Iranwire – Jafar Panahi, one of Iran’s best-known filmmakers, was released from prison on bail, two days after he announced he was launching a hunger strike to protest his continued detention. Social media footage shows Panahi meeting with his family outside Tehran’s notorious Evin prison late on February 3. The Cannes film festival award-winner and director of The White Balloon, The Circle …

Iranwire – The Iranian House of Cinema has expressed “great concern” about the health condition of two jailed filmmakers – Jafar Panahi and Mozhgan Ilanlou – and urged the Islamic Republic to release them immediately. The official guild of Iranian cineastes made the plea in a statement on February 3, two days after Panahi, one of the country’s best-known filmmakers, announced he …

VOA —An Iranian government-backed hacking team allegedly stole and leaked private customer data belonging to French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, security researchers at Microsoft said Friday. The magazine was hacked in early January after it published a series of cartoons that negatively depicted Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. The caricatures were part of a media campaign that Charlie Hebdo said was intended to …

gatestoneinstitute.org – Thanks to the Biden administration’s weak and vacillating leadership, Iran, Russia and China have been emboldened to levels never before seen. [T]he Biden administration has not been taking any action to deter, disincentivize or punish those who breach the sanctions. Ever since the Biden administration assumed office, in fact, Iran’s oil exports have been on the rise… of …

Al-Monitor – Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu didn’t welcome the civics lesson by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken at a press conference in Israel last week, but he’ll pocket a big win on Iran, and a so-so win on Sudan, which outweigh the friction on other issues during the visit. Those “other issues” fall into the categories of something old and something new. Let’s start …

Al-Monitor – Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian visited Venezuela on Friday, following the South American country’s recent moves to warm up relations with the United States. Amir-Abdollahian arrived in Venezuela on Thursday night and met with his Venezuelan counterpart, Carlos Faria, as well as Venezuelan Oil Minister Tareck El Aissami on Friday. Amir-Abdollahian discussed unspecified bilateral and international issues with the officials, …

Foxnews – In the IRF Summit USCIRF staff gave an overview of the Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) Victims List and highlighted specific victims in #Iran, #Burma, #SaudiArabia, #NorthKorea, #China, and #Malaysia. At @IRFSummit, USCIRF staff gave an overview of the Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) Victims List and highlighted specific victims in #Iran, #Burma, #SaudiArabia, #NorthKorea, #China, …

Al-Arabia – Social media images purported to be of an emaciated jailed Iranian physician who went on hunger strike in support of demonstrations against the compulsory wearing of the hijab have caused outrage and warnings that he risks death. Farhad Meysami, 53, who has been in jail since 2018 for supporting women activists protesting against the headscarf policy, began his …

RFL/RE – A rights group says at least 185 citizens in the southeastern Iranian city of Zahedan have been arrested in the past month by security forces trying to stifle widespread dissent. Haalvsh, a group that monitors rights violations of the Sunni minority in Iran, says that it has been able to verify the identity of 125 of the detainees, but added …

RFL/RE – In late November, three Iranian doctors traveled to the country’s western Kurdistan region, the epicenter of ongoing antiestablishment protests, to help treat wounded demonstrators. But within days of their arrival, the medical professionals were arrested on security charges. Before they were released on bail last month, the three men were tortured in custody, informed sources told RFE/RL. The …