Iran: background

April 22 Mohammad Mousavi is executed
in the city of Shiraz, without his parents knowing.
Mohammad Mousavi was one of the minors listed by stopchildexecution on their executionrow page.
He was 19 years old and sentenced for a murder he allegedly committed when he was 16.



According to Iran Newspaper Iran's judiciary submitted a bill to the Parliament of Iran to pass a law to ban execution and life imprisonment of children alleged to have committed crimes under the age of 18.
The bill even after approval by parliament must be approved by the council of experts to verify its conformity with Islamic Sharia and often the bills after substantial delays get rejected at that stage.



In the month of August a group of collegestudents from USA will visit Iran to learn more about Iran's cultural and historical heritage. The trip is scheduled for August 13 -31.
The group plans to visit the city of Yazd and Qom, Zoroastrian and Islamic pilgrimage sites and Shiraz and Isfahan cultural and historical centers.
In order to add to their understanding and experience of Iran, the group will arrange discussions with Iranians.





In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: to cloak

Iran is to start manufacturing "Islamic bicycles" for women.
These bicycles have a cabin which conceals half of the cyclist's body.
According to Elaneh Sofali, one of the "cabin-designers", women would thus be more encouraged to cyclesports.



Shirin Ebadi announced that authorities turned down her request to defend
Haleh Esfandiari en that her team was also refused to visit her in Evinprison.
The only goal of her Human Rights organization is to inform Iranians and the international community that the government is not respecting its own laws and regulations.
According to Ebadi, Haleh Esfandiaris arrest was illegal.



Owners of internetcafes, bars and restaurants popular with young Iranians have received a letter signed by national police authorities in which new measures are announced to enforce "the country's moral health."
In the future public places will not be allowed to use dark windows anymore or curtains which make it impossible to view from the outside what is going on inside.
Especially inside internetcafes are men and women not allowed together, but only in separate days or schedules.
The letter did not mention when these new rules will become effective but states that a failure to fulfil them will lead to a suspension of the licence.


In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: pros and contras

Wednesday are in the cities of Bandar Abbas and Bandar Khamir two men named Abdolrahman and Parviz beheaded.
According to the daily Tehran Emrouz are wednesday in Evinprison three men named Mohammad Safar, Alireza and Behzad hanged.
May 7 is in Bandar Abbasprison a woman named Zahra Nazari hanged.




The Iranian Minister of Education Mahmoud Farshidi survived an impeachment motion by parliament.
Of the 238 votes cast, 132 MPs voted against impeachment, 89 voted to impeach, and 17 abstained.
In April, several members of parliament asked for his stepping down due to his poor performance.




Students of Amir Kabir University demonstrated for the release of their co-demonstrators.
These were arrested last month during demonstrations to end the government-sponsored crackdown on student rights activists.
A New York based "Committee to Protect Journalists" condemned the arrest of four studenteditors.
The arrests earlier this month followed the publication of newsletters carrying articles deemed insulting to Islam.
The editors say they have no involvement in the publications.



Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi and two other lawyers from her Human Rights Defenders Center in Tehran will defend Haleh Esfandiari .
The also arrested Parnaz Azima has been released on bail
after appearing in Tehran's Revolutionary Court.
Her case will be resumed in court May 20.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: participant

In the city of Kermanshah authorities have amputated the hand of a man, named Arash in public.
The man was sentenced for taking part in 16 robberies.
The sentence had been upheld by Iran’s State Supreme Court.




Reporters without Borders reports that Mehdi Botourabi the editor of the very popular Iranian blog platform, persianblog.com, was arrested on 9 May.
According to some sources he is accused of cooperating with the US authorities, others report that he is detained because he has information about the disappearance of Ali Reza Asghari, a former deputy defence minister.



During a private party at a house in Isfahan are according to the Toronto-based Iranian Queer Organisation, IRQO approximately 87 gay people arrested.The party was a birtdayparty for a man, named Farhad.
According to witnesses the police brutally assaulted the host, his parents, and the guests.




Last week arrested Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center, is being investigated for security crimes.
US Condoleezza Rice called for her immediate release.
The Iranian government spokesperson Gholam-Hossein Elham has said according to IRNA that if human rights groups should respect judicial sovereignty of nations and not meddle in their domestic affairs, things would be resolved much faster.
He said this in response to a call made earlier by the Human Rights Watchdog for the release of Haleh Esfandiari.
Ms. Esfandiari is an Iranian-American who lives in USA since 1980.


In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: communicate

In the city of Mashhad, Khorassan province, are during the last week 15 men hanged.
Gholam-Hossein Esmaeili, Chief Prosecutor of Mashhad, said according the daily Qods that the judiciary was acting “decisively” against those creating instability.
All executed men were said to be drugs traffickers.



