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IRGC construction projects continue while private sector lags

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IRGC construction projects continue while private sector lags

IRGC construction projects continue while private sector lags – When the Iran-Iraq war ended in 1988, much of Iran’s infrastructure was either ruined or neglected. Reconstruction started immediately, but neither the private nor the public sector were capable of compensating for all the destruction that occurred during the war. This is where Khatam al-Anbiya (Seal of the Prophets) came in.

 

Today, 26 years after the end of the Iran-Iraq war, no one can doubt that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is one of the most important macroeconomic forces in the country. Khatam al-Anbiya, the main economic arm of the IRGC, was officially founded after the war on the orders of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

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IRGC construction projects continue while private sector lags

Mohsen Rezaee was the first commander of this military-economic base and gave it the nickname “Ghorb,” its acronym in Arabic. He was succeeded by Cmdr. Rahim Safavi, followed by Mohammad Ali Jafari and finally Rostam Ghasemi. Currently, Khatam al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters is headed by commander Abdollah Abdollahi.

Khatam al-Anbiya’s is mostly involved in civil projects such as road construction, dam building, gas line construction and the expansion of gas and oil fields. In an Oct. 11 interview with Fars News, Abdollahi said, “Khatam al-Anbiya has 135,000 personnel,” and added that 5,000 contractors are collaborating with Khatam al-Anbiya.

He presented a long list of Khatam al-Anbiya’s successful projects: Phases 15 and 16 of the South Pars gas field, the Shrine to Shrine Highway (connecting Qom to Mashhad), Sadr Highway in Tehran, building 21 billion cubic meters of water tanks and constructing 730 kilometers (450 miles) of tunnel for various purposes including irrigation, public transportation systems, and oil and gas transport.

“So far, God be praised, we have been successful in all our projects,” Abdollahi said.

However, not everyone feels that way. An economic journalist in Tehran told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, “Khatam al-Anbiya is the unrivaled king of Iran’s private sector economy.” Of its fortunes during the last 26 years, he said, “IRGC started its economic activities during Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani’s presidency, but lost some of its influence during Mohammad Khatami’s presidency. However, it reached the top during [President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad’s time in office.”

It was during Ahmadinejad’s presidency that Khamenei began focusing on Article 44 of the constitution, which addresses privatization, to legalize the limitless economic activities of the IRGC. Ahmadinejad, who had close ties with the IRGC, enthusiastically supported these changes. During his presidency, privatization meant giving all the important projects to the Khatam al-Anbiya base, the journalist said.

The projects awarded to the Khatam al-Anbiya between 2005 and 2011 are worth more than $25 billion. According to Kalameh, which has close ties with former Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi, “Not even the biggest oil cartels in the world, which have decades of experience and access to not only the best and most up-to-date technology in the world but also to the most specialized and skilled human forces, cannot receive and successfully complete this many projects in such a short period of time.”

In summer 2011, Ahmadinejad decided to put Rostam Ghasemi, then commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya, in charge of the Ministry of Petroleum, Iran’s richest ministry. The conservative parliamentarian from Tehran, Ali Motahari, opposed this appointment and so did Alef, which is linked to another parliamentarian representing Tehran, Ahmad Tavakoli.

Motahari accused the IRGC of winning all the important civil projects in an “unfair” competition and said, “Adding the oil projects to all the already existing projects will not end the accusations.”

Abdollahi said, however, that the IRGC does not take possession of all the projects, explaining, “From time to time, there were projects that others could take on and we did not even bid for them.”

Three years ago, Jafari said this military organization would only take on economic projects that are over $30 million.

In the 2013 presidential elections, Hassan Rouhani was supported by both the moderates and the Reformists. The Principlist candidates, including Secretary of the National Security Council Saeed Jalili and Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, both former members of the IRGC, were defeated.

It appeared at the time that Rouhani’s administration might be able to limit the IRGC’s economic activities and allow nonmilitary organizations to enter Iran’s economic circle.

However, in May 2014, Mohammad Bagher Nobakht, the administration’s spokesman and head of Management and Planning Organization, gave a speech in which he said Rouhani’s administration was willing to entrust major economic projects to the Khatam al-Anbiya. “Major projects that cannot be completed by the private sector should be given to the IRGC,” he said. “We will give these projects to the armed forces and especially to the Khatam al-Anbiya.”

A month prior to this, Jafari had clearly expressed his disappointment with the lack of collaboration between the administration and the IRGC. He said, “Unfortunately, the administration was not supportive of the suggestions made by the Basij about the resistance economy. We hope that in future the administration utilizes the abilities of both the IRGC and Basij and the massive human resources available.”

