Social and Political

RadioThe outspoken Deputy Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Ali Motahari has called on Iran’s new Judiciary Chief Ebrahim Raeesi to “stop some wrong practices” in the judicial system. In a letter, Motahari, representing Tehran, has put forward five requests including one that calls on Raeesi (Raeisi) to stop limiting the number of defense lawyers political prisoners can choose from. Motahari …

Radiofarda – Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said his resignation last month was not related to Bashar Assad’s trip to Tehran at the end of February. Zarif abruptly announced he was resigning on February 25, immediately after Syrian strongman Bashar Assad visited Tehran and met with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani. Zarif was not present …

Radiofarda – A former ally and now a vocal opponent of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has been sentenced to three years in jail and ordered to read and copy three books. Abolfazl Qadyani (Ghadyani) who was a staunch revolutionary in the 1970’s and 80’s has become a critic of Khamenei calling him to step down and rejecting the concept …

Al-Arabia – Hundreds of people turned out in Washington Friday demanding regime change in Iran and denouncing “atrocity toward the people” under Tehran’s regime. Protesters waved Iranian flags as they chanted for “regime change now” – with some holding portraits of Maryam Rajavi, leader of the People’s Mujahedin, an Iranian opposition group banned in the country. “The regime inside Iran …

Iranian police have arrested a couple for “outraging public decency” after they got engaged in front of a crowd at a shopping mall.Video of the public proposal in the western city of Arak appeared on social media on March 8, showing the pair standing amid rose petals in a heart shape on the floor. Sobhan Hassanvand✔@Hassanvand Man publicly proposes to …

RFL/RE – Iranian President Hassan Rohani has called for what he called “decisive” action by Pakistan in the wake of a deadly suicide attack in a border area. During a telephone call on March 9, Rohani told Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan that inaction by Islamabad could jeopardize relations between the countries, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported. Twenty-seven members …

gatestoneinstitute -People, especially the younger generation, are not interested in the shopworn anti-American discourse seasoned with empty pseudo-Islamic slogans. The anti-American discourse sounds even more hollow when the Islamic Majlis publishes claims that some 15,000 children of senior Islamic Republic officials, including many mullahs, are in the United States for further studies and that hundreds of top Khomeinist officials are either …

CHRI – To the editors at the National Geographic, March 8, 2019 National Geographic has failed to report on the death of a prominent wildlife conservationist in Iran in an article about wildlife conservation in Iran. The conservationist, Dr. Kavous Seyed-Emami, died in Iranian custody in Tehran’s Evin Prison in February 2018. I am writing to register my dismay over …

CHRI – Education Minister Claims Strikers Wrongly Teaching Students How to Protest Thousands of teachers went on strike throughout Iran for the third time in less than a year March 3-5, 2019, to demand fair pay, the release of their imprisoned colleagues and free, universal education. “The most important reason for the strike is that the government does not feel obligated to implement Article 30 of …

Al-Monitor – “I remember that it was the first of Esfand,” the former senior Iranian official recalled, referring to Feb. 20 in the Iranian calendar, “I was at the Supreme National Security Council with Mr. Rouhani, and I told him that we won’t have any vacation for Nowruz this year. He asked: ‘What do you mean?’ I responded that I …