VOA – Turkish banker Mehmet Hakan Atilla, a prominent ally of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, came to New York this week to school investors on his state bank’s plans to sell new dollar bonds. Instead, he was placed under arrest by U.S. authorities and accused of conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions on Iran by teaming with wealthy Turkish gold …

Iranhumanrights.org – The five-year prison sentence against Christian convert Ebrahim Firoozi for his alleged missionary activities has been confirmed by the Appeals Court in Tehran, the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) has learned. The ruling, issued on January 15, 2017, also requires Firoozi to spend two years in exile in the village of Sarbaz in a remote part of Sistan …

Al-monitor – Anyone who follows international politics knows that the rivalry between Iran and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is bitter and has exacerbated the various conflicts raging across the Middle East. Relations between the two Persian Gulf power centers took a turn for the worse after the Arab Spring, as power vacuums emerged throughout the region, and further deteriorated when the …

Al-monitor – Iran’s relatively large number of holidays have long been a point of contention in the country, although many Iranians don’t hesitate to seize every chance to pack their bags and leave urban sprawls for nature. But now, clerics and a number of politicians are increasingly speaking out against what they deem excessive breaks, saying that the holidays harm the country. Added to the mix is …

PayvandNews – As the Trump administration appears to be taking a tougher line on Iran and the U.S. Congress ponders new hostile actions against the country, several members of the European Parliament visited Tehran in mid-March. The visit, organized jointly by the German Friedrich Ebert Foundation, close to the Social-Democratic party, and the Institute for Political and International Studies, the Iranian foreign ministry’s think-tank, …

PayvandNews – Norooz (Nowruz) World Festivity was held in UNESCO headquarters in Paris with Iran’s permanent representative to UNESCO sponsoring the festivity and 12 member countries of Norooz world registration dossier participating in the event. During the ceremony where many member-states’ ambassadors and representatives were present, the Iranian ambassador, responsible for coordination for Norooz registration in the World List of …

RFL/RE – A Berlin court has sentenced a Pakistani man to four years and three months in prison after he was convicted of spying for Iran. The sentence in the trial of Haidar Syed Mustafa came on March 28, after the court ruled that he had collected material on the former head of the German-Israeli Association and a French-Israeli professor …

VOA – Islamic State has issued a video threatening Iran and promising to conquer the country soon. The 36-minute, Persian-language video is aimed at Iran’s Sunni Muslim minority and accuses Tehran of persecuting them. But analysts said the intention behind the video released late Monday may be a desperate effort to show that IS, at its weakest since its declaration …

Iranhumanrights.org – Outspoken political activist and former reformist member of Parliament Faezeh Hashemi will face a new trial in April 2017 on undeclared charges, an informed source told the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). Branch 1060 of the Tehran Court for Government Employees had previously sentenced the daughter of late former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani to six months …

Iranhumanrights.org – The request for a judicial review of the death sentence against 21-year-old Sina Dehghan for “insulting the prophet” of Islam is being processed, his lawyer told the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). Mehdi Shakiba added that he was hopeful about the outcome, but declined to comment further in the interview on March 28, 2017. “According to Sina’s lawyer, steps …