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Iran Rights Advocate’s Sentencing in Absentia Is Unlawful, According to Defense Team

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Iran Rights Advocate’s Sentencing in Absentia Is Unlawful, According to Defense Team

Nasrin-Sotoudeh

Iran Focus

London, 16 August – Following the June arrest of Iran’s award-winning human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, she was told she had already been found guilty “in absentia” on spying charges by Tehran’s Revolutionary Court.

On Wednesday, her lawyers said that her five-year sentence on spying charges was unlawful as she was never charged or given the chance to appear in court.

Payam Derafshan, one of her lawyers, told the press that the trial took place some time ago, but the sentence was not implemented until after she represented several women arrested for protesting the mandatory wearing of the Islamic headscarf in public. These women were arrested for removing their hijabs in public areas — a controversial issue since it was made mandatory in Iran after the Islamic revolution of 1979.

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EU and US Conflicted Over Iran Sanctions

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EU and US Conflicted Over Iran Sanctions

EU and US conflicted over Iran sanctions

Iran Focus

London, 16 August – Last week, US sanctions on Iran came back into force, fulfilling a promise that Donald Trump made in May when he pulled the US out of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal.
Trump tweeted: “Anyone doing business with Iran will not be doing business with the United States.”

On the same day, the EU instituted a “blocking statute”, which was supposed to protect any European firms doing business with Iran from current and future US sanctions. In fact, it bars any EU individual or company from complying with US secondary sanctions, which means that European firms who still wish to trade with the US are being penalised. It also allows EU firms affected by the sanctions to sue the US, but there is no method in place to reclaim any settlement.

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Iran Tries to Evade US Sanctions by Flogging off Cheap Oil

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Iran Tries to Evade US Sanctions by Flogging off Cheap Oil

Iran-oil-US-sanctions

Iran Focus

London, 15 August – Iran is making a desperate attempt to avoid incoming US sanctions on its oil revenues by significantly lowering the price of its crude oil exports for its biggest buyers in the Asian market, according to an official from within the country’s oil ministry.

The source, who wished to remain anonymous as they were not cleared to speak on this issue, said: “The discount is part of the nature of the global markets being offered by all oil exporters.”

However, many other oil exporting countries are not offering their oil this cheaply, so it seems that this is an attempt to convince its buyers to continue purchasing Iranian oil, even after strict US secondary sanctions come into force in November.

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EU, Japan, and South Korea Cut Banking Investment With Iran

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EU, Japan, and South Korea Cut Banking Investment With Iran

EU, Japan, and South Korea cut banking investment with Iran

Iran Focus

London, 15 August – European, Japanese, and South Korean banks have suspended their investment finance contracts with Iran, according to the Islamic Republic’s Investment Organization.

Saeid Khani Oushani, the General Director for Loans and International Institutions and Organizations, said that while China and Russia are still committed to their deals with Iran, banks in Europe, Japan, and South Korea have stopped all interaction with Iran.

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UN Concern Over Iran Support of Al Qaeda and ISIS

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UN Concern Over Iran Support of Al Qaeda and ISIS

Iran support of Al Qaeda and ISIS

Iran Focus

London, 15 August – A new UN report has expressed concern that ISIS and al-Qaeda’s global network poses a growing threat to the world, with ISIS having to 30,000 members roughly equally distributed between Syria and Iraq and al-Qaeda being much stronger in places.

The report by UN experts, which was being circulated on Monday, advised that despite the defeat of ISIS in Iraq and the majority of Syria; a covert version of the “core” of the militant group will survive in both countries, with significant support from terrorist sympathisers across the Middle East.

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Iranian People Blame Khamenei, Not U.S., for the Economic Disaster

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Iranian People Blame Khamenei, Not U.S., for the Economic Disaster

Iranian people blame Khamenei

Iran Focus

London, 14 August – In remarks that were broadcast by state television, spokesperson for the Iranian judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei discussed the dozens of arrests for financial crimes that occurred recently. “Sixty-seven suspects have been arrested, some of whom were released on bail, and more than 100 people including government employees and officials, as well as private employees and others have been given travel bans,” Ejei said.

In response to a proposal by the Islamic Republic’s Judiciary Sadegh Amoli Larijani to create new Islamic revolutionary courts that will impose maximum sentences on those “disrupting and corrupting the economy”, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, was quoted by the media as saying that those accused of economic corruption must be punished “swiftly and justly.”

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Iranian Officials Admit the Role of MEK

Jubin Katiraie
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Iranian Officials Admit the Role of MEK

Iranian officials admit the role of MEK

By Jubin Katiraie

The dictators in Iran are clearly concerned about their future. The main opposition – the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI / MEK) plays a large role in helping the people of Iran in their struggle for their rights. It is the only viable and organised alternative to the ruling clerical leadership that is destroying the country and plundering its wealth.

The Resistance movement has always had a significant following in Iran despite what officials may claim. Even back in the eighties, the Resistance movement was enough of a threat for the then Supreme Leader to order the executions of more than 30,000 political prisoners – mainly members of the PMOI / MEK and other dissidents. The incident has now become known as the 1988 massacre.

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Is There a Way out for the Iranian Government?

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Is There a Way out for the Iranian Government?

Iran Protests

Iran Focus

London, 14 August – The Trump administration is keen to put an end to the Iran threat. Before even becoming president, Trump had criticised the weak Iran nuclear deal and said that he would scrap it. Although it took a while to do, Trump finally announced in May that the United States was exiting the one-sided deal. And since then the administration has been putting the Iranian regime under intense pressure.

It has been two years since the sanctions were lifted and now they have been re-applied. Iran had a real chance to get back into the global arena and Western companies certainly took the opportunity to make some money in Iran.

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Pessimistic About Current Deadlock

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Pessimistic About Current Deadlock

Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran

Iran Focus

London, 14 August – Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, delivered a speech on Monday 13th August. It was clear to see that he does not see any way out of the desperate situation.

For the past few weeks, the country’s national currency – the rial – has been sharply falling. The more its value decreases, it seems that the people’s anger increases. Protests have been continuing and the uprising and unrest is getting stronger.

The Supreme Leader has been silent over the past few weeks, but he finally broke it by trying to encourage and persuade the country’s leadership that the situation is not as desperate as it appears. He said: “They are propagating viciously that the country has reached a deadlock and it has no way out other than to seek refuge from this Satan or Great Satan. Whoever states that we have reached a deadlock, he is either ignorant or his words are treacherous.”

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Iran’s Water Shortage Has Passed the “Critical” Point

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Iran’s Water Shortage Has Passed the “Critical” Point

Iran’s Water Shortage has Passed the “Critical” Point

Iran Focus

London, 14 August – Isa Kalantari, head of Islamic Republic’s Department of Environment (DoE) and deputy President, warned his country’s leadership that the looming water crisis in Iran is “much more severe” than what has already been predicted. “There will be no water in Iran within less than fifty years.”

Previously, in an interview with the state-run Iran Labor News Agency (ILNA), Kalantari warned that more than 70% of Iran’s population is facing water shortage — the volume of consumption per person has passed the “critical” point.

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