On Sept. 16, 2013, during the 20th IRGC National Assembly of Commanders and Officials, Rouhani had suggested that the IRGC should concentrate on the economy instead of entering “political games” and said, “These rumors about the IRGC are baseless. They want to cast the IRGC as the rival of the people, but the IRGC is not a rival for the private sector. It is not and has never been a regular contractor. Today, the IRGC should take on important economic projects that the private sector is not capable of managing.”

A member of the Islamic Iran Participation Front asking not to be named told Al-Monitor, “Right now, Rouhani is focused on the nuclear negotiations and he knows that he cannot come to any form of agreement with the West without the blessing of the commanders of the IRGC. Therefore, he is trying to appease them. It is a kind of bargain and this is why we have not heard any high-ranking commander of the IRGC criticizing the nuclear negotiations. On the other hand, many of them, including commanders Jazayeri, Firouzabadi and Saffar Harandi, are supporting the nuclear negotiations.”

He believes that in the short term, Rouhani will have good relations with IRGC commanders. “It is possible, however, that he might try to change the game, and take back the major projects awarded to the Khatam al-Anbiya base after an agreement is signed. This is a very risky move and we can’t know if Rouhani is capable of pulling it off.”

Despite the change in the administration, IRGC’s Khatam al-Anbia is continuing to get major projects. On Sept. 17, Jafari said that despite “doubts in the beginning,” there is “good cooperation and interaction” with the administration. According to reports, Khatam-al-Anbiya recently signed a contract with the mayor of Tehran worth approximately $7 billion.

 

Source: Al Monitor – IRGC construction projects

Iran foils attempt to sabotage nuclear heavy-water tanks

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Iran foils attempt to sabotage nuclear heavy-water tanks
Iran foils attempt to sabotage nuclear heavy-water tanks – The Islamic Republic has repeatedly complained of alleged covert US and Israeli attempts to cripple its nuclear program.

 

Iran has foiled an attempt to sabotage tanks used for transporting heavy water, which is needed to run some nuclear reactors, and blames a “foreign country” for the incident, a senior official was quoted by local media as saying.

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Iran foils attempt to sabotage nuclear heavy-water tanks

The Islamic Republic is at odds with the West over suspicions it is covertly using its declared civilian atomic energy program to develop a nuclear arms capability. It denies this and has repeatedly accused certain Western states of trying to cripple the program through acts of sabotage.

Asghar Zarean, deputy chief in charge of nuclear protection and security at Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, was quoted by the Tehran newspaper Arman as saying the bid to damage tanks at the Arak heavy-water production plant occurred two weeks ago.

“There were attempts to cause disruption in storage tanks due to carry heavy water. But these attempts were discovered and foiled before the tanks were filled with heavy water at Arak,” Zarean was quoted as saying.

“A foreign country was behind the attempt,” he said, without elaborating. Iranian officials could not be immediately reached for further comment.

The Arak plant has been producing heavy water to operate a planned 40-megawatt research reactor nearby that Iran says is intended to make isotopes for cancer and other medical treatments.

But in June it said that it was redesigning the Arak reactor to sharply cut its potential output of plutonium, a nuclear bomb material, a gesture apparently meant to address a thorny issue in negotiations with six world powers.

Iran also stopped installing major components in the Arak reactor as part of an interim deal struck with the powers in November 2013, and which expires next month, to curb some sensitive nuclear activity in exchange for limited relief from sanctions. Iran also agreed not to transfer heavy water to the reactor site under this temporary pact.

World powers are negotiating to strike a permanent settlement with Iran by a Nov. 24 deadline under which Tehran would curb its nuclear fuel enrichment work to ensure it cannot be applied to bomb-making in exchange for a phased removal of international sanctions that have hobbled its oil-based economy.

The Islamic Republic has repeatedly complained of alleged covert US and Israeli attempts to cripple its nuclear program.

Iran’s intelligence minister said on Oct. 21 that several people seeking to engage in nuclear espionage “for foreigners” had been arrested in the southern province of Bushehr, where Iran’s only nuclear power station is located.

In 2010, Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities were temporarily impaired by a virus known as Stuxnet, which was widely believed to have been developed by the United States and Israel, although no government took responsibility for it.

In March of this year, pumps at the Arak reactor were subjected to a failed sabotage attempt, Iranian media quoted a senior official as saying at the time.

 

Source: JPost – Iran foils attempt to sabotage nuclear heavy-water tanks

The Real Reason Iran Killed This Woman for Defending Herself

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The Real Reason Iran Killed This Woman for Defending Herself
The Real Reason Iran Killed This Woman for Defending Herself – The execution of Reyhanneh Jabbari has brought worldwide condemnation of the Tehran regime. But the critics may be missing the real story.
Long before Reyhanneh Jabbari was executed in Iran this weekend, she was tortured and beaten for months—and then sent to one of Iran’s most notorious prisons, one of her lawyers claimed. Her crime? Killing the man who tried to rape her when she was just 19.

