatollah Khamenei also insisted Iranian authorities were not concealing information about the scale of the problem, saying: “Our officials have reported with sincerity and transparency since day one. However, some countries where the outbreak has been more serious have tried to hide it.”

    Iran’s outbreak, he added, “will not last long in the country and will pack up”.

    Meanwhile, Health Minister Saeed Namaki said a nationwide screening campaign would begin on Wednesday.

    Teams will visit patients who are suspected of being infected with Covid-19 and who do not have access to medical services.
    A team of experts from the World Health Organization (WHO), who arrived in Iran on Monday, is supporting local health authorities.

    The WHO said they would “review readiness and response efforts, visit designated health facilities, laboratories and points of entry, and provide technical guidance”.

    The plane carrying the experts also contained a shipment of medical supplies and protective equipment to support more than 15,000 healthcare workers, as well as enough laboratory kits to test and diagnose almost 100,000 people.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Sanctions-hit Iran struggles to make cancer drugs

    A lab-coated technician leans over a bioreactor at an Iranian pharmaceutical plant producing cancer drugs — a tall order since equipment imports fell victim to US sanctions.

    A huge corridor bathed in artificial light and smelling of disinfectant leads to the bioreactor room at the Actoverco factory, to which AFP was given rare access.

    Six hundred people run production lines at the facility in an industrial district of Karaj, some 40 kilometres (25 miles) northwest of Tehran.

    Technicians wear scrubs, face masks, gloves and surgical caps as they work.

    In the bioreactor, cells are multiplied then transferred to tanks for use as cultures to produce medication.

    “Much of the equipment that we are using either in production or in laboratory, they are considered as dual-use and they are sanctioned,” said plant manager Reza Mostofi.

    “We have many issues at the moment. Because of the sanctions, usually we can’t either transfer the money or the supplier is not willing to sell the machinery that we need.”

    – Production stoppage –

    As the new coronavirus spreads in Iran, many people have struggled to find medicine — an issue linked to sanctions reinstated by the United States in 2018 after it withdrew from a landmark nuclear deal.

    In retaliation, the Islamic republic has gradually reduced its commitments to the deal since May 2019.

    On paper, humanitarian items are exempt from US sanctions, but in reality banks tend to decline transactions involving Iran to avoid being exposed to potential litigation.

    “The equipment that we are using, the spare parts and everything, now we have a big issue for repairing the spare parts that are needed,” said Mostofi.

    For the past six months, he said, the plant has been unable to produce a drug that is essential for treating leukaemia.

    “For some time we have not been able to import the ingredients of this material, so our line… is now stopped,” said the English-speaking manager.

    The company hopes to produce the active ingredient itself, with a “very big” bioreactor, but it faces almost insurmountable difficulties because of the sanctions.

    Iran’s health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour voiced concern about the situation.

    “Regarding cancer patients, we had no problem because we are producing the medicine ourselves… (but) our companies want to renew, rebuild and replace their industrial equipment,” he told AFP.

    According to him, there are 500,000 cancer patients in Iran, and it is the second biggest cause of death in the country, claiming 30,000 lives a year.

    Actoverco, part of a family business established 40 years ago, also produces the drug interferon beta-1a, used to treat multiple sclerosis.

    “We cannot provide the patients as much as we want,” said the company director.

    “I hope there would (be) a political solution for this because at the end of the day these are people who are suffering” because of medicine shortages.

    He also voiced concern about the new coronavirus.

    “Maybe next year there would be a vaccine available (in) some places, but it might not be available here,” he said.

    “This winter we had shortages of vaccines” for flu.

    – ‘More and more difficult’ –

    With the sanctions, “work has become more and more difficult, you feel it every day”, said medical physicist Maryam Yaftian.

    The 30-year-old works at Roshana, a private clinic that opened in Tehran three years ago and is equipped with modern facilities.

