Social and Political

Al-Arabia – The 24-year-old man who stabbed Salman Rushdie hailed Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini as a “great person” in an interview published Wednesday. Speaking to the New York Post in a video interview from jail, Hadi Matar said he did not think Rushdie was “a very good person.” “He’s someone who attacked Islam, he attacked their beliefs, the belief systems,” …

An appeals court in Tehran has confirmed the prison sentences of three outspoken campaigners who wanted to sue government officials for allegedly mismanaging the coronavirus crisis and hampering the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines. One of the activists, Mostafa Nili, said the Court of Appeal of Tehran Province on August 16 confirmed the sentences they were appealing before the group, who are known …

Iranwire – A doctor in Iran’s Lorestan province has had his clinic sealed off and his medical license revoked for treating patients for free, IranWire has learned. Dr. Yaser Rahmanirad had also offered pregnant women referrals for prenatal screening from his clinic in Khorramabad. The Iranian government has recently moved to restrict patients’ checking for fetal abnormalities, as part of …

Iranwire – Iran’s Headquarters for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (Setad-PV) has published a 119-page document detailing the Islamic Republic’s hijab policy, and the rationale behind a recent government campaign to enforce the veiling of women more strictly and with a greater degree of violence. Entitled the “Hijab and Chastity Project”, the policy was apparently sent last winter to …

Iranwire – The IRGC’s Intelligence Organization (IRGC-IO) has announced a total ban on contact or collaboration with Belgium-based filmmaking NGO the Close Up Initiative. In an announcement on Wednesday, the IRGC-IO accused the Initiative of receiving “material and spiritual aid from the government of Israel”. It had been blacklisted, the Guards claimed, due to “the revelation of the true nature …

gatestoneinstitute.org – “Whenever they (Islamists) disagree with a woman, they accuse her of treason, threaten her with rape and torture, and bully her family.” — Ghada Oueiss, Lebanese journalist, to Lebanese television presenter Dima Sadek’s 1.1 million followers on Twitter, after she received death threats for criticizing the stabbing of author Salman Rushdie; Twitter, August 14, 2022. “Get out of …

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) – According to the Iran Judiciary spokesperson, Shahrooz Sokhanvari who was arrested by Interpol in Malaysia will be executed soon after the Supreme Court upheld his death sentence for “establishing a network of corruption.” Condemning the death penalty in Iran, Iran Human Rights is demanding answers about his alleged arrest and deportation from Interpol. Director, Mahmood …

Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) – Mohiyedin Damani, a Baluch man sentenced to death for drug-related charges, was executed in Birjand Central Prison. According to the Baluch Activists Campaign, a Baluch man was executed in Birjand Central Prison on August 17. His identity has been reported as Mohiyedin Damani who was sentenced to death for drug-related offences by the Revolutionary Court …

Al-Monitor – It’s not done until it’s done, but political analysts and oil-market experts believe a return to the Iran nuclear deal is closer than ever, with US and European officials reviewing Iran’s latest proposal.  If — or when — an agreement is reached, and the US ends sanctions imposed in 2018 when US President Donald Trump withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan …

RFL/RE – Three days after British-American author Salman Rushdie was seriously wounded in a shocking knife attack in New York, Iran “categorically” denied any links with the suspected attacker, 24-year-old Lebanese-American Hadi Matar. The Islamic republic, however, managed to place the blame on Rushdie, who has lived under an Iranian death sentence since 1989 because of his novel The Satanic …