By Jubin Katiraie
Informed sources have reported that several Sunni political prisoners in Iran have been taking part in a hunger strike in protest against being imprisoned in a section for mentally disabled people.
The Sunni political prisoners are currently jailed in a prison in the city of Urmia – the largest city in the West Azerbaijan province of the country. Prisoners are named as follows: Anwar Khadri, Kamran Sheikha and Khashro Bashart.
Pooya Stone
Earlier this week, Abbas Araghchi, the deputy foreign minister of Iran, warned the United States that there is now a race on for nuclear arms. He also said that a competition to modernise nuclear weapons is staring too.
The United Nations General Assembly was holding a high-level meeting to promote the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons during which Araghchi made the comments.
By Jubin Katiraie
Following a call from the Workers’ Union of Tehran and Suburb Bus Company to attend a gathering in protest of the imprisonment of Reza Shahabi, members of this union, and a group of workers, students and teachers participated in the gathering.
At the gathering, which was held on Monday morning September 25 in front of the Ministry of Labor, participants protested Mr. Shahabi’s continued imprisonment and called for his immediate release.
Iran Focus
London, 27 Sep – The future of the Iran nuclear deal is currently very uncertain. Many believe that the deal should be scrapped as it is one-sided and has too many concessions in favour of the Iranian regime. Only last week at the United Nations General Assembly, President Trump said that the nuclear deal was an “embarrassment” to the United States.
He has a deadline of 15th October to decide whether he will grant the Iranian regime compliance with the nuclear deal. If he does not certify Iran compliance, Congress with have sixty days to decide whether it will reapply crippling sanctions that were lifted as a result of the signing of the nuclear deal.
Iran Focus
London, 26 Sep – With roughly two weeks until the White House has to decide whether to (again!) certify Iran as compliant with the 2015 nuclear deal (despite all evidence against), all eyes are on Donald Trump.
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed, the former general manager of Al Arabiya News Channel, wrote an op-ed for Arab News in which he explained that if you want to know how Trump will act on Iran, you have you watch how he is reacting to North Korea.
Indeed, that is what the Iranian mullahs are doing.
Al-Rashed explains how the current North Korean nuclear problem was partly caused by the lax 2015 Iranian nuclear deal which was not too lenient, ergo why Iran is so happy to break the deal without fear of repercussions.
Iran Focus
London, 26 Sep – There is ever-growing speculation that the Iranian Regime is providing North Korea with the funds to develop its nuclear programme, in spite of the heavy sanctions against the rogue Asian country, and Donald Trump appears to confirm this.
On Saturday, September 23, Trump tweeted: “Iran just test-fired a ballistic missile capable of reaching Israel. They are also working with North Korea.”
This collaboration on nuclear and missile technology has not been announced by either Iran or North Korea but many in the Western intelligence community see this as an “unquestionable fact”.
Iran Focus
London, 26 Sep – The US should definitely get tough on Iran for its violations of the 2015 nuclear accord, but the deal should not be removed without a proper strategy in place, according to two national security experts.
Vice Admiral John Bird (ret.), member of the board of advisors of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) and former commander of the US 7th Fleet, and Stephen Rademaker, a former assistant secretary of state for International Security and Nonproliferation, wrote an op-ed for The Hill in which they advised Donald Trump against allowing the Iran nuclear deal to collapse for fear that Iran would end up like North Korea.
Iran Focus
London, 26 Sep – If the US really wants to increase pressure on the Iranian Regime, they need to convince the rest of the world to join with them and pass international sanctions on the Regime and their Revolutionary Guards (IRGC).
In October, the Iranian nuclear deal comes up for review once again and if Donald Trump’s tough rhetoric comes to pass then Iran should be declared noncompliant because of the mountain of evidence that suggests they are not keeping to the deal.
This could mean issuing fresh sanctions against Iran (something that the Trump administration has hardly been shy about) or reintroducing ones lifted by the nuclear deal, but even the action of declaring Iran noncompliant could give the US essential leverage and bring the mullahs back to the negotiating table.
Iran Focus
London, 25 Sep – Although it was common knowledge for some time now, a ranking member of the Iranian Regime has confessed that they exported terrorism across the Middle East and Africa.
Mullah Kazem Sediqi, the Friday prayer leader in Tehran, said on September 22: “We conducted a revolution in Iran, but today we are defending in Syria; today our reputation is heard all over Africa, an altar is set up in Nigeria.”
He also confessed that the theocratic regime’s soft occupation of Iraq has resulted in far-reaching influence over the fellow nation’s political, military and security organs and praised Iran’s use of terror cells like Hezbollah.
Iran Focus
London, 25 Sep – Over the weekend, the Iranian Regime revealed a never before seen video showing a successful test of their new Khorramshahr medium-range ballistic missile.
The missile, revealed during a military parade on September 22, bears remarkable similarities to the North Korean BM-25 Musudan / Hwasong-10 missile, sparking fresh rumours that the two countries are collaborating.
Though Iran claims that this missile is a domestic effort, it has made the same claims about many other weapon systems that appear derived from foreign designs like its Shahab-3 medium-range ballistic missiles (based on North Korea’s Hwasong-7).
