On a tour of Central Asia, Iran’s President Mahmud Ahmadinejad arrived in Turkmenistan’s capital Ashgabat to inaugurate a new natural-gas pipeline linking the the two countries.
An Iranian parliamentary inquiry has found that Tehran prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi was responsible for the deaths of at least three detainees involved in post-election protests.
Iran’s Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar warned that opposition protesters could face execution—as Tehran University professors demanded an end to the repression.
Eleven Iranian police agents were killed when a highway patrol intercepted what officials called an “illicit drug convoy” in Southern Khorasan Province near the Afghan border.
In a fourth day of protests during the Ashura holy period in Iran, police fired teargas to disperse demonstrators. The death toll in the past 48 hours stands at at least eight.
In a heart-warming display of holiday spirit, the New York Times runs a Christmas Eve op-ed making the case for illegal pre-emptive military strikes on Iran.
The holy city of Qom is tense and divided after the Basij militia attacked mourners who filled the streets for the funeral of dissident Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri.
Iran’s government charged that a newly built United Nations station to detect nuclear detonations near its border was established to allow world powers to spy on the country.
Iranian human rights violations following the disputed presidential election in June were among the worst in the past 20 years, according to a new report by Amnesty International.
Protests greeted Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Brazil at the start of a South American tour. In Rio de Janeiro, thousands of gays, artists, Jews, and Holocaust survivors marched in protest of the visit.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Court sentenced former vice president Mohammad Ali Abtahi to six years in prison for his role in the unrest that followed the disputed presidential elections.
Eight environmental activists arbitrarily detained in Iran in January and February remain in detention eight months later without clear charges, Human Rights Watch said. The organization called upon Iranian authorities to either immediately release them or charge them with recognizable crimes and produce evidence to justify their continued detention. The detained are all members of the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation. The public prosecutor for Tehran told reporters after the arrests that the detained are accused of using environmental projects as a cover to collect classified strategic information. It is unclear what classified information they could potentially collect, as their organization says it only works to conserve and protect Iran's flora and fauna, including the Asiatic cheetah, an endangered species in Iran. Other sources indicated they have been accused of "sowing corruption on earth," a serious charge that carries the risk of execution. (Image via HRW)
