Radiofarda – U.S. Special Representative on Iran Brian Hook says that Washington’s sanctions have cut Iran’s oil exports from 2.5 million barrels a day in May 2018 to 70,000 barrels in 2020. Hook who was speaking at a video-seminar on Iran and Venezuela organized by the Hudson Institute in Washington D.C. said, “This is the price the regime pays for acting like …

Al-Arabia – Iran is determined to develop its oil industry in spite of US sanctions imposed on the country, Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh said in a televised speech on Saturday. “We will not surrender under any circumstances … We have to increase our capacity so that when necessary with full strength we can enter the market and revive our market …

VOA – Thousands of Sufi mourners attended the funeral of their spiritual leader, Sheikh Mohammad al-Kasnazani, Friday in Iraq’s northeastern city of Sulaymaniyah. Among the mourners were more than 500 Iranian Kurdish Sufis who forced their way through the Iran-Iraq border to participate in the funeral rituals. VOA’s Rebaz Majeed attended the funeral and filed this report narrated by Bezhan …

(HRW) – Iranian courts have reportedly issued or upheld at least four execution sentences since late June 2020 in connection to repeated protests against the deterioration of economic conditions and government corruption over the past two years, Human Rights Watch said today.These sentences have been issued on vaguely defined national security charges, and defendants have had restricted access to lawyers and alleged …

Amnesty – Following the Iranian judicial authorities’ confirmation that on 8 July, a man in the city of Mashhad was executed following repeated convictions for drinking alcohol, Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director of Middle East and North Africa, said: “The Iranian authorities have once again laid bare the sheer cruelty and inhumanity of their judicial system by executing …

Iran Human Rights (IHR) – The Supreme Court has upheld the death sentences of three detained protestors, Amirhossein Moradi, Saeed Tamjidi, and Mohammad Rajabi, arrested at the nationwide demonstrations last November. According to Iran Human Rights (IHR), the death sentences of Amirhossein Moradi, Saeed Tamjidi and Mohammad Rajabi, who have been held at the Greater Tehran Prison (Fashafuyeh), were upheld …

Al-Monitor – “There is nothing to hide about the deal. Every stage has been transparent, and once it is finalized, the details will be made public,” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told lawmakers last week as he was grilled over a controversial 25-year partnership deal with China. “The point that has to be taken into consideration in our foreign policy is …

Shabtabnews – The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today applauded the U.S. Department of Treasury’s designations under the Global Magnitsky Act and the Department of State’s imposition of visa restrictions on senior Chinese officials responsible for egregious religious freedom violations against Uyghur and other Muslims in Xinjiang. “For years, USCIRF has called on the administration to impose targeted sanctions against Chen Quanguo, Zhu Hailun, …

christianpost.com – What has happened to Iran over the past four decades? Back in 1976, Iran was at the height of its glory after nearly two centuries. As a close ally of the U.S., the only friend of Israel in the region, and a prosperous nation with the eighth largest economy in the world, Iran was poised to surpass many …

Radiofarda – Iran’s electricity management company, TAVANIR, says consumers in the country set a new record for electricity consumption in the past few days. According to TAVANIR, the “historical record” was set at 12:47, Wednesday, July 8, with 57,571 MW of instant electricity consumption. Meanwhile, the overnight electric power consumption in from Tuesday to Wednesday also registered an instant electricity …