Iranian, Belgian FMs Hold Phone Calls Reportedly For Prisoner Swap

Sadeq Ziyaian, Head of National Center for Forecasting and Crisis Management announced Tuesday that "air pollution will continue in industrial and densely populated cities,” after weeks of dangerous levels of pollutants in the air.

The northeastern city of Mashhad, as the most polluted metropolis, with a pollutant index of 154, was placed in an unhealthy category for "everyone". The situation in Esfahan in central Iran is equally dangerous with a pollutant index of 153.

Tehran, Karaj, Ahvaz and Tabriz are at the top of the industrial cities that experience air pollution.

Based on the approval of Tehran Air Pollution Emergency Committee, schools in all cities of the province were shut on Tuesday.

Experts say the reason for the high concentration of air pollutants is burning mazut, a dirty fuel, instead of natural gas in thermal power plants.

Mazut -- commonly called waste oil -- is a heavy, low quality fuel oil, only used when the facilities to blend or break it down into more conventional petrochemicals such as diesel are not available.

Iran has the world’s second largest natural gas deposits but is unable to boost production because it lacks capital and Western technology. It needs to invest $40 billion in modernizing and expanding its gas fields, but most are in the Persian Gulf and need Western technology.

Due to its anti-West foreign policy and an expanding nuclear program, Iran is under US sanctions and cannot borrow money or technology from the West.

Like other European capitals, Amsterdam expressed its displeasure and protest to Iran's Ambassador Alireza Kazemi Abadi.

This is at least the third time in the past month that the Iranian ambassador to the Netherlands has been summoned. Since Iran began executing detained protesters in December, the ministry of foreign affairs of the Netherlands has protested to Tehran.

Alireza Akbari, a dual national, and a former top employee of Iran’s ministry of defense was executed Saturday on espionage charges.

Britain called the execution a barbaric act immediately after the announcement by Iran on Saturday and said it would not go unpunished.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Akbari’s execution is a heinous and barbaric act.

Iran’s action triggered a major escalation in tensions between the West and the Islamic Republic, which were already sour over Tehran’s crackdown on nationwide antigovernment protests and its military support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Jam-e Jam daily, which is owned by Iran's state broadcaster, reported Tuesday that the person was arrested while taking photos of Omidiyeh oil facilities.

Omidiyeh is home to the Aghajari oil field which is owned by National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) and operated by National Iranian South Oil Company.

No other details have been published yet, but Jam-e Jam has told it will report more on the issue later.

After the outbreak of protests over the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in mid-September, Iran had detained tens of foreign nationals including those from France, Germany, Italy, Poland and the Netherlands.

Following Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s lead, Iranian officials claim the ongoing anti-government protests across Iran are instigated by foreign enemies.

Germany and other European countries have slammed Iran's killing of protesters and increased human rights violations, with proposed plans to designate the Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization across Europe.

Meanwhile, several foreigners visiting Iran have also disappeared, confirming earlier reports that the Islamic Republic is taking foreign citizens hostage.

Tehran denies any policy of hostage taking and insists all foreigners are tried according to legal process. However, it has frequently shown readiness for prisoner exchanges and participated in swaps in the past.

Hengaw Human Rights Organization announced in a tweet Monday that 13 children, five university students, four teachers, and five women are among the detainees.

Iranian security forces used excessive and lethal force against protesters in Kurdish regions since the beginning of nationwide protests following the death of 22-year-old Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini in police custody in mid-September.

There are no exact figures on the number of people arrested during the protests across the country, but some sources say nearly 20,000 people have been detained.

Security forces have killed around 500 civilians during the protests, many from Kurdish and Sunni regions in the southeast.

The Islamic Republic’s attacks on Kurds are not limited to the crackdown on protesters as the IRGC has also stepped-up shelling of Iranian Kurdish parties in the Iraqi Kurdistan region.

Back in November, the IRGC launched missile attacks against the positions of the dissident Iranian Kurdish group, the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan in Erbil. At least three missiles hit the party's positions including a hospital, causing casualties.

The Islamic Republic calls the Kurdish armed groups in the western provinces of Iran, "terrorist groups" or "anti-revolutionary" but these groups say that the goal of their armed campaign is "defending the rights of the Kurds".

At the same time, an aide to the Russian president Vladimir Putin met with the Ali Shamkhani, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of the Islamic Republic in Tehran.

Russia, Turkey and Syria have launched diplomatic efforts for an agreement to improve Ankara-Damascus relations, after years of tensions during the Syrian civil war, but Iran has not been invited to take part.

TASS news agency announced that talks between Sergey Lavrov and Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, which were scheduled for January 17, have been postponed "by agreement of the parties".

No explanation was provided about the reasons, but Maria Zakharova, Spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry said earlier that Lavrov and Amir-Abdollahian were going to discuss the JCPOA, cooperation in the United Nations and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the situation in Syria, Afghanistan, and other issues.

Meanwhile, Nournews website reported that Putin Aide Igor Levitin met with Shamkhani Tuesday morning.

The details of the meeting have not been reported yet.

The US State Department said last week that Iran is the most important source of security assistance to Russia and that the military relations between Tehran and Moscow have strengthened in the last few months.