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Category: iran

  • The Telegram App Gives Voice To The Oppressed In Belarus And Russia. But Hate Groups Are Using It Too.

    In a year marked by tightened restrictions and unrest, Telegram sent a clear message to authoritarian governments who tried to keep it quiet in 2020. But as the app, which has earned a reputation as a free-speech platform, looks to spread the word in Iran and China, its popularity among messengers of violence and hate remains a concern.

    Telegram has emerged as an essential tool for opposition movements in places like Belarus and Iran and won a huge victory when the Russian authorities gave up on their effort to ban the app after two fruitless years during which senior officials continued to use it themselves.

    But protesters and open media are not the only ones who find sanctuary in a tool like Telegram. Terrorists, hate groups, and purveyors of gore also see the benefits of encrypted group chats that can reach large audiences without censorship.

    Not Under Your Thumb

    Nowhere was the hidden hand of Telegram more apparent in 2020 than in Belarus, where activists and opposition politicians relied on the platform to counter the authorities’ attempts to control the narrative in a crucial election year.

    Ahead of the August 9 vote pitting authoritarian incumbent Alyaksandr Lukashenka against a thinned pool of opposition candidates, the Belarusian authorities did their best to intimidate administrators of rogue Telegram channels.

    When three Telegram-based opposition bloggers were arrested in June, the rights watchdog Amnesty International decried the pressure against alternative sources of information.

    A quick perusal of some of the more sordid open channels on Telegram reveals that it is a place for violence, criminal activity, and abusers, regardless of what Europol says.

    “The Belarusian authorities are carrying out a full-scale purge of dissenting voices, using repressive laws to stifle criticism ahead of the elections,” said Aisha Jung, Amnesty International’s senior campaigner on Belarus.

    After Lukashenka claimed he had won a sixth straight term, triggering mass protests that continue to bring people onto the streets to contest the outcome, despite a violent police crackdown, it was the authorities who were crying foul.

    “You see: a square was drawn in a well-known channel on Sunday — go there. They went. They stood in this square,” Lukashenka said after attempts to block the websites of independent outlets drove the opposition-minded to Telegram. “They drew another one — go there, and then go to the Palace of Independence. This is how they manage.”

    In November, the state Investigative Committee was accusing the creators of the Poland-based Nexta channel on Telegram of organizing what it called “mass riots.” By the end of the month, the creators of the opposition-friendly news source had been added to the State Security Committee’s list of “persons involved in terrorist activities.”

    Claiming that up to 15 percent of the citizens of Minsk were using Telegram and generating 50,000 to 100,000 messages a day to coordinate actions through 1,000 channels, the deputy head of the presidential administration said that “these are huge figures, and we have no right to turn a blind eye to this.”

    But by then, even Lukashenka had long accepted the reality of Telegram’s power, using a newly created state Telegram channel to post videos in August of him brandishing an AK-47 and barking orders to security forces from his helicopter.

    As the authoritarian leader told friendly members of the press in September: “How can you stop these Telegram channels? Can you block them? No. Nobody can.”

    ‘If You Can’t Beat ‘Em…’

    Belarus was not the only one to grudgingly concede to Telegram this year. Russia too, after a two-year battle to ban the app, took the “if you can’t beat them, join them” approach.

    “Roskomnadzor is dropping its demands to restrict access to Telegram messenger in agreement with Russia’s Prosecutor-General’s Office,” the country’s communications regulator announced in June.

    Shortly afterward, the Communications Ministry admitted that it was “technically impossible” to block the messaging app.

    The ban, introduced after Telegram refused to comply with Russian demands that it hand over encryption keys to help fight terrorism, never really stuck anyway.

    Telegram founder Pavel Durov: "Over the course of the last two years, we had to regularly upgrade our ‘unblocking’ technology to stay ahead of the censors."

    Telegram founder Pavel Durov: “Over the course of the last two years, we had to regularly upgrade our ‘unblocking’ technology to stay ahead of the censors.”

    Despite official efforts to block it, courts, political heavyweights, and even the Russian Foreign Ministry had continued to use the platform. And according to Telegram founder Pavel Durov, use of the app had doubled since the ban, with 30 percent of its 400 million active users coming from Russia.

    The Russian entrepreneur had some experience defying the Kremlin, having created and headed the social-networking site VK before he was dismissed as CEO in 2014 after refusing orders to block Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny’s site and to hand over information about Maidan protesters in Ukraine.

    After Telegram was unblocked, Durov explained that “over the course of the last two years, we had to regularly upgrade our ‘unblocking’ technology to stay ahead of the censors.”

    The strategy included the formation of a “Digital Resistance” movement employing rotating proxy servers and other means of hiding traffic to circumvent censorship.

    “To put it simply, the ban didn’t work,” Durov said.

    Steps Taken, But Not Enough

    There was some merit to Russia citing the effort to fight terrorism as a reason for introducing the ban in the first place, considering that its initial demand for encryption keys stemmed from attempts to decipher comments authorities said were made on Telegram by a suicide bomber who killed 15 people in St. Petersburg in 2017.

    Going into 2020, Telegram was still dealing with such criticism, including that it was not doing enough to prevent extremist groups like Islamic State from disseminating information.

    Among the steps taken by Telegram were the introduction of an ISIS Watch feature that publishes daily updates on banned terrorist content and encouraging users to report extremist content.

    Europol even lauded Telegram’s actions, saying in late 2019 that “Telegram is no place for violence, criminal activity, and abusers. The company has put forth considerable effort to root out the abusers of the platform by both bolstering its technical capacity in countering malicious content and establishing close partnerships with international organizations such as Europol.”

    Those efforts, as well as Telegram’s role as a public-service beacon during the coronavirus pandemic, appear to have factored into the lifting of the digital blockade.

    But they didn’t end criticism that dangerous minds were still exploiting the app’s free-speech policies.

    Within hours, the manifesto of a gunman who killed nine people near Frankfurt, Germany, in February was being spread by right-wing extremist groups on Telegram.

    Within hours, the manifesto of a gunman who killed nine people near Frankfurt, Germany, in February was being spread by right-wing extremist groups on Telegram.

    A racially motivated shooting in February that left nine people dead in a town outside Frankfurt, Germany, sparked renewed concerns. Within hours of the attack, the perpetrator’s manifesto was being spread by right-wing extremist groups on Telegram.

    Scores of white nationalist groups, according to an analysis by Vice News, had made the switch to Telegram after they were kicked off mainstream social media like Facebook and Twitter.

    “Telegram makes a lot of sense for those groups: The app allows users to upload unlimited videos, images, audio clips, and other files, and its founder has repeatedly affirmed his commitment to protecting user data from third parties — including governments,” Vice News wrote.

    The Counter Extremism Project, an international policy organization formed to combat the growing threat from extremist ideologies, reported in May that it was still finding Islamic State propaganda on Telegram.

    In addition, the project said it had found “multiple white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups” on Telegram celebrating the shooting death in the United States of an unarmed black man, as well as encouraging mass shootings and violence against African Americans.

    What Did I Just Watch?

    A quick perusal of some of the more sordid open channels on Telegram reveals that it is a place for violence, criminal activity, and abusers, regardless of what Europol says.

    Multiple channels host full-length, uncensored videos showing the perpetrator of the 2019 Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand preparing for and carrying out the attacks in which 51 people were killed and 40 injured.

    Multiple videos of school shootings are available, and uncut videos of ordinary people being stabbed, shot, bludgeoned, or mutilated are ubiquitous.

    Compromising sex videos of Russian celebrities and politicians are there for the watching, as is a recent live-streamed incident in which a popular vlogger reportedly accepted money to lock his girlfriend outside in subzero temperatures, where she died.

    Amid the recent fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the breakaway territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, videos apparently taken by Azerbaijani soldiers and distributed on Telegram show executions, including beheadings, as well as other abuses of POWs. The videos prompted an investigation by the Council of Europe, Europe’s top human rights watchdog.

    Ihar Losik is the administrator of the Telegram-based Belarus Of The Brain channel and a media consultant for RFE/RL.

    Ihar Losik is the administrator of the Telegram-based Belarus Of The Brain channel and a media consultant for RFE/RL.

    Digital Resistance To Fight Another Day

    Now, as 2021 begins, the fight over Telegram is continuing — and expanding.

    In Belarus, the authorities continue to pursue charges against Telegram bloggers they accuse of fomenting unrest over the outcome of the August presidential vote. Among them is n mid-December, Losik announced that he had launched a hunger strike to protest his treatment and potential eight-year prison sentence.

    In Iran, the execution of activist and journalist Ruhollah Zam has sparked international outrage. Zam, who headed AmadNews — which had been suspended by Telegram in 2018 for publishing information about Molotov cocktails but was revived under a different name — was credited with helping inspire anti-government protests in 2017.

    And in China, where Telegram is banned, the app has seen a surge of millions of new users as other messaging platforms have suffered outages.

    Both Iran and China have come into focus among free-speech advocates in recent years, including efforts to develop technologies such as Signal and Tor that allow people to access the Internet and communicate privately.

    “We don’t want this technology to get rusty and obsolete. That is why we have decided to direct our anti-censorship resources into other places where Telegram is still banned by governments — places like Iran and China,” Durov wrote on his personal channel after Russia unblocked Telegram. “We ask the admins of the former proxy servers for Russian users to focus their efforts on these countries.”

    “The Digital Resistance movement doesn’t end with last week’s cease-fire in Russia,” Durov wrote in June. “It is just getting started — and going global.”

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • UN Condemns Iran’s Execution Of Juvenile Offender

    The United Nations has condemned Iran for executing a man convicted of murder when he was 16 years old, saying the punishment violated international law.

    The UN human rights office in Geneva said Mohammad Hassan Rezaiee was executed on December 31.

    He was the fourth juvenile offender put to death in Iran this year, the office said.

    “The execution of child offenders is categorically prohibited under international law and Iran is under the obligation to abide by this prohibition,” UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said in a statement.

    The UN high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet, “strongly condemns the killing,” she added.

    Shamdasani said the office was “dismayed that the execution had taken place despite” its efforts to engage with Tehran on the case.

