Iranian Politicians Frustrated Over Political, Economic Situation

The hiker, whose identity remains undisclosed, conveyed details of the attack, which targeted tourists, to Faraz news website on Tuesday. He recounted that the attackers were “approximately 18 or 19 years old, wearing cargo pants, and concealing their faces with keffiyehs."

"They targeted both men and women, but the men seemed to bear the brunt of their aggression. Unfortunately, my teammate now faces a life of paralysis due to the impact of the shocker on his back," he said. A shocker – or electroshock weapon is an incapacitating weapon that delivers an electric shock that temporarily disrupts muscle functions. It does not normally cause lasting damage but can cause permanent disability to muscle or nerve tissue.

The attack occurred on Friday when a group of tourists was exploring the picturesque mountainous region of Opert, situated on the border of Semnan and Mazandaran provinces. The assault was orchestrated by an unidentified armed group.

Pictures shared on social media revealed that the attackers were armed with firearms and electric shocker devices. In addition to the paralyzed hiker, multiple individuals sustained injuries and bruises.

During the attack, the group justified the assault, citing it as a response to "hiking on the third night of Muharram," a time when Shiites mourn the martyrdom of their third Imam.

Iran International has been unable to independently verify these details, and so far, no official reactions have been reported regarding this incident.

However, over recent years, there have been numerous reports of restrictions imposed on Iranian tourists and nature enthusiasts.

This recent attack coincides with the regime's ongoing push for obligatory hijab, adding to concerns over personal safety and freedom of expression.

"I had previously warned against such methods that go against the law and Sharia during a meeting of the Supreme National Security Council," Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf said in response to the scandal, following similarly critical remarks made by hardliner lawmakers on the parliament floor.

This is a typical response by regime officials in Iran who usually advocate ‘killing the messenger’ when faced with evidence of corruption or forbidden activities by insiders. 

Meanwhile, what Sharia in Iran clearly forbids is homosexuality among men, which it says is punishable by death.

The video that has gone viral on social media since Wednesday allegedly shows Reza Seqati (Seghati), a married man and the director general of the Islamic Culture and Guidance ministry in the northern Gilan Province who has close ties with the hardliner Paydari Front, engaging in sex with a young man, apparently at a ministry guesthouse. 

A few days after the publication of the video, the Islamic culture and guidance department announced that it had suspended Seqati and referred his case to the judiciary for further investigation.

Ghalibaf added that such matters could only be made public after the alleged crime is proven and a judge’s order is acquired. 

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The presidential administration, the judiciary and senior clerics have so far remained silent about the revelation. 

Hardliner lawmakers, Mojtaba Zolnouri and Kazem Delkhosh, had complained that the official should not be judged before investigations by judicial and law enforcement officials are completed and he is found guilty. 

The situation is completely different when it comes to dissidents or protesters. Not only they are often arrested without a warrant by plainclothes agents and taken to unknown locations, but immediate reprisals against their family members follow, and they spend month in prison without being indicted.

Zolnour who is deputy speaker has also said those who published the video had committed a much bigger crime than the person they made revelations about and demanded their punishment.

But another conservative member of parliament, Morteza Mahmoudvand blasted the silence and apparent inaction of parliament and top officials during a session Tuesday. He urged President Raisi to intervene "in the name of God," and called for the minister of Islamic guidance to resign.

The hardliners' silence or attempts to downplay the significance of the official's sex video have angered many Iranians. They argue that ordinary people are harshly punished for what the authorities consider 'immoral' actions, but when it involves regime loyalists, leniency seems to be the prevailing approach.

The reformist Mardomsalari newspaper highlighted on Saturday that the mere removal of Seqati from his position and the silence of hardliners regarding his alleged wrongdoing, where they would typically raise a storm if someone with different political affiliations were involved, is proof of hardliners' double standards in ethical and moral matters.

