Iran Claims 26 People Indicted Over Zahedan Bloody Massacre

The US-based opposition activist, in London to meet lawmakers and lobby for proscribing the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist organization, said she has been put under 24-hour police protection in the UK after the Metropolitan police received threats to her life.

After she appeared at the Piers Morgan Uncensored show earlier this week, British police came to see her at her hotel room, informing her that they would be giving her protection during the remainder of her stay. 

However, unperturbed, in spite of numerous threats to her life from IRGC operatives abroad, the fearless campaigner said: “I’m not as scared for my life, I survived kidnapping plots,” she said. “I survived an assassination plot, so I am not scared for my life at all. I dedicate my life to giving voice to voiceless people.”

Alinejad said the move confirmed the level of danger she continues to live under, the regime seeing her outspoken leadership against the Islamic Republic as a major threat.

“I know that the British are a little bit relaxed when it comes to death threats. Now, I believe that the level of the threat is very intense, and it’s very serious.”

It has, however, given her direct access to security chiefs to fight for proscribing the IRGC, which has been behind numerous attacks globally, not only on Iranian soil.

Since 2015, there has been a surge in IRGC activity in the UK, Europe and the United States. Most recently, UK spy agency MI5 acknowledged the real threat from Iran’s “aggressive intelligence services” to kidnap or kill UK-based people in 2022.

Earlier this year, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard took credit for the relocation of Iran International studios from the UK to the US following terror threats, calling it a victory for the Islamic Republic.

Iran International was warned by authorities in November that its journalists were under threat from Iranian agents and the Metropolitan Police took measures to strengthen security around the network’s office in the area.

On February 18, the network announced that following the advice of UK anti-terrorism officials it decided to temporarily move its studio operations to the US.

In her remarks at Sir Harry Evans Global Summit in Investigative Journalism on Wednesday, she said, "I told the members of the British Parliament that you asked the Iran International network to stop their work in London... Instead of canceling the activities of journalists, you should stop the Islamic Republic."

She made the remarks at a panel discussion titled "Iran's War Against Journalists," during which she talked about the latest developments of the "Women, Life, Freedom" protests in Iran, sparked by the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, and the Islamic Republic’s repression of journalists and any voice of dissent at home and abroad.

In February, the Jewish Chronicle reported that Iran is reportedly preparing to close the British embassy in Tehran as tensions simmer over a plot to kill journalists in the UK, and London’s rebuke of crackdown on dissent. 

The British embassy in Tehran has been a regular flashpoint in recent years. In December, its walls were defaced by the Basij paramilitary militia, one of the forces operating under the IRGC, with slogans labelling it a “terrorist center”.

Alinejad, who has become one of the main opposition figures amplifying the voice of protesters inside Iran, has appeared at the UN and met with several European leaders such as France’s Emmanuel Macron and the Netherland’s Mark Rutte.

Talks about further restrictions on the activities of the regime and proscribing the IRGC have been among the hot topics at the British parliament in the past several months.

Despite repeated calls by a large number of lawmakers, London has failed to take any tangible actions against Iran and its most important arm the IRGC. However, several rounds of sanctions and other punitive measures have been taken but Iranian people suffering under the atrocities of the regime do not believe that they have been enough.

Earlier in the week, The UK’s Charity Commission removed trustees from the board of the Islamic Center of England for its links to Iran. The UK's security minister Tom Tugendhat welcomed the decision by the regulator, saying its leadership was appointed by the head of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The Washington-based organization said the Women, Life, Freedom movement has demonstrated remarkable courage and resilience in the face of ongoing persecution and discrimination by Iran's oppressive regime.

“From all walks of life, the women of Iran are putting themselves on the line with unbelievable bravery. The international community must stand with the women of Iran as they continue their fight for freedom in the face of horrific repression and human rights abuses,” said Michael J. Abramowitz, the president of Freedom House.

The non-profit organization honored the rapid response of the movement after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in September, with rallies being held in over 100 cities nationwide.

Protesters clashed with security forces, expressing their anger over violence against women and the broader suppression of basic freedoms. The regime responded with a harsh crackdown, targeting protesters in the country’s Kurdish region in particular.

Over 19,700 people have been arrested and 530 have been killed since the protests began in September. Iran has been rated 'Not Free' by the Freedom in the World report since 1979, scoring 12/100 in the Freedom In The World 2023 report.

“The struggle for freedom and human rights requires the unwavering commitment of individuals and communities around the world,” added Abramowitz.

Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian democratic opposition leader and historian was awarded the honor next to the women of Iran for his relentless fight against corruption and repression in Putin’s Russia.

The Coordinating Council of Teachers' Union Organizations had called for further protests last week just hours after the Supreme Leader failed to address nationwide school poisonings.

The rallies were scheduled as a tribute to Jabbar Baghcheban, also known as Mirza Jabbar Asgarzadeh, an Iranian inventor and educator born on May 9, 1886, who established the first Iranian kindergarten and the first deaf school.

The council stressed the necessity of ending the "dominance of the ruling totalitarian ideology" in Iranian schools, claiming the current incompetent managers of the educational system should be replaced by those educated under more modern, secular pedagogy.

In addition to their usual demands such as better salaries and working conditions, the teachers’ council reiterated that Iran’s education system will not improve without a fundamental change.

In response, teachers in the cities of Kermanshah, Arak, Shush, Ahvaz, Torbat Heydarieh, Hamedan, Sanandaj, Eslamabad-e Gharb, Qazvin, Esfahan and Harsin gathered in front of the Education Departments on Tuesday.