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The Real Reason Iran Killed This Woman for Defending Herself

“They kept her in a solitary cell where she was chained,” Jabbari’s first lawyer, Mohammad Mostafaei, said in an interview with The Daily Beast. “They would blindfold her sometimes for days and they beat her face and her head.”

Jabbari’s execution Saturday was widely condemned by human-rights groups such as Amnesty International on the grounds that it illustrates how Iran’s own legal system is prejudiced against women. (She was initially charged with the crime in 2007.)

But Mostafaei said this was not right lesson to draw from the case. Instead, the exiled lawyer said Jabbari’s case illustrated how members of Iran’s intelligence and security services were effectively above the law.

Jabbari was charged with murdering Morteza Abolali Sarbandi, a member of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).

Mostafaei spoke to The Daily Beast from Geneva, where he is scheduled participate on a panel of  dissidents and other experts to document Iran’s systematic abuses of human rights, organized by UN Watch, a group devoted to exposing the hypocrisy of the United Nations’ own human-rights body.

The event is scheduled to coincide with the UN Human Rights Council’s one-year review of human rights in Iran.

Mostafaei said he believed the UN body’s work on Iran was important for letting the outside world know about the state of affairs in his own country. But he said, “The UN council does nothing for people living in Iran.”

Mostafaei said Jabbari was lured to the apartment of the man from the intelligence service. That’s where he attempted to rape her, the lawyer claimed. Jabbari only stabbed him with a pen knife, but did not kill him. The lawyer asserted that an autopsy of Sarbandi showed how the pen knife wound was itself not fatal. Instead, a second man (also with Iran’s intelligence service) came to the apartment at this time and murdered Sarbandi. In the trial, Jabbari only referred to this second man as “Sheikhi.”

While Jabbari confessed in police custody to the murder, Mostafaei said her confession was the result of torture.

“Sheikhi and Sarbandi were members of the intelligence service,” Mostafaei said. “They used their influence with the judge. The court was not fair. If Mr. Sarbandi was an ordinary person, I am sure the judges would not convict Reyhanneh to death.”

Mostafaei had to drop Jabbari’s case in 2010, the year he was exiled after taking up the case of another woman who was sentenced by an Iranian court to be stoned to death. Eventually that client was pardoned. Jabbari received no such relief.

 

Source: The Daily Best – The Real Reason Iran Killed This Woman for Defending Herself

Iranian Government Spying in Cyber Space

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Iranian Government Spying in Cyber Space
This is a field report about the indifference of internet users to the Islamic republic regime’s spying efforts in cyber space as it tries to identify those who are against the regime or certain policies.The only immunity for these users comes from their overwhelming multitudes and the undeniable prevalence of opposition to the regime. Despite this immunity, they have to possess a certain civic courage and regard the freedom to use the internet as a right, while paying attention to certain security details and maintaining awareness of human predators active in various government bodies.

 

Life on Facebook and Arrests

No one can deny that millions of Iranians rely on Facebook these days. The high number of Facebook users in Iran, which is estimated to be anywhere between four million and five million people, makes this a social phenomena. In the absence of social liberties, as young Iranians are denied the most basic freedoms even in their private lives, what these users reflect on their Facebook pages is in effect how they would like to live.

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Iranian Government Spying in Cyber Space

Iranians use social networking sites for, among other things, political discussion, more open posting and publication of works of art and literature, the announcement of events that cannot be publicized on domestic newspapers and to find kindred spirits or like-minded people. But is it possible for Iranians appear in any arena without Islamic Republic officials cracking down on them?

In June of 2014, three Ahwazi citizens were each sentenced to three years in jail for creating certain Facebook pages; membership on Facebook carried a one-year sentence. Some people are arrested for crimes against morality and public decency on Facebook. In July of 2014, a Revolutionary Court sentenced eight people to a total of 127 years imprisonment for being active Facebook users. In another instance, the Malayer Security chief announced the sentencing of 22 Facebook users, and this is a another long story.

All these instances raise the question of whether Iranian citizens pay attention to being under surveillance by the police and security forces in cyber space and are they effectively guarding their safety?

 

Constant Observation and Monitoring of Cyber Space

“The main objective of Iran’s Cyber Police is to promote cyber security through continuous observation and monitoring of cyber space,” the deputy head of Iran’s Cyber Police, Ali MirAhmadi, has been quoted as saying; “I advise all users to comply with the laws and regulations and avoid any form of offence within cyber space because the police have complete knowledge of it.”