    “There are deeply troubling allegations that forced confessions extracted through torture were used in the conviction of Mr. Rezaiee,” Shamdasani said, along with “numerous other serious concerns about violations of his fair-trial rights.”

    Iran regularly forces confessions from prisoners, often under duress or torture, rights groups say.

    Amnesty International said Rezaiee was arrested in 2007 in connection with the fatal stabbing of a man in a brawl and had spent more than 12 years on death row.

    Iran is among a handful of countries that execute juvenile offenders.

    Amnesty International said it is aware of at least 90 cases of people in Iran currently on death row for crimes that took place when they were under 18. The rights organization said the real number is likely to be far higher.

    Rights groups have called on Iranian authorities to urgently amend Article 91 of the 2013 Islamic Penal Code to abolish the death penalty for crimes committed by people under 18 in line with Iran’s international obligations.

    Iran is one of the world’s leading executioners. Amnesty International said in April that at least 251 people were executed by Iranian authorities in 2019.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • America Keeps Claiming Governments It Hates Are Paying Bounties On US Troops In Afghanistan

    We’re now getting mass media reports that yet another country the US government doesn’t like has been trying to kill American troops in Afghanistan, with the accusation this time being leveled at China. This brings the total number of governments against which this exact accusation has been made to three: China, Iran, and Russia.

    “The U.S. has evidence that the PRC [People’s Republic of China] attempted to finance attacks on American servicemen by Afghan non-state actors by offering financial incentives or ‘bounties’,” reads a new “scoop” from Axios, quoting anonymous officials who refused to name their sources.

    “The Trump administration is declassifying as-yet uncorroborated intelligence, recently briefed to President Trump, that indicates China offered to pay non-state actors in Afghanistan to attack American soldiers, two senior administration officials tell Axios,” the evidence-free report claims.

    The Axios report is already being circulated into public consciousness by mass media outlets like CNN. It is co-authored by Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, whose career lately has been focused on churning out extremely aggressive narrative management about China for a liberal audience, including a ridiculous hit piece on The Grayzone and its coverage of Xinjiang which failed to list a single piece of false or inaccurate reporting by that outlet. This eagerness to help manipulate public perception of America’s number one geopolitical rival has seen Allen-Ebrahimian rewarded with plenty of attention from “sources” who provide her with endless career-amplifying “scoops”.

    A few months ago, it was Iran we were being told is trying to use proxies to kill US troops in Afghanistan.

    “US intelligence agencies assessed that Iran offered bounties to Taliban fighters for targeting American and coalition troops in Afghanistan, identifying payments linked to at least six attacks carried out by the militant group just last year alone, including a suicide bombing at a US air base in December,” CNN reported in August without any evidence.

    Before that it was Russia this same accusation was being leveled at, with mainstream news media shamelessly regurgitating claims by anonymous intelligence operatives and then citing each other to falsely claim they’d “confirmed” one another’s reporting back in June. The story was sent so insanely viral by mass media narrative managers eager to pressure Trump on Russia during an election year that when the top US military commander in Afghanistan said in September that no solid evidence had turned up for this claim it was completely ignored, and to this day the liberal commentariat still babble about “Russian bounties” as though they’re an actual thing that happened.

    Three imperialism-targeted nations, same exact accusation. Pretty soon they’ll be telling us that bounties are being paid on US troops in Afghanistan by China, Russia, Iran, Venezuela, North Korea, Syria, Cuba, Hezbollah, WikiLeaks, Jimmy Dore, and the entire staff of World Socialist Website.

    The “Bountygate” narrative was one of the most brazen psyops we’ve seen rammed straight from the US intelligence community into public consciousness with no lube in recent years, and it was so successful that they’re just spraying it all over the place to see if they can replicate its effects on other targeted governments.

    It is not a coincidence that the information landscape is so confusing and bizarre right now. Our psyches are being hammered with more and more aggression by mass-scale psyops designed to manufacture support for increasing aggressions against the governments which have resisted absorption into the US-centralized empire, because as China rises and the US declines we’re moving toward a multipolar world.

    A movement toward a multipolar world should not be a frightening prospect–it’s been the norm throughout the entirety of human civilization minus the last three decades–but after the fall of the Soviet Union the drivers of the US power alliance decided that US global hegemony must be preserved at all cost. Drastic measures will be undertaken to try and retain hegemony, and propaganda campaigns is being rolled out with increasing urgency to grease the wheels for those measures.

    Meanwhile we’ve got nuclear-armed nations brandishing armageddon weapons at each other with increasing urgency and unpredictability because a few imperialists decided the entire planet should be governed from Washington DC. This, to put it gently, is an unsustainable situation.

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  • U.S. Bombers Overfly Persian Gulf Amid Concerns Over Possible Iranian Attacks

    The United States has reportedly flown two B-52 bombers over the Persian Gulf in the third such show of force in recent months, presumably meant to deter Iran from attacking U.S. or allied targets in the region.

    The U.S. bombers carried out a round-trip, 30-hour mission from Minot Air Force Base, in North Dakota, to the Middle East that ended on December 30.

    “The United States continues to deploy combat-ready capabilities into the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility to deter any potential adversary, and make clear that we are ready and able to respond to any aggression directed at Americans or our interests,” General Kenneth McKenzie, chief of U.S. Central Command, said in a statement on December 30.

    He added: “We do not seek conflict, but no one should underestimate our ability to defend our forces or to act decisively in response to any attack.”

    The U.S. Air Force has carried out two similar missions in the past 45 days.

    The mission reflects increasing concern in Washington that Iran could order further military retaliation for the U.S. killing of top Iranian military commander General Qasem Soleimani in neighboring Iraq in January.

    Days after the air strike that killed Soleimani, Iran launched a ballistic-missile attack on a military base housing international troops in Iraq that caused brain-concussion injuries to some 100 U.S. troops.

    Adding to U.S. concerns was a rocket attack last week on the U.S. Embassy compound in Baghdad by Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias.

    Nobody was killed in the attack, but U.S. President Donald Trump said Tehran was on notice.

    “Some friendly health advice to Iran: If one American is killed, I will hold Iran responsible. Think it over, Trump tweeted on December 23.

    The United States has reduced the number of staff at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

    With reporting by AP and The Washington Post

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Allocates $150,000 For Families Of Each Victim Of Ukrainian Plane Crash

    Iran says it has allocated $150,000 for the families of each of the 176 victims of a Ukrainian passenger plane that was downed in Iranian airspace nearly a year ago.

    The Iranian government said in statement on December 30 that it had approved the payment of “$150,000 or the equivalent in euros as soon as possible to the families and survivors of each of the victims” of the crash.

    Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 crashed shortly after taking off from Tehran’s main airport on January 8, killing all on board, including many Canadian citizens and permanent residents.

    Iran admitted days later that its forces accidentally shot down the Kyiv-bound plane after firing two missiles amid heightened tensions with the United States.

    Iranian Roads and Urban Development Minister Mohammad Eslami told reporters on December 30 that Iran’s final report on the crash had been sent to countries involved in investigating it — Ukraine, the United States, France, Canada, Sweden, Britain, and Germany.

    Earlier this month, an independent Canadian report accused Iran of not conducting its investigation properly and said that many questions remain unanswered.

    “The party responsible for the situation is investigating itself, largely in secret. That does not inspire confidence or trust,” said the report, written by the Canadian government’s special counsel on the tragedy.

    Iranian officials said the country never sought to hide the details about the air disaster or to violate the rights of the victims’ families.

    Flight 752 was downed the same night that Iran launched a ballistic-missile attack that targeted U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Tehran’s air defenses were on high alert in case of retaliation.

    Iran’s missile attack was in response to a U.S. drone strike that killed the powerful commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, Major General Qasem Soleimani, in Baghdad five days earlier.

    With reporting by Reuters

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Reports 12 Killed, 14 Rescued Following Avalanches

    Iranian rescue workers have ended their search for survivors of recent heavy snowstorms and avalanches in mountains north of Tehran.

    State television reported on December 27 that 12 people were killed in four separate avalanches following the storms. Fourteen people who had been reported missing were rescued by the international Red Crescent movement.

    Weather-forecasting authorities earlier criticized citizens’ failure to heed warnings against traveling to the mountains, which are a popular weekend destination for hikers, climbers, and skiers.

    The search-and-rescue operation took three days and involved 20 teams using helicopters to scour the Alborz mountain range.

    Tehran lies at the foot of the range, which stretches across 900 kilometers from the Iran-Azerbaijan border in the northwest to Khorasan Province in the northeast.

    Based on reporting by Reuters, AFP, and AP

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran’s President Claims Washington Demanding That Coronavirus Vaccine Transaction Run Through U.S. Bank

    Following an announcement that Tehran had won approval from the United States to use foreign-currency reserves to buy coronavirus vaccines, Iran’s president has claimed that Washington is now demanding that such a transaction go through a U.S. bank.

    President Hassan Rohani told a meeting of the government’s coronavirus-response team on December 26 that Iran sought to transfer money from an unidentified third country, and that it had received approval from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).

    However, Rohani claimed, while the OFAC “had initially indicated that it was not a problem,” it “later said that the money had to first pass through a U.S. bank before it reaches [the recipient].”

    Rohani blasted the alleged demand, which the Treasury Department has not confirmed, and questioned whether the United States might confiscate the funds.

    On December 24, Iranian central bank chief Abdolnaser Hemmati said that the OFAC had approved the transfer of around $244 million to a Swiss bank in order to purchase 16.8 million doses of vaccines from COVAX, a global COVID-19 vaccine-allocation plan led by the World Health Organization (WHO).

    While punitive financial sanctions imposed by the United States against Iran over its nuclear and regional activities prevented such transactions, Washington had been constrained by global public opinion to make an exception in this case, Hemmati claimed on Iranian state TV.

    Iran has been hard-hit by COVID-19, with nearly 1.2 million coronavirus cases recorded along with more than 54,000 deaths.

    Those numbers, which would make Iran the worst-affected country in the Middle East, are considered to be far lower than the actual figures released by Iranian health authorities.

