Iran-HRM – A revolutionary court in Iran has sentenced human rights lawyer Soheila Hejab to 18 years in prison. The branch 28 of Tehran’s Revolutionary Court presided by notorious judge Abolghasem Moghiseh, has sentenced the rights activist to a total of 18 years behind bars on the charges of “propaganda against the state”, “assembly and collusion”, “disrupting public order to …

Iran-HRM – Sepideh Farhan, a civil rights activist held in Evin Prison, has been deprived of leave despite the Coronavirus outbreak and a promise of temporary release made last week by prison authorities. Her family posted a bail on March 18 to secure her release but Judiciary officials and prison authorities have refused to grant her leave since then.Civil rights activist, …

RFL/RE – The global death toll from the coronavirus has passed 21,000 with more than 470,000 infections confirmed, causing mass disruptions as governments continue to try to slow the spread of the new respiratory illness. Here’s a roundup of developments in RFE/RL’s broadcast countries. Russia The Russian government has ordered the suspension of all regular and charter flights in and …

VOA – Tehran has denied it knows the whereabouts of Robert Levinson after the United States demanded “a complete accounting” of what happened to the retired FBI agent, who is believed to have died in Iranian custody.  “Iran has always maintained that its officials have no knowledge of Mr. Levinson’s whereabouts, and that he is not in Iranian custody. Those facts …

VOA – Iran’s supreme leader refused U.S. assistance Sunday to fight the new coronavirus, citing an unfounded conspiracy theory claiming the virus could be man-made by America.   Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s comments come as Iran faces crushing U.S. sanctions blocking the country from selling its crude oil and accessing international financial markets.   But while Iranian civilian officials in recent …

AL-Monitor – Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani told a Cabinet meeting March 25 that “good steps” have been taken to unblock Iranian cash withheld in different countries due to US sanctions. Iran hopes the relief will help it overcome the ongoing coronavirus epidemic that has mounted an exponential hike over the past five weeks. Rouhani quoted an unnamed nonpermanent member of the UN …

Shabtabnews – On 24th March 2020, IOPHR sent an open letter to Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Managing Director of the World Health Organisation, pointing to the Iranian regime’s incapacity to the deal with Coronavirus , and thus asking WHO to directly intervene and deal with the epidemic in Iran . In there letter IOPHR points to Iranian regime’s incompetence, …

Radiofarda – A visiting Doctors Without Borders contingent in Isfahan has been barred from offering its relief services to coronavirus patients because of indecision, chaos and conflicts surrounding Iranian government organizations. President Hassan Rouhani says three of his cabinet ministers, Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli and Health Minister Saeed Namaki had invited the France-based NGO. However, …

Radiofarda – The official number of coronavirus victims in Iran reached 2,077 on Wednesday, March 25, the health ministry spokesman announced. With 143 new deaths, the epidemic does not show any signs of slowing down. The health ministry also said cases of the COVID-19 disease climbed to 27,017, with 2,200 new cases in one day. An independent estimate by Radio …

Radiofarda – Speaking on the side-lines of a meeting of cabinet ministers and President Rouhani on Wednesday Iran’s Central Bank (CBI) Governor said that part of Iran’s frozen assets may be released soon to enable the country to deal with the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) epidemic. “We have information that part of our assets that were frozen in other countries due to …