Iran Digest Week of December 2nd - December 9th
/AIC’s Iran digest project covers the latest developments and news stories published in Iranian and international media outlets. This weekly digest is compiled by associate Samuel Howell. Please note that the news and views expressed in the articles below do not necessarily reflect those of AIC.
US-Iran Relations
The U.S. wants Iran off a U.N. panel. Other countries are wary.
The Biden administration is facing wariness even from some traditional global partners as it tries to get Iran kicked off a United Nations panel that promotes women’s rights, according to four people monitoring the effort.
The U.S.-led effort, inspired by a push from Iranian and other women activists, comes as Iran’s Islamist regime faces protests after the September death of a young woman detained by Iran’s “morality police” for allegedly violating laws that require headscarves and otherwise modest dress. A vote on Iran’s position on the 45-member Commission on the Status of Women is expected on Wednesday.
An ouster would further humiliate Iran’s clerical leaders at a time of already widespread condemnation of their treatment of women and deadly response to protests. The effort could also help boost the Biden administration’s standing among the Iranian people, despite the relatively limited tools it has to pressure the regime.
(Politico)
US Congress Working On Bipartisan Resolution To Support Iran Protests
US Senate Foreign Relations Committee has approved a bipartisan resolution reaffirming Washington’s support for antigovernment protesters in Iran.
Spearheaded by Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), the resolution condemned the Islamic Republic’s security forces for their violent response to Iranian citizens who have taken to the streets for their fundamental human rights.
An identical resolution was also introduced in the House of Representatives by Tom Malinowski (D-N.J.), Claudia Tenney (R-N.Y.), and Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
(Iran International)
Women of Iran
Iranian forces shooting at faces and genitals of female protesters, medics say
Iranian security forces are targeting women at anti-regime protests with shotgun fire to their faces, breasts and genitals, according to interviews with medics across the country.
Doctors and nurses – treating demonstrators in secret to avoid arrest – said they first observed the practice after noticing that women often arrived with different wounds to men, who more commonly had shotgun pellets in their legs, buttocks and backs.
While an internet blackout has hidden much of the bloody crackdown on protesters, photos provided by medics to the Guardian showed devastating wounds all over their bodies from so-called birdshot pellets, which security forces have fired on people at close range. Some of the photos showed people with dozens of tiny “shot” balls lodged deep in their flesh.
With ‘Eyes on Iran,’ Artists Bring Protests to Roosevelt Island
A hand holds a burning white hijab. Scattered behind it are incongruously pink reproductions of a computed tomography scan showing blunt force trauma to the head. The pointed image is an enormous photo print by the Iranian American artist Sheida Soleimani, currently on display in front of a former smallpox hospital on Roosevelt Island.
The scans were leaked after Mahsa Amini, a young Kurdish woman who also went by the name Jina, died in Tehran in police custody in September. She had been detained on the grounds that she was not properly observing Iran’s hijab law. Her death sparked widespread protests in the country, and though pushback from government forces has been severe, with hundreds reported killed and thousands more arrested, the protests still haven’t stopped.
In an effort to keep international attention on the protests — and, more specifically, to pressure the United Nations to remove Iran from its Commission on the Status of Women — the activist/artist collective For Freedoms, working with a female-leadership-focused NGO and a loose coalition of prominent Iranian women, recently mounted a group show called “Eyes on Iran” in Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms State Park, directly across the water from the U.N. building.
Economy
U.S. puts sanctions on Turkish businessman, citing links to Iran's Quds Force
The Biden administration levied sanctions on Thursday on prominent Turkish businessman Sitki Ayan and his network of firms, accusing him of acting as a facilitator for oil sales and money laundering on behalf of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The U.S. measures come at a time of strained ties between the two nations over a host of issues, including disagreement over Syria policy and Ankara's purchase of Russian air defense systems.
Ayan's companies have set up international sales contracts for Iranian oil, arranged shipments and helped launder the proceeds and obscured the origin of the Iranian oil on behalf of Iran's Quds Force, an arm of the IRGC, the Treasury said in a statement first reported by Reuters.
(Reuters)
Iran’s Food Price Inflation Hits Alarming Levels In 12 Provinces
Iran’s point-to-point inflation for the previous Iranian calendar month – which ended November 21 – was about 50 percent with food inflation recorded at above 70 percent in 12 provinces.
According to a recent report by EcoIran website, as the government lifted import subsidies for essential goods earlier this year, food prices have jumped an average of 67.7 percent compared with the same period in the previous year. The news outlet said that at least 12 provinces are in a red state in terms of food inflation, referring to a very critical condition.
The inflation rate for food items was especially high in the province of Sistan-Baluchestan, reaching a whopping 84 percent, with Lorestan province hitting 78 percent to be tat second place. The two provinces are low-income regions where the quality of the items they consume are also lower than in other provinces.
Inside Iran
Iran Executes Man Over Nationwide Protests
The Iranian government announced that it had hanged a 23-year-old prisoner on Thursday, the first known execution of a person arrested in the protests that have engulfed the country for the past three months.
The man, Mohsen Shekari, was accused of blocking a street in Tehran and of attacking a member of the Basij militia with a machete, according to the Mizan news agency, which is overseen by the country’s judiciary. He is one of 11 protesters who have so far been sentenced to death by the regime.
The announcement came during a week that saw businesses, shops and traditional bazaars in more than 50 cities across Iran participate in one of the largest general strikes in decades in support of protests calling for the end to the authoritarian clerical rule that has been in place since 1979.
(The New York Times)
Sister of Iran’s supreme leader condemns protest crackdown
A sister of Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, has spoken out against his bloody crackdown on nationwide demonstrations, saying her brother’s “despotic caliphate” has brought nothing but suffering, according to a letter published by her exiled son.
The letter came a day after the country’s former president Mohammad Khatami also issued a rare statement to voice support for the protest movement, adding pressure on the regime from powerful political figures.
In her letter, Badri Hosseini Khamenei, who lives in Iran, called on the country’s feared Revolutionary Guards and “mercenaries” to lay down their weapons as soon as possible and “join the people”. She said she would herself join the rallies were it not for her poor health.
(The Guardian)
Global Relations
Russia is providing 'unprecedented' military support to Iran in exchange for drones, officials say
Russia is now providing an "unprecedented level" of military and technical support to Iran in exchange for Tehran supplying weapons for the war in Ukraine, senior Biden administration officials say.
As part of the enhanced partnership, Russia may be providing Iran with advanced military equipment and components, including helicopters and air defense systems. In the spring, Iranian pilots trained in Russia to fly the Sukhoi Su-35, a Russian fighter jet, which the officials say indicates Iran “may begin receiving the aircraft within the next year.”
The White House had previously said it believes that Iran was supplying drones to Russia for use in Ukraine, but the relationship between the two nations is transforming into “a full-fledged defense partnership" with weapons and military expertise flowing in both directions, the officials said.
(NBC News)
Analysis
Here is Why Iran Actually Won the World Cup Match Last Week
By: Ciara S. Moezidis
Some tell us to keep politics out of the World Cup. Others tell us to keep the World Cup out of politics. Whether we like it or not, politics and the World Cup are inextricably intertwined.
The Iran vs. United States match was not like any other game — it was more than that. And I am not saying this because the match represents my Iranian-American identity. It is because the Iran team had more at stake than just advancing to win the World Cup. Their livelihoods were on the line.
The last time Iran and the U.S. played against each other was in 1998 in France. I was not even born yet. Throughout the last 24 years, a lot has changed geopolitically, but when it comes to Iran and the U.S., not much has — until recently.
(Read More Here)