    With reporting by Reuters, AFP, and Bloomberg

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Snowstorms In Iran Leave Eight Climbers Dead

    Snowstorms in Iran have left at least eight mountain climbers dead and several others missing. 

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Snowstorms In Iran Leave 10 Climbers Dead

    Snowstorms in Iran have left at least 10 mountain climbers dead and several others missing.

    State television reported the deaths on December 26, following several days of heavy snow and high winds that left roads closed in many parts of the country.

    Local news reports indicated that the death toll could be higher, as several climbers who were in the mountains north of Tehran remain unaccounted for.

    Search and rescue efforts have been halted for the night but are expected to resume on December 27.

    The casualties led weather-forecasting authorities to criticize citizens’ failure to heed their warnings against traveling to the mountains, where avalanches, a blizzard, and heavy snow have been reported.

    With reporting by Reuters

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran’s Zam And Other Sons Of The Islamic Republic Who Rebelled Against The Clerical Regime

    Ruhollah Zam’s father, a cleric who served as the head of Iran’s state propaganda agency in the 1980s, named him after the leader of the 1979 revolution and the founder of the Islamic republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

    But as an adult, Zam turned against the clerical establishment that was created by his infamous namesake.

    Zam’s opposition activities — including his popular Amadnews Telegram channel with its more than 1 million followers — cost him his life as Iranian officials accused the channel of fomenting violence during the December 2017-January 2018 mass protests.

    Zam, who chose for himself the name Nima instead of Ruhollah, was hanged on December 12 after being convicted on the vague charge of “corruption on Earth.” The criminal charge is used against dissidents, spies, and for those who attempt to overthrow the Islamic establishment.

    Zam was 42 years old.

    In 2019, Zam was reportedly lured — under unclear circumstances — to Iraq from Paris, where he was living in exile. He was believed to have been captured by members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and taken to Iran where he was put on a trial and sentenced to death.

    Zam is just one of a number of sons and daughters of the Islamic republic who have rebelled against the system that was created by their fathers.

    Zam, who openly said he was working to take down the Islamic establishment that he accused of “robbing the country,” is believed to be the only one of those offspring who has been executed recently.

    His father, Mohammad Ali Zam, was not successful in protecting him from authorities or preventing his execution. The cleric wrote on Instagram that his son was even unaware that his death sentence had been upheld on appeal when the father and son met one day before he was hanged.

    Other prominent “rebels” include Khomeini’s oldest grandson, Hossein Khomeini, who used to be a vocal critic of what he considered the repressive system founded by his grandfather.

    In media interviews, he accused Iranian leaders of oppressing the people and violating human rights.

    Khomeini traveled to the U.S. in 2003 where he announced that Iranians want democracy and freedom while adding they have realized that religion should be kept separate from the state.

    He returned to Iran with his family in 2005 and was put under temporary house arrest in the holy city of Qom, according to some reports, but was not prosecuted.

    Media reports later suggested the restrictions had been lifted after his prominent relatives mediated on his behalf. In 2018, a Tehran University professor posted a photo with Hossein Khomeini writing the Islamic republic founder’s grandson was “busy teaching and discussing” in Qom.

    No Chip Off The Old Block

    The eldest son of former IRGC commander Mohsen Rezai was also critical of the Iranian establishment. Ahmad Rezaei moved to the United States in 1988 where he blasted the clerical establishment in media interviews, accusing it of carrying out “terrorist attacks.”

    Ahmad Rezaei (right) with his father, former IRGC cmmander Mohsen Rezaei. (undated file photo)

    Ahmad Rezaei (right) with his father, former IRGC cmmander Mohsen Rezaei. (undated file photo)

    He returned to Iran in 2005 but did not face prosecution. Six years later he was found dead in a Dubai hotel. Some reports suggested that he had died of “an overdose of medicine.”

    Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani, the daughter of one of the founders of the Islamic republic, former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, has also become an outspoken critic of the establishment.

    Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani is the daughter of the late Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. (file photo)

    Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani is the daughter of the late Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. (file photo)

    She has warned that the system her father helped create has been weakened and could face collapse. She has also said Iranian leaders have been “misusing” Islam to push their agenda forward.

    In a 2018 interview, Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani said that “intimidation” and “fear” were the main things propping up the Islamic regime.

    She has been briefly detained a few times. In 2012, she was given a six-month jail term for “spreading propaganda against the system,” a charge often brought against critics and intellectuals.

    In 2016, Faezeh Hashemi Rafsanjani created controversy when she visited a former cellmate, a leader of the Baha’i community that has faced state persecution since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

    The meeting was described by powerful clerics as “despicable” and against norms amid calls for her prosecution. Her father was also critical of the meeting, describing the Baha’i faith that originated in Iran as a “deviant sect.” She later said in an interview that she didn’t regret the meeting.

    The division within families began in the early years of the revolution when some of the sons and relatives of Islamic republic officials joined groups such as the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO), which carried out a number of deadly attacks in the 1980s and later sided with Iraq during the bloody 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War.

    Among them is Hossein Jannati, one of the sons of the head of the powerful Guardians Council, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, who is also the chairman of the Assembly of Experts. That group is tasked with overseeing the work of the country’s supreme leader and choosing his successor.

    Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the head of Iran's assembly of experts.(file photo)

    Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the head of Iran’s assembly of experts.(file photo)

    According to some reports, Hossein Jannati was killed in clashes with security forces in 1981. His brother, former Culture Minister Ali Jannati, said in a 2017 interview that Ayatollah Jannati never expressed any grief over the death of his son, but adding: “he must definitely be very upset” over his fate.

    Another prominent case of a son straying from the views of his father is the son of the former Friday Prayers leader of Orumyeh, Gholam Reza Hassani, a member of the leftist Fedayin Khalq organization.

    In his 2005 memoirs, Hassani described how he helped authorities arrest his son, Rashid, in the 1980s. Rashid was executed shortly after his arrest.

    Hassani said he wasn’t saddened when he heard the news of Rashid’s execution because he felt he had carried out his duty.

    “When it comes to the Islamic Revolution, I will never balk at my duties, even if it comes to my son,” he said.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • At Least Six Fighters Reported Killed In Israeli Strikes In Syria

    A British-based group monitoring the Syrian conflict says least six Iran-backed fighters have been killed in an Israeli rocket attack in central Syria.

    The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on December 25 that the Israeli attack launched in the province of Hama also destroyed depots and rocket-manufacturing facilities belonging to pro-Iranian militias.

    Earlier, the official Syrian news agency SANA reported that Israeli rockets had targeted the area of Masyaf in rural Hama.

    The agency, citing a military source, added that Syrian air defenses had intercepted the “hostile” rockets and destroyed most of them.

    SANA did not report any casualties nor damage resulting from the reported attack.

    State television aired footage purporting to show air defenses responding to the attack.

    There has been no comment from Israel, which rarely confirms details of its operations in Syria.

    Along with Russia, Iran has provided crucial military support to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian conflict, which began with a crackdown on anti-government protesters in March 2011.

    Israel accuses Iran of building up its military presence in Syria and has repeatedly struck Iran-linked facilities, positions, as well as weapons convoys destined for Hizballah fighters in the war-torn country.

    Israel has carried out more than 30 air strikes on targets across Syria so far in the present year, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

    Based on reporting by AFP and dpa

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • At Least Six Fighters Reported Killed In Israeli Strikes In Syria

    A British-based group monitoring the Syrian conflict says least six Iran-backed fighters have been killed in an Israeli rocket attack in central Syria.

    The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on December 25 that the Israeli attack launched in the province of Hama also destroyed depots and rocket-manufacturing facilities belonging to pro-Iranian militias.

    Earlier, the official Syrian news agency SANA reported that Israeli rockets had targeted the area of Masyaf in rural Hama.

    The agency, citing a military source, added that Syrian air defenses had intercepted the “hostile” rockets and destroyed most of them.

    SANA did not report any casualties nor damage resulting from the reported attack.

    State television aired footage purporting to show air defenses responding to the attack.

    There has been no comment from Israel, which rarely confirms details of its operations in Syria.

    Along with Russia, Iran has provided crucial military support to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian conflict, which began with a crackdown on anti-government protesters in March 2011.

    Israel accuses Iran of building up its military presence in Syria and has repeatedly struck Iran-linked facilities, positions, as well as weapons convoys destined for Hizballah fighters in the war-torn country.

    Israel has carried out more than 30 air strikes on targets across Syria so far in the present year, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

    Based on reporting by AFP and dpa

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Says It Won Approval From U.S. To Transfer Money To Buy COVID Vaccines

    Iran has won approval from the United States to use foreign currency reserves it holds abroad to buy coronavirus vaccines despite U.S. sanctions on Iranian banks, the central bank chief said on December 24.

    Abdolnaser Hemmati said the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control approved the transfer to a Swiss bank.

    Hemmati said Iran would pay around $244 million for initial imports of 16.8 million doses of vaccines from COVAX, a global COVID-19 vaccine allocation plan led by the World Health Organization (WHO).

    Iranian officials have said that U.S. sanctions are preventing them from making payments to COVAX.

    “They (Americans) have put sanctions on all our banks. They accepted this one case under the pressure of world public opinion,” Hemmati told Iranian state TV.

    Earlier on December 24, Hemmati described the approval of the transfer in an Instagram post that did not give further details of the payment mechanism or the vaccine supplier.

    There was no confirmation from the U.S. Treasury Department.

    Iran’s death toll from COVID-19 is more than 54,000 and it is the worst-affected country in the Middle East.

    Health Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari told state TV earlier that 152 people had died of COVID-19 in Iran in the previous 24 hours.

    While that is the lowest number since September 18, officials have cautioned that there is a danger of a resurgence in infections.

    Based on reporting by Reuters and Bloomberg

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Jab Wanted: Iranians’ Fears Skyrocket That They Won’t Get Access To COVID-19 Vaccines

    Amid the launch of mass COVID-19 vaccination drives in the West, there’s growing concern among Iranians that they could be left behind.

    They fear U.S. sanctions and what some regard as the Iranian clerical establishment’s failure to prioritize the well-being of its citizens.

