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VOA – Iran on Sunday began an annual air force drill in the central part of the country, state media reported, as the United States sends more fighter planes to the region to deter the Islamic Republic from seizing commercial vessels in the Persian Gulf area. The official IRNA news agency said 11 Iranian air force bases participated in the …

VOA – Four Iranian policemen were killed on Sunday after attackers fired on a patrol in the restive southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan near the border with Pakistan, state media reported. “Three policemen were martyred in a terrorist attack on a police patrol unit,” state news agency IRNA reported. A fourth died later after succumbing to his wounds, state television reported. …

RFL/RE – Judges in Iran have diagnosed three prominent actresses sentenced for not wearing the hijab as mentally ill, anti-family, and antisocial, prompting top psychologists in the country to condemn the “abuse of psychiatry and psychology in the judiciary.” The heads of four leading psychiatry boards in the country went public with their criticisms after actresses Azadeh Samadi, Leila Bolukat, and Afsaneh …

RFL/RE – Iran’s Foreign Ministry summoned the Danish ambassador to protest against “the desecration of the Koran in Copenhagen,” the ministry tweeted on July 22. A day earlier, a man set fire to a book purported to be the Koran on a square across from the Iraqi Embassy in Copenhagen. Koran burnings are permitted in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway, which …

VOA – Accusations of beatings and the use of tear gas have been made against members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps by tourists in a scenic resort area of the country.Witnesses say that Thursday evening, a group of security officers — said to be wearing uniforms associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC — attacked tourists at …