In most cases, as soon as someone is arrested for using Facebook, the Cyber Police regard them as either a spy, prostitute, enemy abettor or guilty of crimes against morals and public decency; the offences are considered to be proven in advance.

Matin, a second-year university student, says: “Since I don’t do anything particular on Facebook, I have never paid attention. To tell you the truth, when I read the news about heavy prison terms, I don’t think that these are just average people. I don’t know why they arrest these people.”

Mahmoud is a 27-year-old hairdresser and, unlike Matin, he believes “there is no kidding around with Facebook” and explains: “Our friends had two stereo systems. They had sold their car and taken the stereo out and left the stereos at my home so that I could ask my customers if they were interested to buy them. Someone asked me, why don’t you put it on Facebook? You’ll get more buyers. I went into some groups and described the stereo and its price. The first one was sold. Then I did it for the second one. One day, they called from the Security Police to summon me. I first thought it had to do with my store and I went to the zoning office, but then they said I had to go to the security police. Oh my God! Then they really grilled me, asking why I had started a business selling stereos on the internet, and I was in and out of the court for over five months and it really affected my life and livelihood.”

Pariya believes that “under the current circumstances of our society” one should not go on Facebook with one’s own name and identity. She says: “We have so many busybodies, we should really be careful, especially girls. Security police are after those who are into politics. So those who are writing political stuff have to be really careful. One of my friends would distribute information during the election. They would write messages for them and write obscenities under these posts and even threats.”

Peyman has just finished his military service and is looking for work. He spends a lot of time on social networking sites but says: ”I’ve learned not to use my own name or photos.”

I ask what it is that he does on the internet that he needs to keep his identity concealed.

He says: “I don’t do anything. When the dollar went up, I bought some dollars (foreign currency). I would check the news each day to see how much it would go up. Then there were rumours that the price would go down. There were many comments. Eighty-six people had left comments before me. I just wrote that the price would go up and it was only a rumour that it would go down. I had not used any obscenities or bad language. One day, they called and summoned me, saying that the Cyber Police have reported that you have been creating disruptions in the foreign currency market. They gave me eight months in jail, it was reduced in the appeal court to four months. I had to serve two months and the rest they let me off for having no prior record.”

An Iranian political activist who is also very active in the virtual world says he pays close attention to his own security, adding: “I have no fear of the public. I am personally afraid of those who claim to be providing security of information for the public. I am afraid of the police. I mean those who try to cook up a file against people.”

 

Complainant and Expert Witnesses are One and the Same

A lawyer says that judges often have no expertise in cyber technology, adding: “Judges have no expertise in computer technology and so everything goes back to the reports from the ministry of intelligence or the Cyber Police. The judge accepts these reports as expert opinions. Therefore, it is impossible to prove otherwise.”

An IT expert says the problem is that when an Iranian enters the World Wide Web, he or she must follow the model of use that suits his/her circumstances in Iran. “In our country, the internet and social networking sites are a venue for political activity. The government views this political activity as propaganda against the regime. Therefore, cyber space is under close scrutiny by the government.” The IT specialist goes on to conclude that for this reason, internet users in Iran must maintain different security criteria for themselves when they use the internet as opposed to people outside of Iran.

 

Unguarded Systems

Many internet users in Iran are not too concerned about protecting their privacy and their personal space or taking security measures on the internet.

Some of them do not take the possibility of identity theft on the internet too seriously and some identify unfamiliarity with the English language as the reason for not exploiting potential security methods found on the web.

Most of the 80 people who were interviewed for this article did not have anti-virus software installed on their systems, and even if they did, they were often old versions and not up to date.

 

Source: Radio Zamaneh – Iranian Government Spying in Cyber Space

Stop Targeting Human Rights Lawyer

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Stop Targeting Human Rights Lawyer
The Iranian government should stop detaining and harassing prominent rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, and allow her the right to peaceful dissent and assembly. Officials should also end their interference in the internal affairs of Iran’s bar association; the government and the association should ensure that no lawyer is disciplined for defending clients, and that disciplinary hearings are fair and independent.

 

Reza Khandan, Sotoudeh’s husband, told Human Rights Watch that on October 25, 2014, security forces arrested her and at least 10 others who attempted to gather peacefully in front of the Interior Ministry to protest a recent spate of acid attacks targeting women in the central city of Esfahan. Large demonstrations against the attacks began in Esfahan on October 22.

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Stop Targeting Human Rights Lawyer

“The government’s well-documented harassment of Nasrin Sotoudeh, including her recent detention and previous unlawful conviction and imprisonment, suggests they are heavily invested in preventing her from doing her job as a lawyer,” said Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “Harassing a respected lawyer who peacefully defends human rights only adds insult to injury after locking her up for defending her clients.”

