Amnesty – Azerbaijani Turkic activist, Abbas Lesani, arbitrarily imprisoned in Ardabil prison, Ardabil province, was sentenced to 15 years in prison by an appeal court after a grossly unfair trial. The appeal proceedings were presided over by a judge who had filed the charges against him in his previous capacity as prosecutor. In July 2020, the Supreme Court rejected his …

gatestoneinstitute.org – In August, [Colombia’s] President Ivan Duque… claimed that the Nicolás Maduro regime in Venezuela is looking to acquire medium-to-long-range missiles from the Islamic Republic of Iran. For two decades, Iran has built a covert procurement and acquisition network in Latin America through joint military projects with Venezuela. The network is seemingly aimed at acquiring prohibited parts, minerals, metals, …

Al-Monitor – Iranian President Hassan Rouhani exulted Oct. 14 over a soon-to-come moment of triumph as a UN arms embargo on his country is set to expire Oct. 18. “Thanks to the nation’s resistance and our diplomats’ efforts, and despite America’s push in the past four years, this unjust embargo is to be lifted,” he said of the removal, which has been made legally …

theguardian.com – Iran, the crucible of coronavirus in the Middle East, smashed two grim records this week, reporting its largest number of deaths in a single 24 hours since the outbreak started in March, and the largest number of new infections. Iranian health officials openly admit Iran is deep into its third, and biggest, wave of the disease, and evidence suggests an …

Al-Monitor – Threats by an influential hard-line cleric against Iranian women with loose headscarves has opened up old wounds left behind in acid attacks perpetrated by religious extremists. We must make the social environment unsafe for these people. … We can’t let them simply break the norms in streets and parks,” said Ayatollah Yousef Tabatabai-Nejad in reference to Iranian women who violate the …

Al-Arabia – Saudi Arabia’s Council of Ministers reiterated on Tuesday the Kingdom’s strong condemnation of the Iran-backed Houthi militia’s continued launching of explosive-laden drones to target civilians in Saudi Arabia in a systematic and deliberate manner. The statement from the cabinet comes after virtual session chaired by Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz on Tuesday. The Iran-backed Houthi militia have …

Radiofarda – Lebanon and Israel began indirect talks Wednesday over their disputed maritime border, with American officials mediating the talks that both sides insist are purely technical and not a sign of any normalization of ties. The U.S. has been mediating the issue for about a decade, but only earlier this month a breakthrough was reached on an agreement on …

Radiofarda – Referring to Washington’s new, additional sanctions on Tehran, the spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, Saeed Khatibzadeh, said on Monday that “these decisions and sanctions have caused serious monetary and financial damages to Iran.” At his weekly press conference on Monday, Khatibzadeh announced, “We have been working for months to stop such shocks.” However, he warned that “the United …

Radiofarda – In Iran’s capital city of Tehran, a young teacher, Reza Nahzat, was sentenced to 45 lashes for “insulting” Iran’s Minister of Education and his deputy. A photo of the verdict is widely circulating on the Iranian social media. Nahzat is accused of “insulting” the Minister, Mohsen Haj Mirzaei, and his Deputy, Allahyar Torkamanyar, in a satirical note on …

RFL/RE – Internet freedom has declined for the 10th consecutive year as governments around the world are using the coronavirus pandemic as a “cover” to expand online surveillance, crack down on dissent, and build new technological systems to control society, Freedom House says in a new report. The Washington-based human rights watchdog’s annual Freedom Of The Net report, released on …