Two pro-reformed papers are alllwed to publish again.
The daily Ham Mihan was closed down in 2000 after it called for improved ties with the United States.
The dayly Ham Mihan is published by Gholam Hossein Karbaschi, a centrist technocrat close to former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami.
The daily Sharg was banned last year after it poked fun at president Ahmadinejad in a cartoon.
Ali Farahbaksh a journalist, who worked for Sharg also, is sentenced to three years in jail; he was arrested last year after returning in Iran from a conference abroad.



The wreckage of the missing private airplane that was on its way from Trabzon(Turkey) to Tabriz (Iran) has been found in the mountains near Trabzon.
The wreckage site was located led by signals from a satellite telephone onboard.
The two persons on board were killed by the crash.





In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: crossing border

According to a report on a website a Norwegian-Iranian boy is flogged 130 times in public in the city of Sardasht.
Namand Mamandi was arrested by the paramilitary Bassij Force for drinking alcoholic beverages.
The whole act took place in absence of a courtorder or a verdict.
The boy has managed to return to Norway, where he is been hospitalized.




A airplane on its way to Tabriz (Iran) from Trabzon (Turkey) has gone missing after taking-off.
Thursday the plane with a British and a Pakistan pilot took off in Ankara, it made a refuelling stop in Trabzon, but after it took off on Sunday, nothing has been heard.



According to Iranian state television, Irianian border guards detained 10 people who illegally entered the country from Pakistan carrying $500,000 in cash, maps of "sensitive areas" and "modern spying cameras.
The arrests took place province of Sistan-Baluchestan. Details are not known yet.
The report said that more information would be made available in coming days.




In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: level

Berlin football officials hail the upcoming friendly between Berlin's local amateur women's football club SV Al Dersimspor and Iran's women's national football squad.
The match will be held at June 1.
The German football club says the game is also a cultural meeting with football as international language.

A year ago the first game was played in Tehran, the returnmatch will be held in Katzbachstadion in Berlin-Kreutzberg.



Afghan Minister of Foreign Affairs Spanta had to step back due to the expulsion of Afghan refugees from neighboring Iran.
According to president Hamid Karzai he wants the Supreme Court to decide if lawmakers can oust a minister for an issue not directly related to his ministry. Spanta will remain in his job until that ruling.He received 141 no-confidence votes in the 249-member voting of parliament.
The past three weeks Iran sent 85.000 Afghan refugees back to Afghanistan.
According to Deputy Interior Minister Mohammad-Baqer Zolqadr all these people could return to Iran and even work again but they should have valid documents.


The website www.stopchildexecutions.com is according to a report on their website probably blocked from visitors from Iran.
Also Delara Daribi's personal belongings, including her art and books have been removed from her cell by security officials.
These events seem to be coinciding with words of concerns about child executions in Iran, that was communicated by the Foreign Ministers of Sweden and Canada to Iranian Foreign Minister.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: injustice

Fridaynight, the Dutch newsprogram Netwerk broadcasted(Dutch) an item about Abdullah al-Mansouri, a Dutch-Iranian who exactly a year ago was extradited to Iran by Syria.
Al-Mansouri was in absence sentenced to death by Iran.
Netwerk told that there is evidence that Syria was knowingly wrong in arresting and extraditing al-Mansouri to Iran.
Syria and Iran both state that al-Mansouri was traveling on his Iranian passport, and according to Iran he therefore is not entitled to Dutch assistance or a Dutch lawyer.
According to the newsprogram this is not true and they showed a copy of his Dutch passport with a Syrian visum.
Also they showed a letter from a human rights organization inviting him to Syria.
The Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Verhagen, told that he will urge the highest Iranian authorities asking to release al-Mansouri to The Netherlands.




I heard this song and although I don't speak Farsi and therefore I don't know what this song is about, a video of a song by Mohsen Namjoo, Zolf bar baad.
The poem is from Hafez, the girl is Zara Amir Ebrahimi.









In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: roses and thorns

Dutch Omroep Llink has a tv-program called "LLink op reis"(Llink travel) .
On their website you find a (Dutch) blog, Salam Iran! in which 15 young people blog about their trip to Iran.



Isfahan province is preparing to play host to the traditional Rose and Rose Water Festival.
This will be held May 15 to 31. In the cities Kashan, Qamsar and Niasar, the ceremony of extracting rose water is visited every year by many Iranians and foreign tourists.
Rosewater is a product used in many traditional Iranian dishes and a lot of other things, like parfume and cosmetics.
Also in Tehrans Eram Park will the Rose Water festival be held from 16-25 of May, together with Cultural Heritage Week.


