Iran Focus

London, 30 August – The Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister criticised Iran and insisted that the rogue state deserves more economic sanctions on Wednesday, following the mullah’s announcement of plans to close a key shipping channel in the Persian Gulf.

After a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, Adel al-Jubeir lashed out against Iran, called the country’s nuclear programme “weak”, and advocated for more US sanctions targeting Iran.

Jubeir said: “Regarding the Iranian nuclear programme and the historic deal around the programme, we have said from the very beginning that the programme is weak and does not envision active measures that would prevent Iran from continuing its nuclear programme as soon as possible.”

Iran Focus

London, 29 August – Iran has filed a suit against the US before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at the Hague to stop US sanctions from coming into place, but the US views the suit as “meritless” and will fight against it.

Iran’s claim is based on the 1955 “Treaty of Amity” between the US and Iran, which is a strange treaty to bring up as it has already been before the ICJ several times.

In 2003, when the US and Iran were attacking each other’s oil platforms and shipping industry, the ICJ ruled that the treaty was in force, despite being signed by previous governments, but that the US and Iranian claims based on that treaty were not valid. While during the 1979-80 hostage crisis, the ICJ found in the US’s favour and ordered the return of the American hostages, but ignored the ruling.

Iran Focus

London, 28 August – After being alerted by the vigilant researchers at the cybersecurity firm FireEye, Facebook, Google, and Twitter have deleted hundreds of accounts.

The FireEye team followed what looked to the untrained eye like unrelated threads for the last few month. They examined the phone numbers used by these accounts to sign up for Twitter, the emails they used to register domains, and the changes to their account names over time. The Iranian operation began to unravel.

Iran Focus

London, 28 August – Pro-Iranian governments and Hezbollah media outlets are gloating over the news that Donald Trump’s days in office may soon be ending, which reflects entirely how much of a threat he posed to their continued existence and how his policy on Iran constantly thwarted the mullahs.

Trump is going through a significant political crisis, but he has not yet been impeached or otherwise forced out of office. Therefore, any errant speculation by the media of a country or by officials themselves will not help these countries if Trump remains in power until the end of his first term.

Iran Focus

London, 27 August – Anyone using social media to incite people to “insult sanctities” or “damage public property” will be punished, warned Iranian Police Commander Hossein Ashtari when he spoke at a ceremony in Yazdel, in Isfahan Province. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Brigadier General said, “People behind social media call-ups should leave the illusion aside that people will follow them.”

“anyone who insults Islamic sanctities or any of the Great Prophets or [12] Shi’ite imams or the Holy Fatima shall be executed if the insult is considered saab ul-nabi (insulting Prophet Muhammad); otherwise, they shall be sentenced to one to five years’ imprisonment,” stipulates Article 513 of Iran’s Islamic Penal Code. Iran’s security and intelligence forces have always aggressively confronted what they call “insulting sanctities” and “blasphemy” in speeches, essays, books, and media.