“Would they be so compassionate if a person from the rival political camp had done the same thing or would call him an agent of the CIA and Mossad in Iran who had taken money from the West to morally corrupt the [Iranian] youth,” Mardomsalari asked. 

The paper also drew attention to reports of Seqati’s close affiliation to former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, one of the leaders of the ultra-conservative Paydari group, his brother Vahid Jalili, and their political circle. 

Photos of Saeed Jalili and Seqati have been widely circulating on social media. Some news websites and social media users have speculated that the publication of the video may have something to do with internal conflicts in the hardliner camp and was meant to bring disgrace to Jalili and his immediate associates. 

Most social media users have expressed anger about Seqati’s hypocrisy as he was well known for his efforts to encourage hijab as an Islamic “value” but engaging in homosexuality which is a very serious offense in Islam and punishable by death according to Iran's Islamic Penal Code. 

The addition of the high precision Abu Mahdi missiles to the naval fleet will extend Iran’s ability to counter electronic warfare in the region. According to Iran's Defense Minister Mohammad Reza Ashtiani “the missile system has been outfitted with cutting-edge artificial intelligence in its command-and-control systems.”

At a ceremony to mark the acquisition, which was attended by senior military officials, Ashtiani said the Abu Mahdi missile enables Iran “to counter electronic warfare tactics and adeptly evade radar systems, while also enabling it to autonomously chart its optimal flight path.”

The missile, which is domestically manufactured, is named after former Iraqi militia commander, Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis, who was killed in a US raid outside Baghdad's international airport in January 2020 along with former IRGC Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani.

It is designed on basis of Kh-55 cruise missiles that Iran purchased from Ukraine 20 years ago, according to military analysts.

Iran has long sought to maintain its missile program independent of US and global sanctions tied to its nuclear program. However, recent geopolitical developments, notably the Russian invasion of Ukraine, have brought the perceived threats of Iran's missile program into sharper focus for the West.

The regime continues to provide military support, including drones, to Russian forces and its proxies across the region. Iran, nevertheless, claims that its missile program is entirely geared towards deterrence, with the aim of upholding regional stability.

The announcement comes amid ongoing tensions between the countries over the Nagorno-Karabakh region and the critical Lachin corridor, which serves as the sole communication route between Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh.

Speaking at the press conference alongside his Armenian counterpart, Ararat Mirzoyan, who was on an official visit to Tehran, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian emphasized the significance of transit routes between Iran and Armenia. He said "Iran and Armenia recognize the importance of the historical transit route, and both nations seek to maintain and strengthen its functionality."

Furthermore, the Iranian foreign minister welcomed the continued peace talks between Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan. He said "We are closely following the peace process in the region and are committed to promoting stability and cooperation among our neighboring countries".

However, the Baku authorities have not yet issued a statement regarding President Ilham Aliyev's reported “assurance” to Tehran about the non-closure of the transit routes.

Iran has been deeply concerned about Azerbaijani moves to establish a corridor through Armenia territory to a piece of its territory to the west. While an Azerbaijani military threat exists to force such a corridor, Iran will lose its historic land connection with Armenia.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and the Republic of Azerbaijan has persisted for more than three decades, resulting in numerous military confrontations.

Tensions over the transit road have led to military exercises conducted by the Iranian armed forces near the border with Azerbaijan in recent years.

Iranian opponents of the Islamic Republic on Monday accused the Hanover-based International Neuroscience Institute of expunging the patient record of the “hanging judge” Hossein-Ali Nayeri who was involved in the massacre of hundreds of political prisoners in 1988. 

Germany’s largest paper, the mass circulation Bild, reported that INI deleted Nayeri’s medical record in apparent move to avoid a new pro-Iran regime scandal. The director of the INI, Dr.Madjid Samii, scrambled to deny the allegation that he was caught again treating a regime official responsible for severe human rights abuses.

“There are currently no patients from Iran at the INI. These allegations damage our reputation, and not for the first time,” said Samii, according to the regional paper HAZ.