Khandan said the group had initially gathered in front of the Iranian Bar Association in Tehran to protest its recent three-year ban on Sotoudeh from practicing law, but around noon attempted to join the demonstration in front of the Interior Ministry. Authorities released the others shortly after their arrest, but transferred Sotoudeh to an Intelligence Ministry detention facility in Tehran, where they kept her for approximately seven hours, Sotoudheh told Human Rights Watch after her release. She said that during her detention security agents once threatened to charge her with the crime of moharebeh, or “enmity against God,” which can carry the death penalty, and attempted to forcibly blindfold her but she resisted.

Since large-scale protests began against the acid-throwing attacks, security forces have arrested and detained dozens of demonstrators in Esfahan and Tehran, including a cameraman working for the semi-official Iranian Students News Agency who was covering the protests. There have also been reports of police using teargas and batons to disperse protesters. The protesters have expressed sympathy for the victims and frustration at what they consider to be the authorities’ inadequate response to the attacks. On October 20, authorities announced they had arrested four people in connection with the attacks, but later released them for lack of evidence.

On October 18, the Iranian Bar Association’s disciplinary committee told Sotoudeh that it had revoked her law license because a revolutionary court convicted her on vague national security charges in 2011. The government and the bar association should ensure that all lawyers can continue to practice their profession freely without discrimination on the grounds of political opinion, nor should any lawyer be negatively affected or disciplined for practicing their profession and defending their clients, Human Rights Watch said.

Sotoudeh told Human Rights Watch that the Iranian Bar Association’s disciplinary board imposed the ban under pressure from security, intelligence, and judiciary officials. The September 2011 revolutionary court judgment, after an unfair trial, sentenced her to six years in prison and a 10-year ban on practicing law. She was freed without explanation on September 18, 2013. The national security charges on which she was imprisoned arose solely from her peaceful exercise of fundamental rights and zealous defense of her clients, who included many human rights activists.

Sotoudeh told Human Rights Watch that she appeared before the Iranian Bar Association’s disciplinary board on September 30, 2014, to defend herself against a complaint by the Tehran Prosecutor’s Office seeking to ban her from practicing law. In an interview with the semi-official Iranian Student’s News Agency, Sotoudeh said that bar association officials had “repeatedly told [her] that they are under pressure to suspend [her] law license,” and “went as far as suggesting that [she] turn in [her] license voluntary, which [she] refused.”

Under Iranian law, the prosecutor’s office is empowered, if not required, to file a complaint with the Iranian Bar Association seeking a temporary suspension of a lawyer’s license if the lawyer is indicted, and revocation of the lawyer’s license to practice if the lawyer is convicted of a crime.

Security forces arrested Sotoudeh on September 4, 2010, and Branch 26 of Tehran’s Revolutionary Court sentenced her to 11 years in prison and banned her from practicing law for 20 years in January 2011. The charges against Sotoudeh included “acting against national security,” “propaganda against the state,” and “membership in the Center for Human Rights Defenders,” the group formed by the Nobel peace laureate Shirin Ebadi and other lawyers. On September 14, 2011, Branch 54 of Tehran’s Revolutionary Appeals Court reduced Sotoudeh’s sentence to six years and reduced the legal practice ban to 10 years. Authorities banned and then shut down the Center for Human Rights Defenders in 2008.

Sotoudeh told Human Rights Watch that she did not plan to appeal the disciplinary board’s decision because the case would go before a supervisory board consisting of government-appointed judges – members of the same judiciary that convicted and sentenced her unfairly – instead of a panel of lawyers and peers. Sotoudeh and other lawyers contend that only the Iranian Bar Association, not revolutionary courts, has the legal authority to ban lawyers from practicing law.

Although she will not appeal, Sotoudeh said, “I do, however, plan on exercising my civil rights and will conduct a sit in in front of the bar association to protest this decision.”

Prior to her October 25 arrest, Sotoudeh and supporters had regularly gathered in front of the bar association, since the morning of October 21, 2014, without incident or interference from the authorities. She joined separate protests in support of victims of acid attacks. As part of her protest in front of the bar association, Sotoudeh demands that officials remove legal restrictions and barriers that undermine the independence of the Iranian Bar Association and the ability of lawyers to defend political dissidents and others before Iran’s courts.

The first branch of the bar association’s disciplinary board on August 30 had rejected a complaint by the Tehran Prosecutor’s Office that sought to suspend her law license. Sotoudeh said she was surprised that the bar association seemed to reverse itself such a short time later by imposing the three-year ban.