    Iranians, including health workers, have taken to social media to call on their leaders to purchase vaccines against the coronavirus amid allegations by Iranian officials that U.S. sanctions are impeding their ability to procure them through COVAX, a global payment facility aimed at ensuring vaccine distribution around the world.

    The concern over Iranians’ access to vaccines was also highlighted in a December 22 statement by more than two dozen rights groups and humanitarian organizations, including Human Rights Watch (HRW), who called on “all stakeholders to ensure that Iranians have swift, unencumbered, and equitable access to safe, effective, and affordable COVID-19 vaccines.”

    Without inoculations, many more Iranians are likely to die from the Middle East’s worst COVID-19 outbreak, which has already infected more than 1.1 million Iranians and claimed the lives of nearly 54,000, according to officials figures. Health officials have suggested that the country’s real coronavirus death toll could be twice that number.

    Sanctions

    Earlier this month, Iranian Central Bank Governor Abdolnaser Hemmati said in a social-media post that “inhumane sanctions by the U.S. government” were preventing the country from making any payment for vaccine doses via “the official channel of the World Health Organization (WHO).”

    Republican U.S. President Donald Trump reimposed stifling sanctions on Iran in 2018 after withdrawing the United States from a multilateral 2015 nuclear deal that exchanged sanctions relief for curbs on Iran’s disputed nuclear program.

    Democratic President-elect Joe Biden has said the United States will rejoin the accord if Tehran returns to strict compliance, although there is at least one effort afoot among Republicans in the U.S. Senate to prevent that.

    A COVAX spokesperson was quoted as saying that Iran has received a license from the U.S. Treasury Department to procure vaccines and that Tehran does not face any “legal barrier.”

    Humanitarian goods, including medicine and food, are supposed to be exempt from U.S. sanctions. But HRW has documented that U.S. sanctions have constrained Iran’s ability to finance vital medicines.

    Esfandiyar Batmanghelidj, the founder of Bourse And Bazaar, an opinion website focused on Iran’s economy that promotes business diplomacy between European countries and Iran, told RFE/RL that he thought Iran was seeking to use foreign-exchange reserves held in South Korea to make payments through the COVAX facility.

    “U.S. sanctions exemptions and licenses technically permit these payments to be made for a humanitarian good such as vaccines. But there are only two banks that have engaged in Iran-related transactions since the tightening of oil-related sanctions in 2010: Woori Bank and Industrial Bank of Korea. And both banks have in the last decade come under significant pressure from U.S. authorities over their Iran business,” Batmanghelidj said.

    A patient being treated for coronavirus at a hospital in Tehran.

    A patient being treated for coronavirus at a hospital in Tehran.

    “It is possible that the Trump administration has explicitly told these banks not to process these payments, but even without such a directive, bank executives will be strongly inclined to wait until the Biden administration is in office before proceeding,” he added.

    HRW Iran researcher Tara Sepehrifar argued that the United States and Iran must work together to provide Iranians access to vaccines quickly, adding that humanitarian exemptions have been insufficient to ensure Iran’s access to medicine in a timely manner.

    “The U.S. Treasury should actively work with banks and financial mechanisms to ensure Iran’s money in the form of foreign currency can be used for purchasing vaccines,” Sepehrifar told RFE/RL.

    “Iranian authorities should prioritize Iranians’ right to health and do everything in their power to ensure Iranians access to safe and effective vaccines as soon as possible,” she added.

    Iranians Blaming Their Leaders

    Speaking on December 22, government spokesman Ali Rabiei suggested that part of Iran’s problem was self-inflicted.

    He pointed to a failure to comply with rules of the global anti-money-laundering- and anti-terrorism-funding task force — known as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) — that are opposed by the country’s hard-liners.

    Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei recently ordered a review of legislation that would bring the country into FATF compliance.

    “Based on sanction laws and FATF principles, several possibilities for transferring money encountered problems,” Rabiei said, adding that the FATF blacklisting of Iran is affecting the country’s financial dealings.

    Many Iranians have tweeted about the need to access vaccines quickly using the Farsi hashtag #Buy_vaccines. Some blamed their own leaders for any potential delay and accused them of prioritizing their own ambitions over the health of citizens.

    Among them was prominent former political prisoner Zia Nabavi, who said “[Iranian authorities] consider nuclear energy, but not the right to life, an inalienable right.”

    “When I see my parents who, in their 70s, have become so frustrated at not seeing their children and grandchildren for a long time, I can no longer remain silent and control myself,” economist Siamak Ghassemi wrote on social media.

    Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei

    Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei

    “We know you well. Stop this self-sufficiency show and don’t [sacrifice] our lives for your own adventurism,” he added in an apparent reference to announcements by officials about working on Iranian vaccines and Tehrani officials’ long-running efforts to ensure stability despite Western isolation.

    A doctor in Tehran who did not want to be named said clinical trials for the Iranian vaccines have not started and added that the effort, even if successful, could take many more months.

    “For now, we have to rely on foreign vaccines,” he said.

    Speaking on December 23, President Hassan Rohani attempted to ease Iranians’ concerns.

    “We don’t have any worries for the future, even regarding the production of vaccines or the purchase of vaccines,” he said.

    Rohani added that the Central Bank and the Health Ministry were doing all they could to provide Iranians with vaccines.

    Mostafa Ghanei, the head of the scientific committee at Iran’s National Headquarters for Combating the Coronavirus, told the official news agency IRNA earlier this month that Iran was unlikely to purchase the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine due to its price tag and a local lack of infrastructure.

    But, without being specific, he suggested that the country has several other options.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Trump Warns Iran Over Rocket Attacks On Embassy In Iraq

    President Donald Trump has warned Iran against any attack on U.S. military or diplomatic personnel in Iraq, days after suspected Iran-backed Iraqi militia launched a barrage of rockets at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone.

    The warning, issued on Twitter on December 23, came after top U.S. national security officials met to prepare a range of options to propose to the president in order to deter any attack on U.S. interests in Iraq.

    The so-called principals committee group, including acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and national-security adviser Robert O’Brien met at the White House, Reuters reported, citing an anonymous official.

    For weeks, U.S. officials have suggested Iran or allied Iraqi militia could carry out retaliatory attacks to mark the first anniversary of the U.S. drone strike that killed Iran’s top general, Qasem Soleimani, and Iraqi militia leaders outside Baghdad’s airport on January 3.

    The aim of the White House meeting was “to develop the right set of options that we could present to the president to make sure that we deter the Iranians and Shia militias in Iraq from conducting attacks on our personnel,” a senior administration official told Reuters.

    Following the meeting, Trump took to Twitter to comment on a hail of rockets that targeted Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone on December 20, causing minor damage to the U.S. Embassy compound and residential areas in the international zone.

    “Our embassy in Baghdad got hit Sunday by several rockets. Three rockets failed to launch. Guess where they were from: IRAN,” Trump wrote above a picture claiming to show rockets from Iran.

    “Now we hear chatter of additional attacks against Americans in Iraq. Some friendly health advice to Iran: If one American is killed, I will hold Iran responsible. Think it over,” Trump wrote, repeating a redline over any American casualties.

    Following the December 20 attack, an Iraqi military statement said “an outlawed group” launched eight rockets at the Green Zone, the location of embassies and government buildings.

    Most of the rockets landed near an empty residential complex and checkpoint, injuring one Iraqi security person.

    Although no Americans were killed or injured by the rockets, the attack and Trump’s threat underscore a highly combustible situation in Iraq that could quickly spiral out of control.

    A rocket attack blamed on Iran-backed militia in December 2019 killed a U.S. defense contractor and wounded several U.S. and Iraqi soldiers at a military base in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, touching off a cycle of escalation that led to Soleimani’s killing and Iran launching retaliatory ballistic missiles at Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops, bringing the two rivals to the brink of full-fledged war.

    In a new show of force directed at Iran around the anniversary of Soleimani’s killing, a U.S. nuclear submarine carrying 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles crossed the Strait of Hormuz on December 21.

    The aircraft carrier USS Nimitz has been patrolling Gulf waters since late November, and two American B-52 bombers recently overflew the region in a demonstration of strength aimed at Iran.

    “My assessment is we are in a very good position and we’ll be prepared for anything the Iranians or their proxies acting for them might choose to do,” General Kenneth McKenzie, the U.S. commander for the Middle East, told journalists on December 20.

    U.S. officials have blamed Iran-backed Iraqi militia for carrying out a string of attacks on U.S. interests in Iraq this year, prompting Washington to threaten a diplomatic and military withdrawal from the country.

    The Trump administration in November ordered a reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq from 3,000 to 2,500 by mid-January.

    Several Iraq militia groups in October announced a brief suspension of attacks on U.S. interests on condition that a timetable would be presented for U.S. forces to leave Iraq. That truce came to an end on November 18 with a rocket strike on the U.S. Embassy.

    Meanwhile, the United States said in early December it was partially withdrawing some staff from its embassy in response to rising tensions.

    U.S. officials say the temporary staff reduction was in response to possible threats around the anniversary of Soleimani’s killing and that of leading Iraqi paramilitary figure Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.

    Aggravating the situation, tensions spiked again across the region following assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh near Tehran in late November. Iran has blamed Israel and, indirectly, the United States, raising the possibility that Iran or one of its regional proxies will retaliate.

    The developments in Iraq come as Trump ramps up pressure on Iran ahead of a transition to President-elect Joe Biden, who has said he will try to revive diplomacy with Iran upon entering the White House in January.

    Biden is expected to try to rejoin the Iran nuclear accord that Trump quit in 2018 and work with allies to strengthen its terms, if Tehran resumes compliance.

    Western diplomats and media reports have suggested Iran has told allied Iraqi militia groups to avoid provoking the United States in the final weeks of the Trump administration out of concern the situation could escalate before a more dovish Biden administration comes to power.

    But there are also questions about how much direct operational control Iran really maintains over an array Iraqi militia groups and proxies across the region, raising the prospect of accidents and miscalculations.

    “I do believe we remain in a period of heightened risk,” McKenzie, U.S Central Command head, told ABC News on December 22. “I would just emphasize this key point: We’re not looking to escalate ourselves. We’re not looking for war with Iran, I really want to emphasize that.”

    “It is my belief that Iran doesn’t want a war with the United States right now,” he added.

