An Iranian American journalist living in Brooklyn who has been a sharp critic of the Iranian government was the target of an international kidnapping plot orchestrated by an intelligence network in Iran, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. In an indictment unsealed in federal court in Manhattan, four Iranians were charged with conspiring to kidnap the journalist and author, Masih Alinejad. Ms. Alinejad was not identified by prosecutors, but confirmed in an interview that she was the intended target of the plot.
An Iranian oil executive removed from U.S. financial blacklists last month because he had resigned from Iran’s national oil company now holds senior positions with two Iranian energy firms linked to the Iranian government, according to company officials and regulatory filings. The executive’s role at the two companies appears to violate U.S. sanctions, analysts said, and is expected to fuel concern among U.S. lawmakers critical of the administration’s Iran policy. Both companies contract with Iran’s state energy firms, including the blacklisted National Iranian Oil Company, and one of the firms is substantially owned by a sanctioned state-owned Iranian bank.
In a landmark ruling, a US federal court ruled on Monday that Syria, Iran, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and three Iranian banks were liable for the Hamas terror attack which killed Eitam and Naama Henkin in 2015. The District of Columbia court ruled on two suits: one filed by the parents and siblings of Eitam and one filed by the Henkins’ children and the Henkins’ estates. The suits made claims governed by the US Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, alongside other claims. The Justice for United States Victims of State Sponsored Terrorism Act, which amended the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, established a fund to provide compensation to eligible claimants who hold judgments against state sponsors of terrorism.
Following the publication of a video from the opening of a drapery shop in which female models are present without hijab, Iran’s judiciary reported the arrest of some people. On Sunday, July 11, a video of the ceremony was posted on social media, featuring a number of women in ballgowns as models. The Public and Revolutionary Prosecutor of Mahabad said that five people including the shop owner and those who were present as models at the opening, have been arrested.
In recent months, the Iranian government’s decades-long campaign of hate speech and propaganda against the Bahá’ís in Iran has reached new levels, increasing in both sophistication and scale. The unfolding strategy to demonize the Bahá’í community is reflected in a growing and coordinated network of hundreds of websites, Instagram accounts, Telegram channels, and Clubhouse rooms. “History is replete with the victims of grievous crimes incited by hate speech,” says Diane Ala’i, Representative of the Bahá’í International Community (BIC) to the United Nations in Geneva.
In a rare moment of bipartisanship, Republicans and Democrats shared some common ground this weekend as an unlikely collaboration of lawmakers joined in calls from Iranian dissidents for a democratic Iran and for the regime to be removed. Republican Sens. Ted Cruz, Kevin McCarthy, Rick Scott and Thom Tillis, alongside Democrat Sens. Cory Booker, Bob Menendez and Maggie Hassan all took part of the “Free Iran World Summit.” Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-NY, also spoke at the event.
Iran’s Kurdish parties, on the 32nd anniversary of the assassination of Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou, asked the international community to exercise caution when negotiating with Iran and its President-elect Ebrahim Raisi who they said is known for “crimes and massacres.” “We ask humanitarian communities and advocates of peace and freedom and the rights of oppressed nations, especially now at a time when European countries are in negotiations with the Islamic Republic, to take the election of Ebrahim Raisi, one of the figures known for crimes and massacres committed by the regime, as the president of Iran as a serious message of a continuing policy of murder, terror, and violence,” read a statement from the Cooperation Center of Iranian Kurdistan political parties on Monday.
A delegation of Iranian dissidents and expatriates plan to pay a solidarity visit to Israel next week with officials from the Trump administration. The mission, organized by the Institute for Voices of Liberty (iVOL) – a policy institute dedicated to encouraging freedom, human rights and democracy in Iran – includes eight Iranian expats and four former officials, and is meant to show that the expats support Israelis in light of the latest attacks by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which are sponsored by Iran. The delegation will meet with Foreign Ministry representatives and visit an IDF unit, as well as hear from security experts.
Iranian American and Jewish activists are voicing support for striking Iranian oil workers who are demanding Iranian regime’s state-owned companies pay their past due wages, pay higher wages, and provide other benefits. Iranian American activists who are not Jewish said the latest Iranian energy workers’ latest nationwide strike, now entering its third week, has been a major blow to the Iranian regime’s already faltering economy which has been suffering due to U.S. sanctions. The strikes could potentially bring down the regime, say activists here.