Judiciary officials have curtailed the independence of the Iranian Bar Association by various means in recent years, such as barring lawyers from seeking senior positions based on their imputed political opinions and peaceful human rights activities. For example, in 2008, the judiciary disqualified Farideh Gheyrat, Mohammad Ali Dadkhah, and Abdolfattah Soltani – all members of the Center for Human Rights Defenders – as candidates for the association’s Central Board because of their activities as human rights defenders. The Comprehensive Bill on Lawyering and Attorneyship, a draft law before Iran’s parliament, would further curtail the Iranian Bar Association’s independence, giving the judiciary greater powers over regulating and disciplining members of the legal profession.

The erosion of the Iranian Bar Association’s independence has been accompanied by increased official action against human rights lawyers since 2005, particularly after the mass protests that followed the 2009 presidential election. In the past few years the judiciary has sentenced prominent rights lawyers such as Mohammad Seifzadeh, Soltani, and Dadkhah to lengthy prison terms on similar national security-related charges. Both the judiciary chief, Mohammad Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani, and Javad Larijani, the head of the Human Rights Council of the Judiciary, have publicly accused lawyers such as Sotoudeh of damaging the government’s reputation in interviews with Persian-language media outlets based abroad.

Several other well-known lawyers, including Ebadi, Mohammad Mostafaei, and Shadi Sadr, have left the country as a result of repeated arrests, detention, and harassment since 2009.

The UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers provide that lawyers must be allowed to carry out their work “without intimidation, hindrance, harassment or improper interference.” The basic principles affirm the right of lawyers to freedom of expression, which article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) also provides, including “the right to take part in public discussion of matters concerning the law, the administration of justice and the promotion and protection of human rights.” Iran has ratified the ICCPR and is bound by its provisions.

The UN Basic Principles also require governments and professional associations of lawyers to ensure that lawyers can enter the profession and continue to practice without discrimination, including on the grounds of political or other opinions. It requires governments and professional associations to ensure that lawyers can exercise their profession without intimidation or improper interference. It also requires governments to ensure that the professional associations can operate without outside interference.

“Sotoudeh’s ban is an important test case in determining the independence of the legal profession in Iran and the future ability of rights lawyers to do their job,” Goldstein said. “If Iran’s security services and judiciary are allowed to bully the bar association into banning a prominent lawyer based on a wholly unfair conviction, there is little reason to believe they will stop there.”

 

Source: HRW – Stop Targeting Human Rights Lawyer

Awful Human Rights Situation in Iran

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Awful Human Rights Situation in Iran
Awful Human Rights Situation in Iran – Iran hanged a woman on Saturday who was convicted of murdering a man she alleged was trying to rape her, drawing swift international condemnation for a prosecution several countries described as flawed.

 

Reyhaneh Jabbari was hanged at dawn for premeditated murder, the official IRNA news agency reported. It quoted a statement issued by the Tehran Prosecutor Office Saturday that rejected the claim of attempted rape and said that all evidence proved that Jabbari had plotted to kill Morteza Abdolali Sarbandi, a former intelligence agent.

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Human Rights Situation in Iran

The United Nations as well as Amnesty International and other human rights groups had called on Iran’s judiciary to halt the execution, which was carried out after the country’s Supreme Court upheld the verdict. The victim’s family could have saved Jabbari’s life by accepting blood money but they refused to do so.

According to her 2009 sentencing, Jabbari, 27, stabbed Sarbandi in the back in 2007 after purchasing a knife two days earlier.

“The knife had been used on the back of the deceased, indicating the murder was not self-defense,” the agency quoted the court ruling as saying.

Britain, Germany, and a group of European parliamentarians, among others, condemned the execution, as did the United States.

“There were serious concerns with the fairness of the trial and the circumstances surrounding this case, including reports of confessions made under severe duress,” State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement.

“We join our voice with those who call on Iran to respect the fair trial guarantees afforded to its people under Iran’s own laws and its international obligations,” she added.

 

Source: Website : Pejman Yousef Zadeh – Awful Human Rights Situation in Iran

IRGC sends more arms to Hezbollah – via Damascus Int’l Airport

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IRGC sends more arms to Hezbollah – via Damascus Int’l Airport
IRGC sends more arms to Hezbollah – Iran has transfered hundreds of tons of weapons, ammunition and other materials to the Hezbollah through Syria in recent days, according to reliable sources. The deliveries were airlifted in by giant Antonov 124 transport planes that landed at Damascus International Airport.

 

The equipment was then transported to the storage facilities of the Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon, and to the Hezbollah. Security experts estimate that some of the equipment will be smuggled to Palestinian organizations in the territories.