    With reporting by AFP and Reuters.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • U.S. Sanctions Put Spotlight On Iran’s International Network Of Religious Seminaries

    Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran’s clerical establishment has used religious organizations to expand its clout abroad.

    Key among them is the Al-Mustafa International University, a network of religious seminaries based in the Shi’ite holy city of Qom that has branches in some 50 countries.

    The university claims to teach Shi’ite Muslim theology, Islamic science, and Iran’s national language, Persian, to tens of thousands of foreign students across Asia, Europe, Africa, and South America.

    But Tehran’s adversaries say the university has been involved in espionage and recruited foreign fighters for Iran’s proxy war in Syria.

    For years, experts have documented the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ (IRGC) recruitment, training, and deployment of thousands of Shi’ite fighters to Syria to defend the country’s president, Bashar al-Assad, Tehran’s key ally in the brutal civil war that erupted in 2011.

    ‘Recruitment Platform’

    The United States imposed sanctions on the massive university network on December 8, alleging that it was involved in the recruitment of Afghan and Pakistani students to fight in the Syrian conflict.

    The U.S. Treasury Department said Iran’s elite Quds Force, the overseas operations arm of the IRGC, used the university’s foreign branches as a “recruitment platform” for “intelligence collection and operations,” including recruitment for pro-Iranian militias.

    The Treasury Department alleged that the Quds Force used the Al-Mustafa International University as a “cover” to recruit Afghans for the blacklisted Fatemiyoun Brigade, a pro-Iranian militia that fought in Syria.

    Moreover, Treasury said the Quds Force also used Al-Mustafa’s campus in Qom “as a recruitment ground” for Pakistani students to join the blacklisted Zeynabiyoun Brigade, a militia that consisted of Pakistani Shi’a.

    Treasury added that “multiple students from the university have been killed fighting in Syria.”

    In a statement on December 9, the university said it promoted “peace, friendship, and brotherhood among nations” and slammed the U.S. decision as “hegemonic.”

    ‘High-Value Individuals’

    Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington who has closely monitored IRGC activity in Syria, said that, according to his database from January 2012 to December 2020, 3,059 Iranian and allied foreign fighters were killed in combat in Syria.

    Alfoneh says of those, only three were students or graduates of the Al-Mustafa International University — known as Jamiat al-Mostafa University in Iran.

    “This indicates that Jamiat al-Mostafa has never served as the primary recruitment ground for the IRGC’s war effort in Syria,” he says.

    The IRGC recruited thousands of Afghan migrants and refugees within its own borders and covertly drafted hundreds of Shi’a inside Afghanistan. The same strategy was used to recruit Pakistanis.

    Alfoneh says the “three individuals identified appear to have been in command, intelligence, or political-ideological indoctrination positions.”

    That means, he said, that the IRGC perceived the graduates or students of the Al-Mustafa International University as “high-value individuals.”

    Regular fighters in the poorly trained forces of the Fatemiyoun and Zeynabiyoun brigades were often used as the first line of attack.

    Alfoneh says the IRGC considered the Afghan fighters “cannon fodder,” considering the seemingly minor investment made to train them and the exposure they faced on the battlefield.

    The total number of Fatemiyoun members who fought in Syria is unclear. Experts estimate the number was between 5,000 to 20,000, although Alfoneh says the figure is likely closer to the lower figure cited.

    Iranian authorities said the fighters travelled to Syria voluntarily to defend Shi’ite holy sites. Human rights groups said Afghan migrants and refugees in Iran were offered financial rewards and Iranian residency permits to join the fight in Syria.

    The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates there to be some 3.5 million documented and undocumented Afghan refugees and migrants living in Iran. Tehran has expelled many Afghans and periodically threatens those who remain with mass expulsion.

    Afghan Commander

    Among the three Al-Mustafa students or graduates killed in Syria was Seyyed Hashmat-Ali Shah, a Pakistani national and graduate of Al-Mustafa. He was a member of the Zeynabiyoun Brigade and was killed in combat in Syria in September 2016.

    Another Pakistani national was Mohammad-Hossein Momeni, also known as Mohammad Hosseini, a student at Al-Mustafa who was killed in Syria in April 2017.

    A funeral is held in the Iranian city of Mashhad for four Afghan refugees who were killed in action in Syria. (file photo)

    A funeral is held in the Iranian city of Mashhad for four Afghan refugees who were killed in action in Syria. (file photo)

    The most prominent graduate of the university was Alireza Tivasolii, the Afghan commander of the Fatemiyoun Brigade.

    Also known as Abu Hamed, he was killed in 2015 during clashes with the Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Nusra Front in the southern Syrian province of Daraa.

    Tivasolii moved with his family to Iran during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Soon after, he volunteered for the Abouzar Brigade, an Afghan militia that had fought on Iran’s side in the war against Iraq.

    After the war ended in 1988, Tivasolii enrolled and then graduated from the Al-Mustafa International University in Qom.

    In the 1990s, he returned briefly to his native Afghanistan to fight the Taliban, which had seized large swaths of the country after the Soviet withdrawal and a devastating civil war.

    Tivasolii also fought alongside the Iranian-backed Hizballah movement in Lebanon during the war with Israel in 2006.

    In 2015, a large funeral was held for Tivasolii in his adopted city of Mashhad, in northwestern Iran. Iranian state media reported that Tivasolii was trusted by the former powerful commander of the Quds Force, Qasem Soleimani, who was killed in a U.S. air strike in January 2020.

    Former Quds Force Commander Qasem Soleimani (left) with Afghan Alireza Tivasolii, commander of the Fatemiyoun Brigade, who was killed fighting in Syria: (undated)

    Former Quds Force Commander Qasem Soleimani (left) with Afghan Alireza Tivasolii, commander of the Fatemiyoun Brigade, who was killed fighting in Syria: (undated)

    The hard-line Rajanews.ir posted a photo of Soleimani and Tivasolii in military uniform.

    With the Syrian war ebbing, most fighters in the Fatemiyoun and Zeynabiyoun brigades have returned to Iran or their homelands.

    Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Afghanistan’s Tolo News in an interview on December 21 that less than 2,000 Fatemiyoun fighters still remain in Syria.

    Afghan Branch

    It is unclear how U.S. sanctions will affect Al-Mustafa’s international activities.

    One of Al-Mustafa’s largest foreign branches is in neighboring Afghanistan, where the majority of Muslims are Sunni, but around 15 percent of its population — mainly Hazaras — are Shi’a with religious links to the Shi’ite-majority in Iran.

    Iran shares deep historical, cultural, and linguistic ties with Afghanistan, and it has expanded its sway in the country through the funding of seminaries, media outlets, cultural centers, and infrastructure projects.

    Members of the Fatemiyoun Brigade attend the funeral in Tehran for Major General Qasem Soleimani, Iran's top military commander. (file photo)

    Members of the Fatemiyoun Brigade attend the funeral in Tehran for Major General Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s top military commander. (file photo)

    Hundreds of students are enrolled at the local branch of the university — locally known as Jamiat ul-Mustafa — in the capital, Kabul.

    Afghanistan’s Higher Education Ministry told RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan that the Iranian university has “conducted its activities in accordance with the rules and regulations” of the ministry.

    But spokesman Hamid Obaidi said the ministry would soon “make a decision” about the university’s future in Afghanistan considering U.S. sanctions against Al-Mustafa.

    Exporting Shi’ism

    Observers say Al-Mustafa has become Iran’s chief tool for promoting Shi’ism abroad.

    The university received around $80 million in the 2020-2021 Iranian budget, serving to highlight its importance.

    Al-Mustafa is believed to receive additional funding from the office of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and businesses under his control.

    Mehdi Khalaji, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who studied Shi’ite theology in Qom, said the Al-Mustafa International University is owned and run by Khamenei.

    Khalaji said Al-Mustafa “specializes in educating non-Iranian clerics.”

    Observers say Al-Mustafa spreads anti-Western and anti-Semitic propaganda, and its activities are seen to be tied to Tehran’s longstanding effort to export the Islamic Revolution.

    The university’s activities in Europe came under scrutiny in 2016 when an Iranian national in Kosovo was charged with financing terrorism.

    Hasan Azari Bejandi was the head of the Qur’an Foundation of Kosova, an umbrella group for five Shi’ite organizations operating in Kosovo. The umbrella group appeared to be affiliated with the Al-Mustafa National University, which claimed that Bejandi was its representative in Kosovo.

    Saeed Ghasseminejad and Alireza Nader at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) wrote that three religious organizations — the Islamic Development Organization, Al-Mustafa International University, and the Islamic Propaganda Office of Qom Seminary — play a “central role in projecting [Iran’s] influence abroad.”

    They said that the three organizations were focused on “training Shi’ite clerics, sending missionaries across the globe, and disseminating Shi’ite propaganda” with the goal of creating a “network of native missionaries in each country who are loyal to Tehran.”

    Iranian journalist and writer Akbar Ganji said that Al-Mustafa “harbors a huge army of potential sympathizers of ayatollahs who could spread their ideology around the globe.”

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Reprisal Murders Targeting Journalists Doubled In 2020, New Report Finds

    The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says 21 journalists worldwide were singled out for murder in reprisal for their work in 2020, more than double the previous year’s figure of 10.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Nuclear Deal Parties Await U.S. Return To Accord

    Remaining parties to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal said December 21 they were preparing for a possible return of the United States to the accord.

    President-elect Joe Biden, who takes office on January 20, has said he will try to rejoin the deal, which was struck when he was vice president.

    In a joint statement following a virtual foreign ministers’ meeting on the ailing nuclear deal, Germany, France, and the UK, along with accord signatories China, Russia, and Iran, said they were ready to “positively address” a U.S. return to the nuclear accord.

    “Ministers acknowledged the prospect of a return of the U.S. to the JCPOA and underlined their readiness to positively address this in a joint effort,” they said in a statement, referring to the formal name of the accord, the Joint Comprehensive Plan Of Action.

    “Ministers reiterated their deep regret towards the U.S. withdrawal from the agreement,” they added.

