Al-Arabia – Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Sunday that his country is experiencing its toughest year because of US sanctions coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic. For more coronavirus news, visit our dedicated page. The coronavirus crisis has exacerbated economic problems that worsened after US President Donald Trump withdrew in 2018 from Iran’s nuclear deal with major powers and reimposed sanctions. …

Al-Arabia – Saudi Arabia forced three Iranian boats out of its waters on Thursday after firing warning shots, the Kingdom’s border guards said on Saturday. The official spokesperson of Saudi Arabia’s boarder guard said: “On Thursday, Maritime Border Guard patrols detected three Iranian boats that entered Saudi waters. They were immediately followed, and repeated warnings were issued for them to stop, but they refused to …

RFL/RE – A semiofficial Iranian news agency issued a rare public announcement on June 27 of a visit to war-torn Syria by the commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force, Ismail Qaani, before deleting the report.Reuters reported that the hard-line Tasnim news outlet initially said Qaani had traveled to Abu Kamal, a Syrian town near the border with Iraq, in the …

VOA – An Iranian dissident sentenced to two years in prison for engaging in online activities deemed subversive by the government says he is defying a summons to begin serving his prison term. In a Friday message to VOA Persian, Reza Mazaheri, a Tehran-based computer repair technician, said he was rejecting a June 16 letter calling on him to appear …

Shabtabnews – In a statement IOPHR called “on all human rights organisations inside, and outside of Iran to prevent the execution of these three men, by launching a maximum pressure campaign, and putting pressure on the Iranian authorities.” Amir-Hossein Moradi, Saeed Tamjidi, and Mohammad Rajabi were sentenced to death in February in connection with acts of arson that took place …

Al-Arabia – Eight Iranian protesters have been charged with “spreading corruption on earth,” a crime punishable by death in Iran, in Isfahan province, a judiciary official said Friday, days after the country’s highest judicial authority upheld the death sentences of three other protesters. The cases of eight protesters have been finalized, and they have been charged with “spreading corruption on …

Radiofarda – The fugitive Iranian judge Gholamreza Mansouri who was found dead in suspicious circumstances at a Bucharest hotel on June 19, had told an extradition hearing in Romania that the corruption charges against him had been a “bogus scenario”. Mansouri was wanted in Iran for corruption and in Germany for human rights violations. Iranian authorities filed a case for his extradition on …

Radiofarda – Local officials in Iran’s Bushehr Province on the Persian Gulf say Saudi Arabia’s coast guard fired on Iranian fishermen who inadvertently crossed into Saudi waters. The date of the incident has not been mentioned but the fishermen left an Iranian port on June 21 for a ten-day fishing expedition, according to a report by Iran’s Mehr news agency, …

Radiofarda — A Danish court on Friday sentenced a Norwegian citizen to seven years in jail after finding him guilty of spying for an Iranian intelligence service and of complicity in a suspected plot to kill an Iranian Arab opposition figure in Denmark. The 40-year-old Norwegian man, who has Iranian heritage, was arrested in October 2018 after a major police …

Radiofarda – Alireza Zali, Chief of Coronavirus Combat Headquarters of Tehran, has said Friday studies show that between 14 to 20 percent of the residents of the Iranian capital have already contracted the coronavirus. Speaking on a live news program Zali said the highest number of cases and fatalities were found in District Four of Tehran which is the most …