Samii, who was born in Tehran in 1937, faced widespread outrage in 2018 for providing care to Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi at INI. Shahroudi headed the Islamic Republic’s opaque judiciary from 1999 to 2009 and imposed executions on 2,000 people, including adolescents. Germany’s government permitted Shahroudi to leave the country after his treatment.

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Samii told the HAZ that “As a doctor, I have an obligation to treat every patient, even it is Putin.”

Jason Brodsky, policy director of the US-based United Against a Nuclear Iran (UANI), tweeted a report from the German paper Die Welt that said “According to eyewitnesses, two vehicles with license plates of the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran were in the parking lot of the clinic [INI]last Friday.”

The Iranian-German dissident, Dr. Kazem Moussavi, told Iran International that Samii is a “well-known friend of the mullahs” and also treated former Iranian regime judge Gholamreza Mansouri in 2020. Mansouri incarcerated 20 journalists during his tenure. The regime-controlled Young Journalists Club reported at the time that Mansouri “is said to be hospitalized in Professor[Majid] Samii's hospital in Germany.”

Moussavi added, “As an Iranian member of the opposition and spokesman for the Green Party of Iran in Germany, I sharply criticize the Federal government and Green Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock for regrettably turning Germany into a secret place of treatment for the mullahs' death judges. He [Nayeri] is being treated in a German city of all places, in Hanover, where the Germanpolitical hostage awaiting his execution in Tehran, Jamshid Sharmahd, lived with his family.” 

Moussavi said the German “Federal government must end its appeasement policy” toward Iran’s regime and called for the immediate arrest of Nayeri. 

The Bild paper also took the German government to task for its policies that reportedly placate Tehran’s rulers. “Sweden shows that there is another way: Hamid Nouri, a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards and Nayeri’s assistant, was arrested [in Sweden] in 2019. Despite protests from Tehran, Nouri was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2021 for torture and murder.”

Moussavi said that Nayeri ”has served as chief adviser to the Islamic Republic's death judge, Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei, since Ebrahim Raisi's presidency. Both are directly responsible for the political prisoners and those executed in the ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ protests in Iran.”

The Bild reported that Iranians, who live in Germany and were victimized by Nayeri, filed criminal complaints against the cleric and judge. The human rights activist Mina Ahadi told the paper “Many of his traumatized victims are here in Germany, you meet them everywhere.”

Amnesty International classified the 1988 massacre as a “crimes against humanity” in which the regime slaughtered at least 5,000 political prisoners. Nayeri issued summary executions to hundreds of political prisoners at Evin and Gohardasht prisons.

The Iran People’s Tribunal on Monday wrote on its website that it filed a case against Nayeri at the Berlin Prosecutor’s Office. Four witnesses are part of the Tribunal’s case who were taken to Nayeri’s “Death Committee” in 1988. The Tribunal said the Berlin Prosecutor forwarded the case to the Hanover Prosecutor who assigned the police to investigate. The police said Nayeri had not been admitted to the INI.

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Mizan, an Iranian regime-controlled news agency affiliated to the judiciary, denied that Nayeri visited Germany.

Sheina Vojoudi, an Iranian dissident in Germany, termed Germany’s conduct toward admitting Iranian regime officials accused of grave human rights violations a “double standard.” 

She said, “How can Germany express its concern about human rights violations in Iran, yet let the human rights abusers who are responsible for thousands of innocent lives be hospitalized in Germany while there is no way for the persecuted Christians or political activists to apply for a German visa.”

She continued, “These ayatollahs who have been treated on German soil issued thousands of death sentences to innocent Iranians. Arresting these human rights abusers for their crimes against humanity is the least expected when they enter a democratic country.”

Vojoudi, an associate fellow for the Gold Institute for International Strategy, argued that “Iranian refugees in Germany fled to save their lives from the same Ayatollahs who always come to Germany for the best treatment.”

Iran International sent numerous press queries to the INI and the German Foreign Ministry.