Social and Political

iranintl – The Biden administration is set to move towards a reduced role for the US military in Iraq, amid continuing attacks by Iran proxies on American interests in the region. In a statement published Thursday, secretary of defense Lloyd Austin confirmed that the US-Iraqi Higher Military Commission (HMC) will convene meetings in the “coming days” to discuss new ways …

iranintl – A day after former president Hassan Rouhani was barred from running in the upcoming March 1 election, the Iranian public remained indifferent to his situation. Iranian hardliners controlling a conspicuous vetting mechanism told the former president that he was barred for running for re-election at Assembly of experts that will elect the next Supreme Leader after Ali Khamenei’s death. Most …

RFL/RE – It is not only missiles that are being lobbed as U.S. and U.K. air strikes aim to stop the Iran-backed Huthi rebels in Yemen from targeting ships in a key global trade route — mutual threats of continued attacks are flying around, too. The question is how far each side might go in carrying out their warnings without …

Iranwire – A sharp rise in executions in Iran has sparked a passionate call from Iranian civil society to abolish the death penalty in Iran, with a growing number of activists in and outside of the country announcing plans to go on hunger strike to make their voices heard. The campaign has grown since imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges …

Iranwire – An Iranian deputy education minister has said that approximately 30,000 children with disabilities are unable to attend primary schools in the country. Speaking on January 26, Masoumeh Najafi Pazuki also said that 140,000 pupils dropped out of school last year, while media reports have put the figure at over 200,000. Pazuki attributed the discrepancy to “deficiencies in the …

Iranwire – China has asked the Islamic Republic of Iran to help rein in attacks on ships in the Red Sea by Yemen’s Tehran-backed Houthi rebels, the Reuters news agency reported on January 26. Four unidentified Iranian sources and a diplomat were quoted as saying that the matter was raised at recent meetings between Chinese and Iranian officials in both …

VOA – The U.S. government privately warned Iran that the Islamic State group’s affiliate in Afghanistan was preparing to carry out a terrorist attack before bombings in Kerman earlier this month that killed 95 people, a U.S. official said Thursday. The official, who was not authorized to comment and insisted on anonymity to discuss the intelligence, said the U.S. was …

VOA – Iranian dissidents living inside the Islamic republic and in exile went on a hunger strike Thursday to protest a surge of hangings in Iran, which included most recently a participant in the 2022 protest movement who activists say had mental health difficulties. Led by jailed 2023 Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi, those going on the one-day hunger …

Al-Arabia – Iran has supplied Sudan’s army with combat drones, taking sides in a disastrous civil war fueled by proxies keen for Red Sea access that has displaced millions and risks destabilizing the wider region, according to senior Western officials. Iran’s intervention in the nine-month conflict on the side of the military, which has lost swathes of territory to a …

iranintl – The Pentagon has denied media reports that the Biden administration may be considering a full withdrawal of American troops from Syria in 2024. A report in Foreign Policy Wednesday suggested that “the White House is no longer invested in sustaining a mission that it perceives as unnecessary,” quoting “four sources within the Defense and State departments”. But a Pentagon …