Iranwire – In recent weeks, the phrase “coldest election” has been used repeatedly to describe Iran’s 2021 presidential election. This is because, as the June 18 election nears, there is no sign of an election mood: no politicians frantically vying for attention and support, no air of expectation. In fact, the main candidates have not even been announced. This unprecedented …

gatestoneinstitute.org – The letter’s signatories remind the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee and the International Olympic Committee of their charter commitments and international obligations pertaining to the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment for Genocide. “At least one million of these victims are incarcerated in scores of concentration camps, some replete with crematoria, where they are being brainwashed, …

Al-Monitor – In his first address as the registration process for Iran’s presidential election kicked off, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei outlined desirable traits of the next administration in Iran. In the televised address, Khamenei clarified previous remarks he had made about the next administration being “young.” He said that he did not mean a Cabinet made up of people in …

foxbusiness –  Fifteen Republican senators have written a letter to three major business and financial groups warning them against engaging with Iranian businesses if the Biden administration lifts sanctions to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.  The letter sent Tuesday to the heads of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Financial Services Forum and Business Roundtable was co-signed by Sens. Tom Cotton, Ted Cruz, Marco …

Al-Arabia – Iran is still the “greatest, single threat” to stability in the region, the top US general for the Middle East said Tuesday. “And they still pursue a wide variety of malign activities, both directly and through proxies, that threaten not only us but our friends and partners across the region,” head of US Central Command (CENTCOM) Gen. Frank …

RFL/RE – His name was Alireza Fazeli Monfared and he was only 20 years old.Fazeli Monfared was homosexual and due to the difficulties he faced because of his sexual orientation, was about to flee his native Iran for Turkey.But he was reportedly killed by his family members before he could leave the southwestern province of Khuzestan after they accused him …

gatestoneinstitute.org – Last year, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei admitted for the first time that his country was supplying the Palestinian terrorist groups with weapons….”Iran realized Palestinian fighters’ only problem was lack of access to weapons” — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Reuters, May 22, 2020. The [earlier] denial exposes the extent of Iran’s scheme to deceive the …

Iranwire – Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe should be grateful to the Islamic Republic for its “benevolence” and “humanitarian actions,” the spokesman for the judiciary has said. The British-Iranian charity worker has been held in Iran for over five years. She spent the first four  in prison, and has been under house arrest since spring 2020. Authorities brought a new charge against her before …

Iranwire – Furious protests broke out in the Iraqi governorate of Karbala this week after an activist was assassinated and a TV journalist shot in the head in attacks blamed on Iran-backed militias. On Sunday, May 9 unidentified gunmen murdered Ihab Jahad al-Wazni, a prominent civil rights campaigner, in front of his house in Karbala’s Al-Haddad Street. Al-Wazni had railed …

VOA – Iran’s former firebrand president will run again for office in upcoming elections in June, raising the possibility of a bolstered hardline leadership at a time of tense negotiations with the West.  Thronged by shouting supporters, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad marched to a registration center at the Interior Ministry where he filled out registration forms. He held up his hands in …