AP – Israel’s domestic security agency said Tuesday it arrested an Israeli citizen alleged to have spied for Iran. The Shin Bet alleged in a statement the man was in contact with Iranian agents abroad, where he was given money, guidance and encryption tools. The Shin Bet said the man was expected to provide information on strategic Israeli sites, ways …

Radiofarda – More than 80 political and civil rights inmates in Sheyban (Shiban) prison in Ahvaz have been taken to an unknown detention center, an Iranian-Arab activist, Karim Dahimi, told Radio Farda on Tuesday, April 7. Ahvaz is the capital city of the oil-rich Khuzestan province, southwest Iran, where the majority of Arabic-speaking Iranians live. The decision to transfer the …

Radiofarda – Just how sick is Iran, really? As the coronavirus swept across the world throughout the month of March, the Islamic Republic quickly emerged as one of the key global hotspots for the disease. A month into the worldwide pandemic, however, the actual depths of the Iranian regime’s coronavirus crisis remain the subject of heated debate. To hear regime …

Radiofarda – The Iranian parliament (Majles) rejected an emergency bill for a one-month nationwide lockdown to control the spread of the coronavirus epidemic. In its first meeting in the new Iranian year on Tuesday April 7, lawmakers rejected the proposal because it “undermines the Constitution”. The motion was supported by 80 members of the Iranian Parliament. Health Minister Saeed Namaki, …

Iran-HRM – Elderly political prisoner Mohammad Banazadeh Amirkhizi remains incarcerated in Raja’i Shahr Prison of Karaj despite Judiciary’s New Year directive to free all prisoners over 70. The Judiciary Chief sent a letter to the mullahs’ Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in March in which he urged Khamenei to grant amnesty to part of the population of prisoners both because of …

Iran-HRM – The number of Iranian medical staff who lost their lives to the coronavirus in under equipped hospitals across the country is on the rise. Health workers, including doctors and nurses at the front lines of the fight against the deadly virus, lack basic protective equipment. According to citizen reports from Saqqez, 40 of the nurses and staff of the Khomeini hospital …

Iran-HRM- Iranian security officials have arrested some 150 men and women in three mixed-gender parties during the past days. The state security forces on Monday raided a party in the city of Sirjan and arrested more than a 20 participants on charges of holding a mixed-gender party, the state-run ROKNA news agency reported on Tuesday.Mohsen Nikvarz, the prosecutor of Sirjan …

Radiofarda – Iran’s parliament reconvened on April 7 for the first time since the new coronavirus outbreak forced it to close, as the country reported a drop in new infections for the seventh straight day. More than two-thirds of the legislature’s 290 members gathered in the absence of speaker and veteran politician Ali Larijani, who tested positive for the virus …

VOA – Iran demanded on Wednesday that U.S. oil production levels must be known before an upcoming OPEC meeting with Russia and others seeking to boost global energy prices.   The meeting of the so-called OPEC+ is scheduled to be held Thursday after officials delayed it following Saudi Arabia criticizing Russia over its comments about the price collapse.   A meeting in …

HRANA – Samaneh Norouz Moradi, a political prisoner, returned to Evin Prison on April 5, 2020. Ms. Morouzi is suffering from Lupus and breast infection. Even a doctor prescribed her mastectomy which has not been performed yet. She was granted furlough on March 18, 2020. Her request to extend her furlough was not accepted by Amin Vaziri, the special assistant …