A massive blast at a military base in Cyprus of confiscated Iranian munitions killed at least 12 people on Monday and knocked out the island’s largest power station, officials said. Witnesses said metal rained down on a nearby motorway and the explosion was felt for miles around in the olive groves and small farming villages [...]
US defence secretary on Iraq visit says US to act “unilaterally” against what he said was Iran’s arming of Shia groups. US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta has said that his country will act “uniterally” to confront what he said were Iranian threats to US interests in Iraq. Speaking during his first visit to Baghdad since taking office on July [...]
Senior Revolutionary Guards officer Yadollah Javani has accused former prime minister Mohammad Khatami of taking part in a “seditious movement” related to the 2009 presidential election. The Islamic Republic establishment contends that those who challenged the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were engaged in a seditious movement aimed at regime change. Javani told the Neday-e Enghelab [...]
Weapons supplies from Iran have ‘really hurt us’ in Iraq, says Defense’s Leon Panetta. The U.S. may be pushing Iraqi leader Nouri Maliki to request that some U.S. troops remain after the withdrawal deadline. Reporting from Baghdad— Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Sunday that weapons supplied byIran are behind a rash of attacks against American forces [...]
In another verdict against an Iranian blogger, the judiciary has sentenced Peyman Roshanzamir to seven months in prison for “insulting the leader.” The Jaras opposition website reports that Roshanzamir is charged with “insulting the leader” in an article entitled “Legal Ways of Changing the Leader.” He is also charged with adding his signature to a [...]
Hossein Ronaghi Maleki, 26, also known as “Babak Khorramdin” (his blog name), is a well-known Iranian blogger dissident, who was arrested on December 13, 2009 at his parents’ home in the Malekan suburb in Tabriz (northwestern Iran) and transferred to Evin prison. He was held for 10 months in solitary confinement. In October 2010 he [...]
Four years ago, on July 9, 2007 (the eighth anniversary of the 1999 Iranian student uprising), six members of the central council of Tahkim Vahdat (student alumni organization) protested at Polytechnic University (Amirkabir University of Technology). Some minutes after the above picture was taken by currently imprisoned student activist Milad Asadi, the six protesters were [...]
Iran said it fired two medium range missile into the Indian Ocean six months ago under the eyes of “American spy planes,” local media reported on Saturday, quoting a top military commander. “In Bahman (Iranian month which runs from January 21 to February 19, two Revolutionary Guard missiles with the range of 1,900 kilometres (1,180 [...]
Iran has reportedly executed at least 183 people during the first six months of 2011, with reports of an additional 130 executions that have gone unacknowledged. Those figures, according to Amnesty International statistics, put Iran on course for a record year for capital punishment. In 2010, 253 people were executed, including 170 people for drug [...]
Iran is stepping up its support for Shiite militants in Iraq, supplying them with more sophisticated weapons, the top US military officer said Thursday. Admiral Mike Mullen said Iran had made a decision to curtail its support for Shiite factions in 2008 but has now increased its activity in Iraq, sending in lethal arms that [...]