Social and Political

RFL/RE – Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said the United States must lift all sanctions if it wants Iran to return to the nuclear deal with Western powers, state TV has reported. “If they want Iran to return to its commitments, the U.S. must lift all sanctions in practice, then we will do verification and see if the …

gatestoneinstitute.org – The Abraham Accords — between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain — will lead to billions of dollars of investment and trade between Israel and its partners in peace. The Accords will also allow the Emirates and Bahrain to benefit from Israeli technology, and see their defense strengthened against Iran. Sudan, freshly removed from the list of terrorist states, …

gatestoneinstitute.org – Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)… is a key supporter and sponsor of the Houthis, and has been stepping up its weapons supply to Yemen…. Saudi Arabia, Iran’s rival, has been the main target of Iran’s supply of weapons to the Houthis. After the attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil installations, Iran’s major state-owned newspaper, Kayhan, whose editor is a …

Iranwire – Iran will kick off its coronavirus vaccination campaign within a week and “this is a real cause for celebration,” President Hassan Rouhani said on February 6, two days after the country received its first batch of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine. The announcement comes amid fears of a fourth wave of the coronavirus that was first reported in Iran …

VOA – Iran’s foreign minister warned that the Iran nuclear deal could be further jeopardized if the U.S. does not ease sanctions against the Middle Eastern power by Feb. 21. Mohammad Javad Zarif, in an interview published Saturday in the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri, said recently passed legislation compels the government to harden its position on the issue. He also noted …

Iranwire – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, claimed in front of an audience of engineers at the Ministry of Agriculture, on June 29, 1979, that: “In the name of progress and civilization, the Shah of Iran derailed the country’s economic growth, stopped the development of universities and made Iran dependent on foreigners.” He added that: “That is why …

Iranwire – Amid escalating political tensions in Iran, a poll published by the Islamic Republic News Agency reveals what political factions and government authorities in Iran know too well: the Iranian people do not trust the government or the country’s political system. All sides of the entrenched political battle — whether officials from the administration of Hassan Rouhani or people …

Iranwire – In a recent announcement, senior Afghan officials declared they have identified 34 human trafficking networks operating in the first nine months of 2020, and arrested 60 people on human trafficking-related charges. The Afghan Justice Minister Fazl Ahmad Manavi said some of the defendants have since been sentenced to several years in prison. Although Afghans have represented the world’s …

Iran-HRM – Iran’s intelligence and security forces have summoned and detained at least 100 Kurdish citizens in what appears to be an escalating crackdown Iran’s Kurdish minority. Since January 6, Iranian authorities have targeted scores of Kurdish people including activists, environmentalists, writers, university students, and ordinary individuals with no track record of activism. Nine of the detainees are women. The …

Iran Human Rights (IHR) – 300 days after their arrests, Ali Younesi and Amirhossein Moradi, two elite Sharif University students, continue to be held in Evin Prison’s Ward 209 without being charged or access to a lawyer. A letter from the Islamic Republic’s Ambassador to the United Nations (UN) shows how he attempted to cover-up breaches of their human rights …