    She points to the difficulty of obtaining supplies including medicine and spare parts for two radiotherapy machines bought from an American company prior to the sanctions.

    For troubleshooting, staff at the clinic hold video conferences with Iranian technicians based abroad.

    The sanctions have also caused prices to skyrocket for the clinic which is absorbing some of the increase on behalf of its patients, said its director Touraj Norouzi.

    In one room, mother of two Seyedeh Hosseini is receiving chemotherapy.

    Thanks to financial help from her brothers and father, she feels “lucky” to have been able to undergo treatment for bowel cancer with chemo drugs and an imported infusion pump.

    Many patients or their relatives seek chemo treatment abroad as they do not trust the quality of local products.

    The director of a Tehran pharmacy, Shahrzad Shahbani, said she had sought treatment abroad at all costs for her mother, who ultimately lost her battle with cancer.

    Nevertheless, she said, “If I had a chemo patient right now, I would not advise them to take local drugs.”

    Source: AFP

  • Iran raid left ’34 US troops with traumatic brain injuries’

    The Pentagon has said that 34 US troops were diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries (TBI) following an Iranian attack on their base in Iraq.

    Seventeen troops are still under medical observation, a spokesman said.

    President Donald Trump had said no Americans were injured in the 8 January strike, which came in retaliation for the US killing of an Iranian general.

    Mr Trump had cited the supposed lack of injuries in his decision not to strike back against Iran.

    But last week, the Pentagon said 11 service members had been treated for concussion symptoms from the attack.

    Read:Iran denies missile downed plane, calls for data

    Asked about the apparent discrepancy this week at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Mr Trump said: “I heard that they had headaches, and a couple of other things, but I would say, and I can report, it’s not very serious.”

    “I don’t consider them very serious injuries relative to other injuries I have seen,” he said when asked about possible TBIs.

    The Pentagon says no Americans were killed in the Iranian missile strike on the Ain al-Asad base, with most sheltering in bunkers as missiles rained down.

    On Friday, defence department spokesman Jonathan Hoffman told reporters that eight of the affected soldiers have been sent back to the US for further treatment, while another nine are being treated in Germany.

    Sixteen troops were treated in Iraq and one in Kuwait before all 17 were returned to active duty, officials say.

    Read:US House votes to limit Trump war powers against Iran

    Mr Hoffman added that the US Defence Secretary Mark Esper had not immediately been aware of the injuries in the days after the attack.

    Iraq & Afghanistan Veterans of America, a non-profit organisation, slammed the Trump administration for taking so long to reveal the extent of casualties.

    “This is a big deal,” its founder Paul Rieckhoff tweeted. “The American people must be able to trust the government to share information about our sons and daughters in harms way. Nothing is more serious and sacred.”

    TBIs are common in warzones, according to the US military.

    The most common cause of a TBI for deployed soldiers is an explosive blast, writes the US Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center.

    Read:World War 3: Iran fires missiles at US targets in Iraq: All the latest updates

    They are classified as mild, moderate, severe or penetrating. A mild TBI is also known as a concussion, and can be caused by a blast’s “atmospheric over-pressure followed by under-pressure or vacuum”.

    The air vacuum is capable of penetrating solid objects, making it possible for soldiers to avoid blunt force trauma but still receive an invisible brain injury.

    On Friday, tens of thousands of Iraqis protested in the streets Baghdad against the presence of some 5,000 foreign troops in the country.

    The Iraqi parliament has urged all foreign fighters – including from the US – to leave.

    Source: bbc.com

  • Iran plane crash: Protesters condemn ‘lies’ on downed jet

    Hundreds of protesters have taken to the streets in Iran’s capital, Tehran, to vent anger at officials, calling them liars for having denied shooting down a Ukrainian passenger plane.

    Protests took place outside at least two universities, with tear gas reportedly fired.

    US President Donald Trump tweeted support for the “inspiring” protests.

    Iran on Saturday admitted downing the jet “unintentionally”, three days after the crash that killed 176 people.

    Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752, en route to Kyiv, was shot down on Wednesday near Imam Khomeini Airport in Tehran shortly after take-off, and only hours after Iran had fired missiles at two airbases housing US forces in Iraq.

    Read:Ukrainian passenger plane crashes in Iran

    Those attacks were Iran’s response to the US killing of senior Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in a drone strike in Baghdad on 3 January.

    Dozens of Iranians and Canadians, as well as nationals from Ukraine, the UK, Afghanistan and Germany died on the plane.

    What happened at the protests?

    Students gathered outside at least two universities, Sharif and Amir Kabir, reports said, initially to pay respect to the victims. Protests turned angry in the evening.

    The semi-official Fars news agency carried a rare report of the unrest, saying up to 1,000 people had chanted slogans against leaders and tore up pictures of Soleimani.

    The students called for those responsible for the downing the plane, and those they said had covered up the action, to be prosecuted.

    Chants included “commander-in-chief resign”, referring to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and “death to liars”.

    Fars said police had “dispersed” the protesters, who were blocking roads. Social media footage appeared to show tear gas being fired.

    Social media users also vented anger at the government’s actions.

    Read:Iran denies missile downed plane, calls for data

    One wrote on Twitter: “I will never forgive the authorities in my country, the people who were on the scene and lying.”

    The protests were, however, far smaller than the mass demonstrations across Iran in support of Soleimani after he was killed.

    What has been the reaction?

    President Trump tweeted in both English and Farsi, saying: “To the brave and suffering Iranian people: I have stood with you since the beginning of my presidency and my government will continue to stand with you.

    “We are following your protests closely. Your courage is inspiring.”

    Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted video of the protests in Iran, saying: “The voice of the Iranian people is clear. They are fed up with the regime’s lies, corruption, ineptitude, and brutality of the IRGC [Revolutionary Guards] under Khamenei’s kleptocracy. We stand with the Iranian people who deserve a better future.”

    Read:Iran invites Boeing, US investigators to help probe plane crash likely downed by missile


    Source: bbc.com

  • US rolls out new Iran sanctions after airstrikes

    In a joint statement to the press on Friday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin announced a new raft of economic sanctions against several senior Iranian officials and major companies.

    The financial penalties came as a response to Iranian airstrikes against US bases in Iraq, which were in turn in retaliation for the assassination of Iran’s General Qassem Soleimani.

    Soleimani had been the commander of the Quds Force, a special unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. He was also known to be in charge of attacks on US targets within Iraq.

    Read:At UN, US justifies killing Iranian commander as self-defence

    “We don’t know exactly which day it would’ve been executed but it was very clear, Qassem Soleimani himself was plotting a broad, large-scale attack against American interests and those attacks were imminent,” Pompeo said.

    New sanctions will target individuals and firms who own, operate, or assist “sectors of the Iranian economy including construction, manufacturing, textiles and mining,” Mnuchin said.

    The plan is also to target the “inner heart of Iranian security apparatus” with the sanctions.

    Read:Iran denies missile downed plane, calls for data

    ‘It is likely that plane was shot down by an Iranian missile’

    While the Iranian airstrikes did not kill any US personnel, Pompeo said he believed it possible that the crash of a Ukrainian Airlines flight outside of Tehran on Wednesday that killed 176 civilians could have been caused by an Iranian missile launch.

    “We do believe it’s likely that plane was shot down by an Iranian missile. We are going to let the investigation play out before we make a final determination,” he said.

    Government officials in the US, UK, and Canada have said there is evidence that the crash was caused by a surface-to-air missile, though with the caveat that the passenger jet was not necessarily downed on purpose.

    Read:Iran invites Boeing, US investigators to help probe plane crash likely downed by missile

    During the press conference, Mnuchin said sanction waivers would be given to anyone wanting to “help facilitate the investigation” into the crash.

    Source: dw.com