    The three European powers, known as the E3, have struggled to keep the JCPOA on life support since President Donald Trump withdrew from the accord in 2018 and imposed punishing sanctions on Iran under a so-called “maximum pressure” campaign.

    In response, Iran has gradually breached parts of the agreement restricting the amount of enriched uranium it can stockpile and the purity to which the uranium is enriched. Iran says it can come back into compliance with the deal once the United States and E3 fulfill their end of the agreement by providing Tehran economic relief promised under the accord.

    Biden has suggested he will reenter the JCPOA if Iran complies with the agreement, leaving other issues of concern such as Iran’s ballistic missiles and support for regional proxies to “follow on” agreements.

    Iran says its missile program and regional policies are off the table, and Washington and the E3 must first comply with the nuclear agreement.

    “Renegotiation is out of question,” Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif wrote on Twitter after the ministers’ meeting, reiterating Iran will not agree to a new deal.

    “Iran will rapidly reverse remedial measures in response to U.S. unlawful withdrawal—and blatant E3 breaches—when US/E3 perform their duties. The Iranian people MUST feel the effects of sanctions lifting,” he said.

    EU foreign ministers appear to be coalescing around the idea that the first priority should be to save what’s left of the nuclear accord, before adding more complicated and contentious issues.

    “We are standing at a crossroads today,” German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told reporters in Berlin, adding that the deal’s fate will be determined in the coming weeks and months.

    “To make possible a rapprochement under Biden, there must be no more tactical maneuvers of the kind we have seen plenty of in recent times—they would do nothing but further undermine the agreement,” he added.

    “The opportunity that is now being offered—this last window of opportunity —must not be squandered,” Maas said. “We made that very clear today to Iran in particular.”

    Complicating the situation is the assassination in November of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh near Tehran. Iran has blamed Israel and, indirectly, the United States, raising the possibility that Iran or one of its regional proxies will retaliate.

    In response to the killing, hardliners in Iran’s parliament passed a bill calling for the further expansion to Iran’s nuclear program and an end to inspections of nuclear facilities by the UN watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

    Iran’s Foreign Ministry said it opposes the bill and President Hassan Rohani’s moderate government has suggested he will not sign it into law. IAEA inspections are considered one of the key features keeping the nuclear deal alive.

    All sides are also running up against the timeline of June elections in Iran, in which Rohani will not be running because of term limits. Analysts say a possible hardliner victory in those elections would complicate saving the JCPOA, which is opposed by Rohani’s domestic critics.

    With reporting by AFP, AP, and dpa.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Rockets Target U.S. Embassy In Baghdad

    A barrage of rockets has targeted Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, causing minor damage to the U.S. Embassy compound and residential areas in the international zone.

    An Iraqi military statement said “an outlawed group” launched eight rockets on December 20 targeting the Green Zone, the location of embassies and government buildings. Most of the rockets landed near an empty residential complex and checkpoint, injuring one Iraqi security person.

    The U.S. Embassy said its defense systems engaged the rockets and called on the Iraqi government to take action to prevent such attacks by militia groups.

    “These sorts of attacks on diplomatic facilities are a violation of international law and are a direct assault on the sovereignty of the Iraqi government,” the U.S. Embassy said in a statement.

    U.S. officials have blamed Iran-backed Iraqi militia for carrying out a string of attacks on U.S. interests in the country, prompting Washington to threaten a diplomatic and military withdrawal from the country.

    Several militia groups in October announced a brief suspension of attacks on U.S. interests on condition that a timetable would be presented for U.S. forces to leave Iraq. That truce came to an end on November 18 with a rocket strike on the U.S. Embassy.

    The United States confirmed in early December it was partially withdrawing some staff from its embassy in response to rising tensions with Iran and Iraqi militia groups.

    U.S. officials say the temporarily staff reduction came ahead of the first anniversary of the U.S. strike that killed Iran’s top general, Qasem Soleimani, and Iraqi militia leaders outside Baghdad’s airport on January 3.

    Soleimani’s killing and that of leading Iraqi paramilitary figure Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis led Iraq’s parliament to pass a non-binding resolution calling for the exit of all foreign troops from Iraq.

    U.S. officials say Iran or allied militia could carry out a possible retaliatory strike around the anniversary.

    Tension spiked again across the region following assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh near Tehran in late November. Iran has blamed Israel and, indirectly, the United States, raising the possibility that Iran or one of its regional proxies will retaliate.

    The developments in Iraq come as President Donald Trump ramps up pressure on Iran ahead of a transition to President-elect Joe Biden, who has said he will try to revive diplomacy with Iran upon entering the White House in January.

    Biden is expected to try to rejoin the Iran nuclear accord that Trump quit in 2018 and work with allies to strengthen its terms, if Tehran first resumes compliance.

    Western diplomats and media reports have suggested Iran has told Iraqi militia groups to avoid provoking the United States in the final weeks of the Trump administration out of concern the situation could escalate before a more dovish Biden administration comes to power.

    The Trump administration in November ordered a reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq from 3,000 to 2,500 by mid-January.

    With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Magnitude 4.5 Quake Strikes Northwestern Iran

    An earthquake with a magnitude of 4.5 struck northwestern Iran, near the border with Turkey, state media reported.

    The official news agency IRNA reported on December 20 that the quake struck the region of Qotur in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province at a shallow depth of 5 kilometers.

    IRNA did not report if the quake had caused any casualties or damage.

    The quake struck the Iranian region of Qotur in West Azerbaijan Province.

    The quake struck the Iranian region of Qotur in West Azerbaijan Province.

    A magnitude-5.7 earthquake in February in the same area on the Iran-Turkey border killed nine people in Turkey, injured more than a hundred in villages and towns in both countries, and caused buildings to collapse across southeastern Turkey.

    Iran sits on top of major tectonic plates and experiences frequent seismic activity.

    A 7.3-magnitude quake in the western province of Kermanshah killed 620 people in November 2017.

    In 2003, a 6.6-magnitude quake destroyed the ancient mud-brick city of Bam in Iran’s southeast, killing at least 31,000 people.

    Iran’s deadliest quake was a 7.4-magnitude tremor in 1990 that killed 40,000 people, injured 300,000 others, and left half a million homeless in the country’s north.

    Based on reporting by IRNA and Reuters

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Canada Questions Iran’s Probe Into Accidental Downing Of Ukrainian Passenger Jet

    An independent Canadian report published on December 14 has questioned Iran’s investigation of its own military’s accidental downing of a Kyiv-bound passenger plane, killing 176 people.

    Iran is not conducting the probe properly and many questions remain unanswered, the report said in the latest complaint over Iran’s handling of the aftermath of the disaster.

    “The party responsible for the situation is investigating itself, largely in secret. That does not inspire confidence or trust,” said the report, written by the Canadian government’s special counsel on the tragedy.

    Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 crashed shortly after taking off from the Iranian capital’s main airport on January 8, killing all on board, including 85 Canadian citizens and permanent residents.

    Iran admitted days later that its forces accidentally shot down the plane after firing two missiles amid heightened tensions with the United States. Flight 752 was downed the same night that Iran launched a ballistic-missile attack that targeted U.S. soldiers in Iraq, and Tehran’s air defenses were on high alert in case of retaliation.

    Iran’s missile attack was in response to a U.S. drone strike that killed the powerful commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, Major General Qasem Soleimani, in Baghdad five days earlier.

    “Many of the key details of this horrific event remain unknown,” the report said, noting in particular why Iranian airspace had remained open the night of the tragedy.

    “Iran bears responsibility for that because — at least thus far — it has not conducted its investigations (safety, criminal or otherwise) in a truly independent, objective and transparent manner,” the report continued.

    Canada said in October that it would set up its own team of investigators to collect and analyze available information on the crash.

    In early November, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) called on Iran to “expedite the accident investigation” and publish its final findings on the crash.

    The author of the report, Ralph Goodale, a former minister in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet, also called for a review of the current international standard that entrusts the investigation of an aviation crash to the country where the accident occurred.

    “In the case of a military shoot-down, that means the very government involved in causing the disaster (Iran in this case) is in complete control of the safety investigation, obvious conflicts of interest notwithstanding, with few safeguards to ensure independence, impartiality or legitimacy,” the report said.

    “This undermines the investigation’s credibility and enables a sense of impunity in avoiding essential questions.”

    Trudeau welcomed the report and called on Iran to “answer comprehensively, with supporting evidence” the questions the document raises.

    With reporting by Reuters and AFP

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Canada Questions Iran’s Probe Into Downing Of Ukrainian Passenger Jet

    An independent Canadian report published on December 14 has questioned Iran’s investigation of its own military’s accidental downing of a Kyiv-bound passenger plane that killed 176 people.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • How Gulf States became Business Partners in Israel’s Occupation

    Since signing the Abraham Accords, the UAE and Bahrain have been actively colluding with Israel’s settler movement and military authorities

    The professed rationale for the recent Abraham Accords, so-called “peace deals” signed with Israel by the UAE and Bahrain, was to stymie Israeli efforts to annex swaths of the West Bank.

    The aim was supposedly to neutralise another “peace” plan – one issued early this year by US President Donald Trump’s administration – that approved Israel’s annexation of large areas of the West Bank dominated by illegal Jewish settlements.

    The two Gulf states trumpeted the fact that, in signing the accords in September, they had effectively scotched that move, thereby salvaging hopes of a future Palestinian state. Few observers entirely bought the official story – not least because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed that annexation had only been put on temporary hold.

    The real purpose of the Abraham Accords appeared less about saving Palestinians than allowing Gulf states to go public with, and expand, their existing ties to Israel. Regional intelligence could now be shared more easily, especially on Iran, and the Gulf would gain access to Israeli hi-tech and US military technology and weapons systems.

    Separately, Sudan was induced to sign the accords after promises it would be removed from Washington’s list of “terror-supporting” states, opening the door to debt relief and aid. And last week, Morocco became the fourth Arab state to initiate formal relations with Israel after the Trump administration agreed to recognise its occupation of Western Sahara.

    Twisting more arms

    Israel, in return, has been able to begin “normalising” with an important bloc of Arab states – all without offering any meaningful concessions on the Palestinian issue.

