Iran-HRM – A peaceful gathering of farmers in Isfahan Province turned violent after the state security forces attacked the protesters on Wednesday. 

RFL/RE – A senior Iranian official has said the country is prepared to block Instagram once authorities sign off, a move that would deny 24 million users — including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rohani — access to the popular social-media platform.

VOA — Iranian theatre director Hossein Parsaee calls Victor Hugo’s classic a “masterpiece without borders” but his groundbreaking production of “Les Miserables” that has hit the stage in Tehran has a few unique twists.

gatestoneinstitute – Iran’s terror campaign is not directed only at the West’s democratic ally in the Middle East, but also at Europe itself.

HRANA – The following is an overview of human rights violations in Iran on January 2nd, 2019 based on the information compiled and verified by Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA).

Al-Monitor – Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has appointed Ayatollah Sadegh Amoli Larijani as chairman of the influential Expediency Council amid heavy speculation about who will succeed Larijani as head of the powerful judiciary. One top name circulated for the post is Ebrahim Raisi, the conservative who lost the 2017 presidential election.

CHRI – Imprisoned political activist Hengameh Shahidi has been held in solitary confinement for six months with extremely limited access to a lawyer since June 26, 2018, the day she was taken to Tehran’s Evin Prison.

CHRI – The food served at the Great Tehran Penitentiary (GTP) is unsanitary and has been found to contain rodent feces, making some prisoners sick, the wife of a political prisoner held there told the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI).

lobelog.com – After Donald Trump declared that he was pulling U.S. forces out of Syria, nearly all commentators declared that Iran would be one of the major beneficiaries–if not the major beneficiary–of the move. This is not surprising, since as a rule, U,S,, Arab, and even European commentators have declared Iran the winner of nearly all U.S. actions in the …

Radiofarda – Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah Yazdi, a top Shiite cleric and the spiritual father of Iran’s hardliner conservatives, says the Islamic Republic’s leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is aware that Iranians are evading religious teachings and turning to secularism.