Hundreds of Iranian Arabs took to the streets on July 11 to protest water shortages in Ahvaz, southwestern Iran. According to Khakzadegan, a local Arab Telegram channel, the protests started because of water shortages. Locals demanded their water rights and the blockage of dams. They gathered peacefully outside the Governor’s building, demanding authorities to respond to the water problems. The state-run Mehr News website also wrote locals gathered peacefully to demand their water rights and water shortages for livestock.
Iran said on Tuesday it was holding talks on prisoner exchanges with the United States aimed at securing the release of Iranians held in U.S. jails and other countries over violations of U.S. sanctions. “Negotiations are under way on the exchange of prisoners between Iran and America, and we will issue more information if Iranian prisoners are released and the country’s interests are secured and the talks reach a conclusion,” government spokesman Ali Rabiei said. “Because of its humanitarian aims, Iran is ready to exchange all American political prisoners in exchange for the release of all Iranian prisoners who have been detained around the world at the behest of America,” he told a news conference carried on a government website. There was no immediate U.S. comment on his remarks.
…At some point, the Biden administration will have to stop letting the Iranians urinate on its shoes while it’s inviting them to further negotiations about their nuclear program. Tehran is not interested in making concessions, and it is not interested in changing its behavior. The mullahs think the Biden administration is a bunch of naïve suckers, and they don’t really hide their contempt. For starters, the U.S. must not make concessions to regimes that plot to kidnap American citizens who dare criticize that regime: In an indictment unsealed in federal court in Manhattan, four Iranians were charged with conspiring to kidnap the journalist and author, Masih Alinejad.
حکومت جمهوری اسلامی، قهرمان نقض حقوق شهروندی اعم از حقوق بشر، اساسی، و مدنی ایرانیان بوده است. این کار بلاوقفه و در همه زمانها و مکانها و در مورد همه شهروندان، بدون توجه به دین و قومیت و سن و جنسیت آنها انجام میشود تا مردم فراموش نکنند تحت چه نظامی زندگی میکنند. در هیچ شرایطی این نقض نهادینه متوقف نمیشود. بروز بحران کرونا نه تنها از میزان نقض حقوق شهروندی ایرانیان نکاست بلکه موارد تازهای به این نقضها افزود. بازداشتهای مربوط به بیان و تجمع و انجام مراسم مذهبی و فعالیتهای سیاسی همچنان در ارتباط با بحران کرونا ادامه داشته است. این نوشته به پنج قلمرو تازه نقض حقوق ایرانیان که کاملا مرتبط با شیوع کرونا است، میپردازد.
دولت حسن روحانی به پایان خط رسیده است و از امروز دیگر میتوان عملکرد او و همراهانش را با ابزار تاریخ، به تیغ تیز نقد سپرد. هیاهوی تبلیغاتی که بر سر منشور حقوق شهروندی به راه افتاد، بخشی از تبلیغات روحانی برای نمایش اراده او در حمایت از اقلیتهای قومی و مذهبی بود. وی در ادامه، علی یونسی، وزیر پیشین اطلاعات را که سابقه حضور طولانی در پستهای امنیتی را در کارنامه داشت، به عنوان نماینده خود در حوزه اقوام و اقلیتهای مذهبی معرفی کرد. از همینجا مشخص شد که وعدهها با اجرا فاصله عمیقی دارند. انتصاب یک فرد امنیتی که خود در بخش بزرگی از تبعیضهای نهادینه بر اهل سنت و فشار بر اقوام ایرانی سهم دارد، ثابت کرد که روحانی همچنان به این مسئله بسان موضوعی امنیتی مینگرد.
شماری از سازمانها، اشخاص و نهادهای فعال در حوزه آزادی بیان، حقوق بشر و سیاسی به گزارشها در مورد توطئه وزارت اطلاعات جمهوری اسلامی ایران برای ربودن مسیح علینژاد از خاک آمریکا و انتقال او به ایران، واکنش نشان داده و آن را محکوم کردند. کمیته حمایت از روزنامهنگاران روز چهارشنبه ۲۳ تیر و در پیامی گفت: «ما از شنیدن این اخبار، نگران شدهایم. این کمیته میگوید «طرح ادعایی دولت ایران برای زیر نظر گرفتن و نقشه ربودن مسیح علینژاد، خبرنگار ایرانی آمریکایی، هم منزجر کننده است و هم نشان از خطری است که خبرنگاران در تبعید با آن از جمله در خاک ایالات متحده روبرو هستند.