    Qatar and Saudi Arabia are also reported to have been considering doing their own deals with Israel. Jared Kushner, Trump’s Middle East adviser, visited the region this month in what was widely assumed to be a bid to twist arms.

    Riyadh’s hesitation, however, appears to have increased after Trump lost last month’s US presidential election to Joe Biden.

    Last week, during an online conference held in Bahrain and attended by Israeli Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi, a former senior Saudi government official, Turki al-Faisal al-Saud, launched a blistering verbal attack on Israel, saying it jailed Palestinians in “concentration camps” and had built an “apartheid wall”. It was unclear whether he was speaking in more than a personal capacity.

    While the covert purpose of the Abraham Accords was difficult to obscure, the stated aim – of aiding Palestinians by preventing Israel’s annexation of the West Bank – was still seen as a vital tool for the UAE and Bahrian to sell these agreements back home.

    But in practice, both have quickly jettisoned any pretence that Palestinians will benefit from these deals. Not only that, but already they barely bother to conceal the fact that they are actively and tangibly colluding with Israel to harm Palestinians – by bolstering Israel’s illegal settlements and subsidising its military regime of occupation.

    Trade with settlements

    Bahrain demonstrated this month how indifferent it is to the negative impacts on Palestinians. On a visit to Israel, the country’s trade minister, Zayed bin Rashid al-Zayani, said Bahrain was open to importing products from Israel wherever they were manufactured. “We have no issue with labelling or origin,” he said.

    The comment suggested that Manama was ready to become a gateway for Israel to export settlement products to the rest of the Arab world, helping to bolster the settlements’ legitimacy and economic viability. Bahrain’s trade policy with Israel would then be even laxer than that of the European Union, Israel’s top trade partner. The EU’s feeble guidelines recommend the labelling of settlement products.

    After wide reporting of Zayani’s comments, Bahrain’s state news agency issued a statement shortly afterwards saying he had been “misinterpreted”, and that there would be no import of settlement goods. But it is hard not to interpret the remarks as indicating that behind the scenes, Bahrain is only too willing to collude in Israel’s refusal to distinguish between products from Israel and those made in the settlements.

    That this is the trading basis of the Abraham Accords is further highlighted by reports that the UAE is already welcoming business with Israel’s illegal settlements. An Israeli winery, using grapes grown on the Golan Heights, a large plateau of Syrian territory seized by Israel in 1967 and illegally annexed in 1981, has reportedly started exporting to the UAE, which has liberalised its alcohol laws for non-citizens.

    This is a fruitful turn of events for Israel’s 500,000 settlers in the occupied West Bank. They have lost no time touting for business, with the first delegation arriving in Dubai last month hoping to tap new markets in the Arab world via the UAE. Last week a settler delegation reportedly returned to Dubai to sign an agreement with a UAE company to import settlement goods, including alcohol, honey, olive oil, and sesame paste.

    New low-point

    This marks a new low-point in the shift by Arab states away from their original position that Israel was a colonial implant in the region, sponsored by the West, and that there could be no “normalisation” – or normal relations – with it.

    In 2002, Saudi Arabia launched the Arab Peace Initiative, which offered Israel full diplomatic relations in return for ending the occupation. But Gulf states are now not only normalising with Israel when the occupation is actually intensifying; they are normalising with the occupation itself – as well as its bastard progeny, the settlements.

    Israel has built more than 250 settlements across a vast expanse of occupied Palestinian territory – 62 percent of the West Bank, referred to as Area C under the Oslo Accords. This area was supposed to be gradually transferred to the Palestinian Authority (PA), the government-in-waiting under Mahmoud Abbas, to become the territorial backbone of a Palestinian state.

    Instead, over the past quarter of a century, Israel has used its supposedly temporary control over Area C to rapidly expand the settlements, stealing vital land and resources. These colonies have been highly integrated into Israel, with settler roads criss-crossing the occupied West Bank and tightly limiting Palestinian movement.

    The peace deals with the UAE and Bahrain will help the settlements entrench further, assisting Israel’s longstanding policy of annexing the West Bank in all but name, through the creation of facts on the ground – the very outcome the Abraham Accords were ostensibly meant to prevent.

    Yossi Dagan, head of the West Bank regional council that visited Dubai last month, declared that there was “no contradiction between our demand to impose sovereignty [annex large parts of the West Bank] and the strengthening of commercial and industrial ties” with the Gulf.

    Al-Aqsa dividend

    In other words, settlers see the Abraham Accords as a business opportunity to expand their footprint in the occupied West Bank, not an obstacle. The likely gains for the settlers will include tourism, too, as visitors from the Gulf are expected to flock to al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem.

    The irony is that, because of Israel’s physical seizure of areas around the Islamic holy site and its control over access, Gulf Arabs will have far greater rights at al-Aqsa than the majority of Palestinians, who cannot reach it.

    Jordan, which has long been the custodian of al-Aqsa, justifiably fears that Saudi Arabia may use a future accord with Israel to muscle its way into taking charge of the Jerusalem holy site, adding it to its guardianship of Mecca and Medina.

    In occupied Jerusalem, Palestinians are deprived of the chance to develop their own housing, let alone infrastructure to cope with the business opportunities provided by the arrival of wealthy Gulf Arabs. That should leave Israel and its settler population – rather than Palestinians – well-placed to reap the dividends from any new tourism ventures.

    In a supreme irony, a member of the Abu Dhabi ruling family has bought a major stake in the Beitar Jerusalem football team, whose supporters are fiercely anti-Arab and back the takeover of East Jerusalem by settlers.

    Palestinian laboratories

    During his visit, Bahrain’s Zayani observed that, as his country geared up for flights to and from Israel next month: “We are fascinated by how integrated IT and the innovation sector in Israel has been embedded in every facet of life.”

    But Israel’s technology sector is “embedded in every facet of life” only because Israel treats the occupied Palestinian territories as a laboratory. Tests are conducted there on how best to surveil Palestinians, physically limit their movement and freedoms, and collect their biometric data.

    The hi-tech firms carrying out these experiments may be formally headquartered inside Israel, but they work and profit from their activities in the occupied territories. They are a vast complex of settlement businesses in their own right.

    This is why Nabil Shaath, an aide to Abbas, observed of the Gulf’s burgeoning ties with Israel that it was “painful to witness Arab cooperation with one of the worst manifestations of aggression against the Palestinian people, which is the Israeli settlements on our land”.

    Settler ally

    How enthusiastically the UAE and Bahrain are getting into the occupation business, and preparing to subsidise its worst features, is highlighted by the Abraham Fund, set up by the US in October. It is a vehicle for Gulf states and Israel to secure billions of dollars in private investment to underpin their new diplomatic relations.

    Again, the official story has glossed over the reality. According to statements from the main parties, the fund is intended to raise at least $3billion to bolster regional economic cooperation and development initiatives.

    The UAE’s minister of state, Ahmed Ali Al Sayegh, has said: “The initiative can be a source of economic and technological strength for the region, while simultaneously improving the lives of those who need the most support.”

    The fund is supposed to help Palestinians, as one of those groups most in need of support. But again, the main parties are not playing straight. Their deception is revealed by the Trump administration’s selection of who is to head the Abraham Fund, one of its last appointments before the handover to Biden.

    According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, the fund will be overseen by Aryeh Lightstone, a fervently right-wing rabbi and ally of Israel’s settler community. Lightstone is a senior adviser to David Friedman, the US ambassador to Israel who has his own strong ties to the settlements. Friedman pushed aggressively for the US to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to occupied Jerusalem. Trump finally did so in May 2018, breaking an international consensus against locating diplomatic missions in Jerusalem.

    Checkpoint upgrade

    The political priorities of Lightstone are evident in one of the Abraham Fund’s first declared projects: to “modernise” Israeli checkpoints across the occupied West Bank.

    The checkpoint upgrade is being hailed by US officials as benefiting Palestinians. It will speed up their passage as they try to move around the occupied West Bank, and as those with permits enter Israel or the settlements to work. One senior Trump administration official promised checkpoint delays that currently keep Palestinians waiting for many hours could be dramatically cut: “If I can upgrade that, which doesn’t cost a lot of money, and have it take 30 seconds, I am blowing up [freeing up] 400,000 work hours a day.”

    There are many glaring problems with this approach – not least that under international law, belligerent military occupations such as Israel’s must be temporary in nature. Israel’s occupation has endured for more than five decades already.

    Efforts to make the occupation even more permanent – by improving and refining its infrastructure, such as through upgrades to create airport-style checkpoints – is in clear breach of international law. Now the Gulf will be intimately involved in subsidising these violations.

    Further, the idea that the Abraham Fund’s checkpoint upgrade is assisting Palestinians – “those who most need support” – or developing their economy is patently ridiculous. The fund is exclusively helping Israel, a robust first-world economy, which is supposed to shoulder the costs of its military rule over Palestinians.

    The economic costs of occupation are one of the few tangible pressures on Israel to withdraw from the territories and allow Palestinians sovereignty. If the oil-rich Gulf states help pick up the tab, they will incentivise Israel to stay put and steal yet more Palestinian land and resources.

    Indeed, the hours being freed up, even assuming that is what actually happens, are unlikely to help the Palestinian economy or bring financial benefits to the Palestinian labourers Israel has made dependent on its economy through the lengthy occupation. To develop their own economy, Palestinians need their land and resources stolen by Israel restored to them.

    Herding Palestinians

    Seen another way, the Abraham Fund’s planned checkpoint upgrade is actually a subsidy by the Gulf to the settlements. That is because the very purpose of the checkpoints is to enforce Israeli control over where and when Palestinians can travel in their homeland.

    Israel uses the checkpoints as a way to herd Palestinians into particular areas of the occupied West Bank, especially the third under nominal PA control, while blocking their entry to the rest. That includes a denial of access to the West Bank’s most fertile land and its best water sources. Those areas are exactly where Israel has been building and expanding the settlements.

    Palestinians are in a zero-sum battle against the settlers for control over land in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Any help Israel receives in restricting their movement through checkpoints is a loss to Palestinians and a victory for the settlers. Modernised checkpoints will simply be far more efficient at herding Palestinians where Israel and the settlers want them to be.