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IRGC sends more arms to Hezbollah

Iranian assistance via Hezbollah to Palestinian organizations that attack Israel, is increasing. In addition to extensive efforts to smuggle equipment, weapons and ammunition, the Hezbollah has also started training Palestinian guerrillas in Hezbollah bases in the Beka’a Valley in Lebanon.

Intelligence also shows that the Hezbollah had direct links with Palestinian cells operating in the territories – in addition to the ties it cultivates with Fatah. One center for such links is the city of Nablus in the West Bank.

It is thought that the guerrilla infrastructure the Hezbollah is setting up in the territories is intended to be deployed to disrupt any future cease-fire agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

The large airlift is believed to be a response to the urgent need of the Revolutionary Guards and the Hezbollah for additional equipment in Lebanon.

The previous route used by the Iranians to airlift equipment to the Hezbollah in Lebanon crossed over Turkey. However, following a request by Ankara that Iranian flights over Turkey en route to Damascus declare the nature of their cargo, the flights were stopped. The current airlift is believed to have crossed over Saudi Arabian and Jordanian airspace on its way to Syria.

The pace of weapons transfers to the Hezbollah in Lebanon was shown in the past to be dictated by security developments in Lebanon. Following the withdrawal of the Israel Defense Forces from south Lebanon in May last year, Iran sought to replenish the military stores of the Hezbollah and the Revolutionary Guards stationed in Lebanon

According to Israeli estimates, the Hezbollah has some 7,000 Katyusha rockets.

Source: Israel behind the News – IRGC sends more arms to Hezbollah

Iran re-arrests leading human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh

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Iran re-arrests leading human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh
Iran re-arrests leading human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh –  Iranian security forces arrested world-renowned human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh and several others on their way back from a protest on Saturday, her husband said.

 

“While returning from the sit-in outside the Bar Association in Tehran, Nasrin was detained along with several friends and colleagues,” her husband, Reza Khandan, said on his Facebook page.

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Iran re-arrests leading human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh

“They photographed and ran identity checks on all the detainees and then released everyone but Nasrin, who is still detained wantonly and without a court order.”

Sotoudeh, who has represented Iranian opposition activists, was sentenced to six years in jail in 2010 and banned from practice after being convicted of spreading propaganda and conspiring to harm state security.

Her case came to international attention in 2012 when she embarked on a 50-day hunger strike against a travel ban on her daughter.

The United States and human rights campaigners like Amnesty International criticized the Islamic Republic over the case and Sotoudeh was freed in September 2013 ahead of a visit to the United Nations by President Hassan Rouhani, soon after he swept to election victory in part on promises of liberal reforms.

Speaking to Reuters by telephone on Wednesday, Sotoudeh said she was protesting outside the Iranian Bar Association to demand a reversal of a three-year ban on her practicing law.

Iran’s Bar Association, under pressure from conservative hardliners who dominate the judiciary, this month banned her from practice, enforcing that part of her 2010 sentence.

“From the first day in prison, my interrogator vowed to use all his powers to stop me from practicing law,” she had said on the second day of her protest. “Four years on, he seems to have succeeded with the help of others.”

She said on Wednesday she would stop protesting once the right of dissidents to work and the bar’s independence were restored. She had been accompanied in her protest by 15 other people, including human and women’s rights activists.

“For years Iranian dissidents have been denied the right to live, work and seek education,” she said on her husband’s Facebook page last week, referring to a crackdown on pro-democracy activists since 2009.

 

Source: Reuters – Iran re-arrests leading human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh

Amnesty condemns ‘bloody stain on human rights record’ as Iran hangs 26-year-old woman

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Amnesty condemns ‘bloody stain on human rights record’ as Iran hangs 26-year-old woman
Amnesty condemns ‘bloody stain on human rights record’ as Iran hangs 26-year-old woman – Reyhaneh Jabbari is 967th person to be executed since Hassan Rouhani became Iran’s president in August last year

 

Amnesty International denounced “another bloody stain” on Iran’s human rights record on Saturday when a 26-year-old woman was executed for allegedly killing a man who she said was intent on rape.

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Amnesty condemns ‘bloody stain on human rights record’ as Iran hangs 26-year-old woman

Reyhaneh Jabbari was hanged at dawn in Rajaie Shahr prison outside Tehran after spending seven years behind bars. She was the 967th person to be executed since Hassan Rouhani took office as Iran’s president on 4 Aug 2013, according to the Iran Human Rights Documentation Centre.

The state media announced that Miss Jabbari had been put to death after the family of the man she was accused of killing declined to grant a reprieve. Her mother, Shole Pakravan, confirmed the execution and said she was going to a cemetery to identify her daughter’s corpse.

