When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

TOPIC: iran regime

Society

Iran's Use Of Death Penalty Has Doubled, Targeting Protesters And Ethnic Minorities

Without drawing attention to public executions like it did last year, the regime has quietly continued to mete out capital punishment: increasing both death sentences and the carrying out of executions, on pace in 2023 to double from the previous year.

The tribunals of the Islamic Republic of Iran have accelerated the churning out of their specialty: death sentences. The latest were issued in the southwestern city of Ahwaz for six members of the local Arab minority and suspected separatists.

The defendants, named as Ali Majdam, Muhammad Reza Muqaddam, Moin Khanfari, Habib Deris, Adnan Gheibshahi and Salem Musawi, had been charged with terrorist activities in the Khuzestan province, in the southwest of the country, in the years 2018-2020, and may have been members of an Arab separatist group, the Harakat al-nidhal.

Watch VideoShow less

How A Drone Strike Inside Iran Exposes The Regime's Vulnerability — On All Fronts

It is still not clear what was the exact target of an attack by three armed drones Saturday night on an arms factory in central Iran. But it comes as Tehran authorities appear increasingly vulnerable to both its foreign and domestic enemies, with more attacks increasingly likely.

-Analysis-

PARIS — It's the kind of incident that momentarily reveals the shadow wars that are part of the Middle East. No one has claimed responsibility for the attack by three armed drones Saturday night on an arms factory complex north of Isfahan in central Iran.

But the explosion was so strong that it set off a small earthquake. Iranian authorities have played down the damage, as we might expect, and claim to have shot down the drones.

Nevertheless, three armed drones reaching the center of Iran, buzzing right up to weapons factories, is anything but ordinary in light of recent events. Iran is at the crossroads of several crises: from the war in Ukraine where it's been supplying drones to Russia to its nuclear development arriving at the moment of truth; from regional wars of influence to the anti-government uprising of Iranian youth.

Stay up-to-date with the latest on the Russia-Ukraine war, with our exclusive international coverage.

Sign up to our free daily newsletter.

That leaves us spoiled for choice when it comes to possible interpretations of this act of war against Iran, which likely is a precursor to plenty of others to follow.

Iranian authorities, in their comments, blame the United States and Israel for the aggression. These are the two usual suspects for Tehran, and it is not surprising that they are at the top of the list.

Keep reading...Show less

Iranian "Justice" At Work: Executions For Protesters, Leniency For Honor Killings

After hanging at least four anti-government protesters, Islamic Iran's judiciary decided, not for the first time, to give a short jail term to a man who murdered his "unruly" wife last year.

-Editorial-

Iran's regime has no qualms about executing those it deems the "undesirables" of the nation: political opponents, criminals and most recently anti-state protesters, often using the courts to issue extravagant charges against those it sends to be hanged.

And yet the same judiciary has recently given an eight-year jail sentence to a young man who murdered his wife in 2022. This was a notorious case of "honor killing" reported in February that year in the southern city of Ahwaz.

The convict, Sajjad Heidarnava, became a figure of macabre evil on social media when he was shown smiling and displaying his 17-year-old wife's severed head as a trophy in the neighborhood. His victim, Mona Heidari, had married Heidarnava, her cousin, some years earlier but insisted on a divorce before being killed.

Keep reading...Show less

Growing Public Hatred Of Religious Leaders Unnerves Iran Regime

An increase in public protests has sounded the alarm bell for Iranian officials and clerics. But public discontent runs much deeper than discontent over wages and water. There are also signs of nostalgia for the monarchy that ruled the country before the 1979 revolution.

Recently quoted by Iran's government news agency, IRNA, Taghi Rostamvandi, the country's deputy interior minister, addressed a subject that had long gone unspoken: "People are moving in a direction where the religious government is no longer addressing their problems." He said they may seek the solution to these in a "secular or non-religious system."

Rostamvandi told a Tehran seminar on social problems on Jan. 16 that people's interest in secular models of governance should be taken as "sounding the alarm" for the Islamic Republic.

Keep reading...Show less