    In partnering with Israel on upgrading checkpoints, the Gulf will be aiding Israel in making its technology of confinement and control of the Palestinian population even more sophisticated, benefiting once again the settlers.

    This is the real story of the Gulf’s Abraham Accords – not simply of turning a blind eye to Israel’s decades-long oppression of Palestinians, but of actively becoming partners with Israel and the settlers in carrying out that oppression.

    • First published in Middle East Eye

    This article was posted on Monday, December 14th, 2020 at 11:23pm and is filed under Annexation, Apartheid, Bahrain, Benjamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump, EU, Human Rights, Hypocrisy, Iran, Israel/Palestine, Israeli Defence Force (IDF), Jordan, Land Theft, Morocco, Occupation, Palestinian Authority, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Surveillance, Technology, Tourism, Trade, United States, US Military, West Bank, Zionism.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Turkey Detains 11 Suspected Of Abducting Iranian Dissident

    Turkish authorities say they have detained 11 people suspected of spying and abducting an exiled Iranian political dissident on behalf of Tehran.

    Agents from Turkey’s MIT intelligence service arrested the Turkish nationals two weeks ago following Habib Chaab’s disappearance in Istanbul, the Turkish police said on December 14.

    Chaab, the former leader of the separatist group the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahwaz (ASMLA), lived in Sweden and visited Turkey in October.

    Turkish police said the suspects grabbed Chaab in Istanbul and smuggled him to the Iranian border region of Van before giving him up to Iranian officials.

    A senior official was quoted as saying he was drugged and kidnapped by a network working “on behalf of Iran’s intelligence service” after being lured into flying to Turkey by an Iranian intelligence operative.

    There was no immediate public comment from Iran.

    Iran’s state media reported Chaab’s arrest in November by Iranian intelligence officers.

    ASMLA said Tehran had kidnapped Chaab, also known as Habib Asyud, after “luring” him to Turkey.

    The group, which has an armed branch and seeks a separate state for ethnic Arabs in Iran’s oil-producing southwestern province of Khuzestan, was named by Tehran as being behind a deadly 2018 terror attack on a military parade in the southwestern city of Ahvaz that left at least 25 dead, including civilians.

    In recent years, a number of Iranian opposition activists have ended up in Iran under mysterious circumstances.

    They include opposition journalist and activist Ruhollah Zam, a former exile in France who was seized while he was traveling in Iraq in 2019.

    He was convicted of “corruption on Earth” and sentenced to death in June before being hanged last week, triggering international condemnation.

    The announcement by the Turkish authorities follows a rare public spat between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and top Iranian officials.

    During a visit to Baku on December 10 to attend a parade celebrating Azerbaijan’s resumption of control over parts of its Nagorno-Karabakh region and adjacent districts following a military conflict with neighboring Armenia, Erdogan read parts of an Azeri-Iranian poem that Iranian officials said supported separatism among Iran’s large ethnic Azeri minority.

    Iranian authorities summoned Turkey’s ambassador to Tehran to complain about Erdogan’s “interventionist and unacceptable remarks.”

    Turkey replied by summoning Iran’s ambassador to Ankara to protest the “baseless” claims.

    Turkey and Iran have close political and trade relations but find themselves on opposite sides of the Syrian conflict and have other regional disputes.

    Ankara is a close ally of Azerbaijan.

    With reporting by Reuters and AFP

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Sentences British-Iranian Academic To 8 Years In Prison

    Iran has sentenced British-Iranian anthropologist Kameel Ahmady, who studies child marriage and female genital mutilation, to eight years in prison.

    The researcher’s lawyer, Amir Raesian, said on December 13 that his client had received an eight-year sentence for “collaborating with a hostile government.”

    “We will present an appeal request against this ruling and we are still hopeful,” Raesian said on Twitter.

    The semi-official Tasnim news agency reported a Revolutionary Court sentenced the academic to nine years in prison and ordered him to pay a $727,000 fine. It was unclear why the discrepancy over the duration of the prison sentence.

    It was not immediately clear if Ahmady will begin serving the sentence now or will remain free pending an appeal.

    Ahmady wrote on Twitter that he was already subject to 100 days of detention last year and denied access to his lawyer while being interrogated.

    He accused Iranian authorities of targeting him for his research on “the most harmful traditions about children in disadvantaged minority areas of Iran.”

    Tasnim reported Ahmady was charged with cooperation with European embassies to promote homosexuality, visiting Israel, cooperation and communication with hostile media, and providing false reports to the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in Iran.

    Ahmady, an ethnic Kurd whose research touched on sensitive issues in the conservative country, was arrested at his home in Tehran in August 2019. He was released in November 2019 on bail.

    In addition to studying child marriage and female genital mutilation, he also researches minorities, gender, and temporary marriages practiced in Shi’ite Islam.

    Ahmady is one of several dual nationals who’ve been detained by Iran in the past several years.

    Critics say Iran arbitrarily detains dual nationals as part of hostage diplomacy to extract political concessions from Western countries.

    With reporting by AP, Reuters, and Tasnim.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Sentences British-Iranian Academic To 8 Years In Prison

    Iran has sentenced British-Iranian anthropologist Kameel Ahmady, who studies child marriage and female genital mutilation, to eight years in prison.

    The researcher’s lawyer, Amir Raesian, said on December 13 that his client had received an eight-year sentence for “collaborating with a hostile government.”

    “We will present an appeal request against this ruling and we are still hopeful,” Raesian said on Twitter.

    The semi-official Tasnim news agency reported a Revolutionary Court sentenced the academic to nine years in prison and ordered him to pay a $727,000 fine. It was unclear why the discrepancy over the duration of the prison sentence.

    It was not immediately clear if Ahmady will begin serving the sentence now or will remain free pending an appeal.

    Ahmady wrote on Twitter that he was already subject to 100 days of detention last year and denied access to his lawyer while being interrogated.

    He accused Iranian authorities of targeting him for his research on “the most harmful traditions about children in disadvantaged minority areas of Iran.”

    Tasnim reported Ahmady was charged with cooperation with European embassies to promote homosexuality, visiting Israel, cooperation and communication with hostile media, and providing false reports to the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in Iran.

    Ahmady, an ethnic Kurd whose research touched on sensitive issues in the conservative country, was arrested at his home in Tehran in August 2019. He was released in November 2019 on bail.

    In addition to studying child marriage and female genital mutilation, he also researches minorities, gender, and temporary marriages practiced in Shi’ite Islam.

    Ahmady is one of several dual nationals who’ve been detained by Iran in the past several years.

    Critics say Iran arbitrarily detains dual nationals as part of hostage diplomacy to extract political concessions from Western countries.

    With reporting by AP, Reuters, and Tasnim.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Summons German, French Envoys Over EU Condemnation Of Journalist’s Hanging

    Iran has summoned the German and French ambassadors to Tehran after the European Union condemned the execution of an Iranian journalist whose online work helped inspire anti-government protests in 2017, Iranian state media report.

    According to the IRNA news agency, Iran’s Foreign Ministry told the envoys that Tehran rejects the EU statement as “an unacceptable interference in Iran’s domestic affairs.”

    Ruhollah Zam, a former exile in France, was hanged on December 12, sparking a chorus of international outrage.

    The EU condemned the journalist’s execution “in the strongest terms” and reiterated its “irrevocable opposition to the use of capital punishment under any circumstances.”

    France called the execution a “barbaric and unacceptable act” and a “serious breach of free expression and press freedom in Iran.”

    Zam, 47, was being held in Iran after Iranian intelligence services reportedly seized him while he was traveling in neighboring Iraq in 2019.

    He was sentenced to death in June following what media watchdog Reporters Without Borders called a “grossly unfair” trial.

    Zam was convicted of “corruption on Earth,” a charge often leveled in cases involving espionage or attempts to overthrow Iran’s government.

    Germany expressed its shock about the circumstances of Zam’s sentencing and what it described as his “abduction from abroad” and forced return to Iran.

    Zam’s website, AmadNews, and a channel he created on the popular messaging app Telegram had informed people about the 2017 protests, which began over economic hardship and spread nationwide.

    The protests represented the biggest challenge to Iran since postelection mass unrest in 2009 and set the stage for similar turmoil in November 2019. More than 20 people were killed during the unrest and thousands were arrested.

    AmadNews was suspended on Telegram in 2018 but later continued under a different name.

    Based on reporting by AP, dpa, AFP, and Reuters

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Russia ‘Looking To Counter’ U.S. Sanctions Against Iran

    Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said Moscow continues to reject U.S. sanctions against Iran, has put its money where its mouth is by increasing trade with Tehran, and that Moscow will continue to look for new ways to counter the punitive measures.

    “We do not just refuse to recognize unilateral sanctions, but support Iran with specific measures,” Lavrov told Iranian state television in an interview on December 12. “Perhaps we are doing more than anyone else. In terms of figures, this amounts to billions of dollars.”

    Lavrov said Russian trade with Iran grew by 8 percent in the first half of the year, and that “we do not have such indicators actually with anyone else, when trade is growing and not decreasing amid coronavirus restrictions.”

    Russia’s top diplomat added that he was convinced that “we will be looking for new methods of ignoring the sanctions’ negative economic effect.”

    The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has continued to increase pressure on Iran in its last weeks of office before President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration.

    Last week, the Trump administration imposed sanctions on Iran’s envoy to the Huthi rebels in Yemen in what was seen as an attempt to force the Tehran-backed militants to negotiate a peace deal to end an ongoing civil war in which Iranian archenemy Saudi Arabia is heavily involved.

    Iran recently announced plans to increase its uranium-enrichment capabilities in violation of the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

    In 2018 the United States abandoned the agreement, under which Tehran curtailed its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief.

    Based on reporting by TASS and AFP

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Executes Opposition Journalist Ruhollah Zam

    Iran has executed dissident journalist Ruhollah Zam, whose online work helped inspire nationwide economic protests in 2017.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Iran Protests Turkish President’s Reciting Of ‘Meddlesome’ Verses

    Iran’s Foreign Ministry summoned Turkey’s ambassador on December 11 to protest remarks by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a visit to Azerbaijan.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.