The wife of missing American Robert Levinson wrote a letter to President Ahmadinejad, asking him to help finding her husband. She told this in a CNN-interview.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Wednesday that USA has made approximately five inquiries about Levinson's whereabouts
He also said that in addition to Levinson there are three Iranian-Americans who have had their passports confiscated by Iranian officials and not allowed to leave Iran.
These are Haleh Esfandiari, who runs the Middle East programs for the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington and Parnaz Azima, who works for US-funded Radio Farda.
The third person has not been identified.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: slap

Mohammad Baqer-Qalibaf is re-elected as mayor of Tehran.
He defeated two other candidates by a 12-3 vote of the City Council.
Baqer-Qalibaf is known as a moderate conservative and rival of the hardliners surrounding president Ahmadinejad.



A moderate earthquake measuring 4.0 on the Richter scale, jolted the town of Bam Wednesday.
According to Fars Newsagency there are no reports of deaths or injuries.
The governor of Bam told Farsnews that the quake possibly has destroyed a number of subterranean canals in Bam.




A mine explosion in Dopazeh, 15 km far from west of Sardasht city, Kurdestan province, killed one police-officer and injured another seriously.
This is the second time in the current Iranian year (Starting March 21) that mine explosions in Sardasht claim victims.
The area is still full of mines left over from Iraq/Iran war (1980-88).





A military F-5 jet crashed near the village of Golkhaneh, Khuzestan province, last Wednesday.
The pilot was killed in the crash.
IRNA reports that witnesses told that sound of strong explosion was heard with the crash.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: activity

In the town of Ravar in Kerman province are five drugstraffickers hanged.
This was reported by Iranian media.

Further information is not known.



Sunday has a man put himself on fire outside the offices of President Ahmadinejad. The reasons are not known.
The man was immediately rushed to a burns unit of a local Tehran hospital by ambulance.
He has suffered 80 percent burns and is in critical condition.
The man was not identified by name.


Zeinab Peyghambar Zaded is arrested two days ago and transferred to Evinprison.
Her father, along with Zeinab’s lawyer, Nasim Qanavi, went to the Revolutionary Courts to post bail in an effort to secure the release of his daughter. In her short phone conversation yesterday, Zeinab had informed her father that she was being transferred to Evin because she was unable to post the 20 million toman bail required of her by the courts.
According to Ms. Qanavi, the Security Branch of the Revolutionary Courts refused to allow them entry into court or to post bail for the release of Zeinab.
She is an activist at the "One million signatures"campaign.
Photo weforchange.info




An Iranian-Amercan academic from Washington is arrested by Iranian authorities and brought to Evinprison.
Haleh Esfandiari was visiting her mother in December and was unable to leave the country since.
She endured repeated interrogations about her work at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars where she is director of the Middle East program, and Wednesday she was arrested.

Photo USAToday



According to Farsnews the last week arrested Hossein Moussavian will Wednesday be released on bail of $215,000.
The newsagency reported that the court ruling has been issued Tuesday afternoon and that Moussavian will be released midday.
The introductory investigations have been accomplished.
Moussavian was arrested on charge of espionage.
Iranmania said that Moussavian would be released during a special ceremony attended by reporters.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl

Iran: attract

Nureddin Zarrinkelk,a professor of fine art known as 'the father of Iranian animation', professor at a Tehran university, is sacked for insulting a female student who was dressed in full chador.
According to the daily Etemad, the incident was sparked during a classroom discussion over an image of a bald angel drawn by a student when the professor asked the woman if she wore the full veil because she herself was bald.
Photo BBC


Ezatollah Zarghami,the conservative head of Iran state-run television appointed by the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has said that all Iranian television productions that do not have prayer scenes will not be allowed to air.
The new directive appears to apply to drama series and television films but it is not clear whether it also includes programmes such as game shows and sitcoms.
Children's programmes should also seek to teach the young about praying, which mature muslims are required to perform five times a day.



Iran wants full segregation of sexes also in healthcare.
Health minister Kamran Bagheri Lankarani said that hospitals should implement a 1998 parliament bill that stipulates segregation of sexes.
According to the daily Kargozaran a council has been formed with two parliament members as observers to facilitate the enforcement of this law.
The 1998 bill drew strong criticism and opposition from health workers who considered it impractical due to insufficient numbers of qualified staff from each sex.
The law used to outsource women seeking treatment in Iran's male-dominated healthcare service, however, Lankarani said that in future it could be men who would need an alternative as 67 percent of medical students are women.



In Iran there are childoffenders, still on death row.

Children are being hanged to death.
A child will be hanged to death.
Poster amnesty.nl