PayvandNews – Animation Lima directed by Afshin Roshanbakht and Vahid Jafari received the best animation award at the 10th Scottish Mental Health Arts & Film Festival. “A gorgeous stop motion short about a son’s struggle to keep the memory of his father alive, with an evocative score by Icelandic composer Stein Thor.” – Festival’s website Lima (2015) Written and Directed …

PayvandNews- The International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) should cease awarding Iran the right to host FIVB international tournaments until the country ensures that female spectators can freely attend volleyball matches in the country, Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Ary Graca, the sports federation’s leader. Graca was re-elected as the FIVB’s president at the sports federation’s 35th World Congress …

VOA – Iran has disrupted an Islamic State bombing plot targeting the Shi’ite religious commemoration of Ashoura, according to state media reports on Thursday. “Intelligence ministry agents, with the cooperation of other security forces, succeeded to defuse one of the anti-security plots of the ‘takfiri’ terrorist groups and prevent an inhuman crime in the ceremonies,” Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi said, …

IBTimes – A group of Iranian schoolgirls were reportedly flogged because their parents owed less than £7 ($8.50) in tuition fees. At least 10 girls are believed to have been punished by education authorities in the Mokhtarabad village in the country’s southern province of Kerman when it discovered their families could not afford to pay 30,000 toumans in fees. The students …

Al-monitor — In recent years, tension between Iran and Turkey has been rooted in differences over regional developments rather than bilateral disagreements. Indeed, if one reviews the exchanges between the two neighbors during the past two decades, one can see that clashing policy toward regional issues has been virtually the only source of conflict. Now, however, more than five years …

Iranhumanrighst.org – Families of the detainees who died after they were tortured in the Kahrizak Detention Center in 2009 and survivors have told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran that their quest for justice has gotten nowhere. Some of the cases brought by the families resulted in the conviction of low-level agents while other cases were closed with …

Iranhumanrights.org – Four months after her husband was unexpectedly forced to begin serving his 19-year prison sentence for his peaceful activism, Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee has refused to abide by a verbal order via telephone to report to Evin Prison to begin serving a six-year prison sentence for writing an unpublished story about burning the Koran and for her Facebook posts. …

PayvandNews – Millions of Shia Muslims in Iran and other parts of the world are commemorating Ashura, which marks the martyrdom anniversary of Imam Hussein (PBUH), the third Shia Imam. The faithful have converged on the streets and in mosques with heavy hearts to honor Ashura, the 10th day of the first month of the Islamic lunar calendar Muharram, which …

Amnesty – The Iranian authorities must urgently halt their plans to execute Zeinab Sekaanvand, a 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman who was arrested when she was just 17-years-old and convicted of the murder of her husband after a grossly unfair trial, Amnesty International said today. She is due to be executed by hanging as soon as 13 October. “Iran’s continued use of …

Al-monitor — Former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s attempt at a political comeback came to an abrupt end following his reported Aug. 30 meeting with the supreme leader. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reportedly told Ahmadinejad that his provincial tours in recent months were inappropriate and that his candidacy in the May 2017 presidential election would be divisive, thus effectively barring him from …