The message coming out of Tehran on the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution was that Iran is willing to negotiate with the United States, though it remains unclear how its declared “red lines” can be squared with Washington’s demands.
One month after a sweeping and deadly crackdown on nationwide protests, Islamic Republic marked its anniversary with state-organized rallies that appeared designed to project strength even as anti-government chants reverberated across neighborhoods nationwide.
The arrest of several prominent reformist figures in Tehran appears less aimed at silencing dissent than at tightening control at a moment of acute vulnerability for the state, as Iran navigates renewed talks with the United States under the shadow of war.
An Iranian teachers' union has confirmed the identities of 200 students killed during the January protests and published their names, defying efforts to suppress information about the deaths.
Free expression group ARTICLE 19 said China has spent more than a decade helping Iran build one of the world’s most restrictive internet control systems, supplying technology and a governance model used for censorship, surveillance and shutdowns.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hastily advanced trip to Washington this week underscores the rising stakes surrounding renewed diplomacy between Iran and the United States.
Iran International has obtained information alleging that senior Iranian diplomats transported large amounts of cash to Beirut in recent months, using diplomatic passports to move funds to Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
The Canadian Senate held a hearing on Tuesday on a new immigration and border security bill with much of the discussion focusing on individuals allegedly linked to the Islamic Republic living freely in Canada.
Iran’s January protests were the predictable result of years of ignored economic and social warning signs, according to one of the country’s most prominent economists, who says the state failed to recognize how close society had come to the brink.
Tehran appears to be speaking in two voices about diplomacy with Washington: one calibrated for foreign capitals, the other aimed inward, shaped by fear, factionalism, and propaganda.
Mohammad-Javad Larijani, an Islamic Republic insider and former senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader, said any US military strike would trigger a harsh response from that could kill many American troops.
A senior official in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said the United States warned Tehran it could face military action if it did not accept a set of conditions ahead of renewed diplomatic talks.
The killings that swept Iran last month revived memories of 1988, when the Islamic Republic erased thousands of political prisoners in silence—my brother, Bijan, among them.
Oil, gas and Iran economic analyst
International Security and Law Analyst
Iran International
Iran International
Iran International
Iran International
Iran International
Iran International
Iran International
I am writing this from Tehran after three days of trying to find a way to send it: things may get a lot worse before they get any better.
There is a cruel ritual in Iranian opposition politics: some voices abroad constantly interrogate the “purity” of activists inside—why they did not speak more sharply or endorse maximalist slogans, why survival itself looks insufficiently heroic.