Gatherings were held peacefully in some cities, but in Sanandaj west of Iran and Esfahan in the center the police force attacked protesters.

Hengaw Human Rights Organization, a Kurdish rights group, reported that the security forces have kidnapped two teachers in the city.

In its final statement, The Coordinating Council of Teachers' Union Organizations slammed the ideological indoctrination in textbooks, creating psychological insecurity and threatening the female students, and urged attention to the livelihood of the teachers.

“The goal of the education system is not to train citizens, but to train soldiers aligned with the narrow-minded indoctrination of totalitarian ideology," reads the statement.

Referring to the nationwide uprising following the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, the statement added what was seen in the schools and streets was the failure of a model that ignores the deep changes in society which wants to achieve its unrealistic ideals in the educational system.

Hundreds of schools in the Iranian provinces have been attacked by unidentified gases since November 30 when the first case of poisoning among schoolgirls was reported in the religious city of Qom. However, the government has not taken any tangible measures to identify and pursue the perpetrators, nor to explain to terrified parents and students what was happening, other than a few staged arrests. It is impossible such wide scale attacks could happen without regime approval.

Thousands of students have been affected, mostly girls, with hundreds hospitalized with symptoms including respiratory distress, numbness in their limbs, heart palpitations, headaches, nausea, and vomiting.

Critics of the regime say the attacks are part of a crackdown on protests, a claim denied by government officials who have claimed the symptoms are the result of mass hysteria.

Families of students have staged protest rallies urging officials to hold classes virtually rather than in school to protect children from further attacks.

The hacktivist group ‘Uprising till Overthrow', affiliated with the Albania-based opposition Mujahideen-e Khalq (MEK) group, released hundreds of identification documents, minutes of meetings, the ministry’s correspondence, phone numbers of ministry officials, and the names of 11,000 employees of the foreign ministry, among others. 

According to the telegram channel of the hackers, all the sites related to the ministry such as the Islamic Republic’s embassies, and affiliated organizations were targeted, showing a landing page with photos of the leaders of MEK as well as photos of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Raisi with red crosses over them. 

Also on the page, there were slogans of “Death to Khamenei” and “Hail to Rajavi”, the current leader of the opposition group. “There is a great revolution underway in Iran. The uprising will continue until the palace of oppression is demolished. Iran’s democratic revolution will be victorious,” read the message on the pages. Most of the pages were down midday on Sunday. 

The ‘Uprising till Overthrow' had already hacked and deactivated several regime’s websites and services. In June 2022, it hacked over 5,000 security cameras of state bodies and 150 websites belonging to Tehran Municipality, displaying similar slogans on the websites and releasing internal data. 

The hack comes after another cyberassault in March on the portal of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance (Ershad) and its affiliated websites showing the photos of the Rajavis and calling for the death of the country’s supreme leader. 

Since the beginning of the current wave of protests in mid-September, several hacking groups have targeted state websites and online services. They have released numerous documents and have disrupted hundreds of surveillance cameras. 

The documents leaked on Sunday also revealed the Islamic Republic’s continuous efforts and correspondence with European officials to finalize a prisoner swap deal with Belgium, which would see jailed Iranian diplomat Asadollah Assadi released in exchange for the detained Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele. 

The Belgian Constitutional Court upheld a prisoner exchange treaty with Iran in March that could result in Assadi being swapped for Vandecasteele. The MEK mounted a fierce campaign against the deal, challenging the extradition. 

Former Iranian embassy attaché, Asadollah Asadi, 51, is currently serving a 20-year sentence in Belgium for alleged attempted murder and involvement in terrorism for his role in plotting a bomb attack during an MEK event near Paris in 2018. Asadi, the only Iranian diplomat ever brought to trial in Europe for direct involvement in terrorism was arrested in Germany, where he did not enjoy diplomatic immunity while he was on holiday. German authorities later extradited Assadi to Belgium. He was a diplomat in Iran’s embassy in Austria.

Security forces in Iran arrested aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele, 41, who has worked in a variety of humanitarian agencies since at least 2006. In January, the Islamic Republic’s judiciary sentenced Vandecasteele, who was detained in 2022, to 40 years in prison and 74 lashes for alleged “spying and cooperation with the United States, money laundering and smuggling $500,000 out of Iran.” 

Iran has been accused of wrongfully detaining at least a dozen foreign and dual nationals on trumped up charges, effectively as hostages to extract concessions from Western governments. Most of them are held on spurious spying charges. 

The Coordination Council of Iranian Teachers' Trade Associations said teachers should gather in protest in front of the parliament in Tehran and education ministry departments in other cities.

In recent weeks, Iran's security forces have violently attacked teachers’ protests in Tehran and other cities detaining several demonstrators.

While calling for better salaries and working conditions, the teachers’ council also stated that Iran’s education system will not improve without a fundamental change. The union urged an end to the "dominance of the ruling totalitarian ideology" in Iranian schools.

Earlier, the union had called for further protests just hours after the Supreme Leader failed to address nationwide school poisonings in his speech on Wednesday.

Khamenei had been speaking at an event for the Islamic Republic’s National Teachers’ Day with a cherry-picked group of teachers. During the meeting, Khamenei discussed the country’s education system but failed to even mention the months of gas attacks against the schools across Iran which have left thousands of schoolgirls sick and hospitalized.

Scores of schools in many of the country’s provinces have been attacked by unidentified chemicals since November 30 when the first case of poisoning among schoolgirls was reported in the religious city of Qom.

The union also voiced support for the recent wave of protests by teachers and families of students who have been victims of the mysterious chemical attacks on schools.