Amnesty International and other human rights groups had campaigned for Miss Jabbari to be spared the death penalty. On several occasions, her execution was thought to be imminent, but each time there was a delay. In the end, however, Iran’s hardline judiciary proved impermeable to outside pressure.

“This is another bloody stain on Iran’s human rights record,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, the deputy director of Amnesty’s Middle East and North Africa Programme. “Once again Iran has insisted on applying the death penalty despite serious concerns over the fairness of the trial.”

Miss Jabbari was sentenced to death in 2009 after what Amnesty called a “deeply flawed investigation”. She admitted stabbing Morteza Abdolali Sarbandi, a former intelligence ministry official, but pleaded self-defence. On her account, she stabbed Sarbandi in the back as he was trying to rape her – but the victim was actually killed by another named person, who was never the focus of inquiry.

Amnesty said these claims “if proven” could have exonerated Miss Jabari. But they were never “properly investigated, raising many questions about the circumstances of the killing”.

Amnesty added that the judiciary had “pressured” Miss Jabbari to “replace her lawyer, Mohammad Ali Jedari Foroughi, for a more inexperienced one, in an apparent attempt to prevent an investigation of her claims”.

Over the last decade, Iran’s regime has typically hanged between 500 and 600 people every year, giving the country the highest number of executions in the world, apart from China. Unlike in China, however, hangings in Iran often take place in public.

The pace of executions has accelerated since Mr Rouhani became president: 381 people were hanged between his accession to office and 31 Dec 2013. Another 586 are known to have been put to death so far this year, including Miss Jabbari, according to a database maintained by the Iran Human Rights Documentation Centre.

While Mr Rouhani has moderated Iran’s foreign policy, critics say that he has done nothing to ease the regime’s domestic oppression. In particular, he appointed a notorious figure, Mostafa Pour-Mohammadi, as justice minister. Mr Pour-Mohammadi was dubbed the “minister of murder” by Human Rights Watch for his role in overseeing the mass killing of thousands of prisoners in 1988.

 

Source: The Telegraph – bloody stain on human rights record

Iran acid attacks put ‘vice groups’ on defensive

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Iran acid attacks put ‘vice groups’ on defensive
Iran acid attacks put ‘vice groups’ on defensive – In response to a number of acid attacks on women in the city of Esfahan, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has ordered the Interior Ministry, Intelligence Ministry and Justice Ministry to pursue the case. Tehran’s Friday Prayer leader Ayatollah Mohadi Kermani has also said that the attackers must be given the “maximum punishment.”

 

Protests erupted in Esfahan and the capital Tehran over the attacks, which left a number of young women disfigured. Some at these protests blamed the authorities for not protecting women from violence and supporting legislation that offers legal protection to vigilante “vice groups” engaged in the Islamic teaching of “enjoining good and forbidding wrong.”

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Iran acid attacks put ‘vice groups’ on defensive

These vice groups, often organized around Ansar-e Hezbollah, have threatened that if the administration does not take action to enforce hijab laws, they will take to the streets and enforce it themselves, despite hijab-law enforcement falling under the jurisdiction of the police and not the administration. Iranian authorities have claimed that Ansar-e Hezbollah or other vice groups were not involved in the attacks, and a number of officials have suggested the violence was the work of “anti-social” individuals.

During an Oct. 22 trip to Zanjani, Rouhani condemned those who believe that “enjoining good and forbidding wrong” is their duty alone, and use the teaching as a partisan tool. He said it should be used to “bring society closer together [rather than] to create separation and divisions,” and asked parliament to consider wording the law in a manner that would “create more unity in society.”

Parliament member Laleh Eftekhari criticized Rouhani for his comments. “I did not expect this from a president who studied in the seminary,” she said, adding that “enjoining good and forbidding wrong” is not just about hijab and modesty laws, but relates to all aspects of governance.

Hard-line cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami called for the attackers to be punished both for injuring the victims and causing “damage to the dignity of the Islamic system.” He called, however, for media outlets that blamed vice groups for the attacks to be punished as well. He said, “These websites and newspapers that have accused the Islamic system and the religious forces must be pursued. The owners and managers must be punished and held accountable for their lies.”

Khatami dismissed criticism of the bill, saying that it “makes clear the framework” in which these groups will operate.

The Ansar-e Hezbollah website Yalarasat alHussein claimed that the protests in response to the acid attacks “proved that the protesters do not have concerns for society, but rather seek to challenge Islamic laws and constitutional laws.” The article stated that some of the chants and posters in front of the parliament building in Tehran questioned Iran’s hijab laws and the proposed law to protect vice groups. It condemned any connection between the violence and these laws, and quoted officials as equating connecting the two with “inciting public opinion.”

 

Source: al-monitor – Iran acid attacks put ‘vice groups’ on defensive

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