Iranwire – Belgian Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib is facing calls for resignation after approving visa requests for citizens from Iran and Russia under international sanctions. Lahbib is under scrutiny for having granted visas to delegations from Iranian and Russian cities to attend a mayors convention in Brussels last week, only three weeks after Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele was released …

Iranwire – Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk has said that a free trade zone deal between Iran, Russia and four former Soviet republics is possible by the end of the year. Overchuk told the state TASS agency on June 19 that talks between Iran and the Eurasian Economic Union, which groups Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia, are in …

VOA – A Belgium regional official for Brussels, Pascal Smet, resigned on Sunday after sparking a furor by hosting an Iranian delegation led by the mayor of Tehran. Smet’s exit came three days after Belgian Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib accused him of “sullying the image” of the capital by allowing the Iranians and a Russian delegation to attend the Brussels …

VOA – Lebanon’s top Christian cleric said on Sunday the constitution and democratic system had been violated in “cold blood” during a failed attempt to elect a new president last week, and he warned that divisions in the nation had widened. Maronite Patriarch Bechara Boutros al-Rai spoke in his first sermon since the Iran-backed Shiite group Hezbollah and its closest …

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) – State media have reported the public execution of an unnamed man in a beach park in Bandar-e-Deylam in Khuzestan province. This is the second public execution in 2023. Repeating its warning about the resumption of public executions, Iran Human Rights urges the international community for urgent action to stop these state crimes. Director, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam …

Al-Monitor – Saudi Investment Minister Khalid al-Fatih claims he is “optimistic” about the economic potential of the detente announced March 10 between Saudi Arabia and Iran, brokered by China. In an interview with CNBC earlier this week, the minister said he was “very hopeful” that Saudi Arabia’s normalization with Iran will go beyond the two countries and address the concerns the international …

RFL/RE – Farzad Amiri joined the hundreds of thousands of Afghans who flocked to neighboring Iran after the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in 2021. Amiri found work at a supermarket in the city of Shiraz, the capital of the southwestern province of Fars, where he resides with his family of eight.But last week, Amiri, the sole breadwinner for his …

RFL/RE – Iranian state news agencies have reported the arrest of two young men accused of being part of a team that manages a Telegram channel associated with the wave of protests sweeping the country. The agencies, including the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), revealed the arrests on June 15 while also broadcasting what some suspect were “forced confessions.”Video of the …

Iranwire – Islamic Republic forces arrested on Friday at least three family members of Abolfazl Adinezadeh, a teenage boy who was killed in October 2022 during a crackdown on one of Iran’s nationwide protests. According to reports circulating on social networks, Ali Adinezadeh, the father of Abolfazl, Marzieh, his sister, and Reza, his uncle, were arrested just a day before …

Iranwire – Concerns are rising as access to the family of the slain child, Kian Pirfalak, has become impossible amid mounting pressures from security forces, and sporadic reports of house arrests, IranWire reveals.  The latest situation began on June 11, what would have been the tenth birthday of Kian, a young child who lost his life on November 16 of …