Depression Gripping Tehran, Study Finds

Hamid Qarahassanlou, a fifty-four-year-old radiologist, and his wife Farzaneh were arrested in November during protests in Karaj, following the death of Basij militia member Ruhollah Ajamian, who was reportedly beaten to death by angry demonstrators.

The doctors, expressing their objection to the allegations against Qarahassanlou, stated, "With the close and extensive knowledge we have of Qarahassanlou, either personally or through trustworthy colleagues, we do not find the accusation of his involvement in attributed violence to be justified." They emphasized that information from the family, lawyers, and official media outlets supported their belief in the couple's innocence.

After a commemoration ceremony on November 3, 2022, for those who lost their lives in the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising, 16 people were detained in connection to the death of Ruhollah Ajamian. Two men, Mohammad Mehdi Karami and Mohammad Hosseini, were executed on January 7, 2023, while eight others faced heavy prison sentences and exile.

Qarahassanlou, initially sentenced to death, received the longest imprisonment term of 15 years in the case. The doctors, drawing attention to the couple's diseases, have called for a retrial and temporary release until the case can be reexamined in a fair court.

The plea from the medical community comes amid tensions, as the brother of Ajamian has publicly stated that their family "only wants" Qarahassanlou and his wife to be hanged. The Islamic Republic has previously executed protesters on charges of 'moharebeh,' meaning "war against God."

It’s unclear what the proof was of Iranian involvement in manufacturing and operating of the missiles, although a photo has been presented along with the announcement, which Israel army says is a cruise missile produced by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Iran has never denied its support for Hamas and other armed groups in the region, providing funds, training, weapons and knowhow. But until now, Hezbollah in Lebanon has been widely believed to be the only group to have received precision-guided missiles (or the required technology to make it in-house).

The revelation about Hamas comes only a day after the Israeli army announced it had dismantled Hamas’s “military framework” in northern Gaza, and was now focusing on central and southern Gaza.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly said that the onslaught on Gaza will continue until Hamas is “eliminated.” On Sunday, he told his war cabinet that “the war must not be stopped until we complete all of its goals.”

Netanyahu critics say his military ambitions may be driven by political interests. TheWashington Post on Sunday quoted an unnamed US official as saying “Netanyahu’s political career will end with it, incentivizing him to broaden the conflict.”

This could mean, above all, a possible war with Hezbollah in Lebanon –which is Iran’s most powerful ally and has frequently targeted Israel during the three months since October 7th.

The Lebanese Shiite militant group launched a barrage of rockets towards Israel early Saturday in response to the killing of a senior Hamas official in Beirut Last week. Shortly after, Israel hit several Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon.

Many –including the Biden administration– fear that the regular exchange of fire at the Israeli-Lebanese border would lead to an all-out war, especially since Netanyahu has spoken of a “fundamental change” to address the border fighting with Hezbollah.

The situation seems to be worrying enough for President Joe Biden to have sent his Secretary of State Anthony Blinken on yet another tour of the Middle East to try and prevent any widening of the ongoing conflict, which has killed more than a thousand in Israel and twenty times more in Gaza.

“We have an intense focus on preventing this conflict from spreading,” Blinken said in a meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah.

Even more concerned than the US seems to be the European Union.

On Saturday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said it is “absolutely necessary” that Israel’s onslaught in Gaza does not drag Lebanon into a regional war.

“I am sending this message to Israel, too,” Borrell said after a meeting with the Lebanese foreign ministers, “I think that the war can be prevented, has to be avoided and diplomacy can prevail.”

Iran is also part of that conversation –behind the scenes, perhaps, with the Biden administration but publicly and openly with EU countries.

“I called Iranian Minister A Abdollahian and gave him a very clear message,” French foreign minister Catherine Colonna posted on X Saturday, “the risk of regional conflagration has never been so significant; Iran and its associates must immediately stop their destabilizing actions. No one would gain from escalation.”

In an interview published Sunday, former chief of Iran's central bank Valiollah Seif said the biggest challenge facing the country is economic corruption, mainly due to a government controlled system that that hands out privileges. The government also has a habit of regulating prices, including the subsidized cheap foreign currency given to a cherrypicked group of regime insiders.

Seif said as long as the government hands out dollars below the free market rate, there would be people who find ways to take advantage of it. “Any control mechanism, sooner or later, falls prey to some opportunistic individuals who are tempted by personal gain and ultimately, they devise ways to exploit the existing privilege system," he argued.

Seif headed the bank from 2013 to 2018, during the first six years of Hassan Rouhani’s presidency, but was himself accused of improper foreign currency transactions together with one his deputies, Ahmad Araghchi, nephew of Iran’s former chief nuclear negotiator, Abbas Araghchi. Seif was sentenced to 10 years in prison and a travel ban in 2021 for charges of improperly selling $160 million and €20 million on the open market. The Supreme Court annulled his sentence in 2021, explaining that he was just following the country’s macroeconomic policies.

Referring to the case of Debsh Tea Company -- labeled Iran’s biggest corruption case, Seif said when the free-market exchange rate for the dollar is about twice higher than the dollars provided by the central bank for imports, “it is evident that the likelihood of corruption increases... as some individuals are even encouraged" to exploit the system.

Debsh company, handling most of the country's tea imports, received a staggering $3.37 billion in foreign currency from the government on a preferential exchange rate for tea and machinery imports from 2019 to 2022. However, it allegedly sold $1.4 billion of the currency on the free market at a higher rate. The company also sold low-grade tea imported from Kenya as high-grade tea originating from India, with a $12 difference per kilogram. The embezzlement case of Debsh Tea Company involved officials from both the current and the previous presidential administrations -- including ministers of agriculture, industry as well as the governors of the Central Bank of Iran and the chiefs of Iranian Customs Administration, further proof that the country’s corruption is systematic.

In an article in Etemad daily earlier in the month, Iranian pundit Abbas Abdi said corruption in Iran should not be reduced to a moral or legal matter, noting that such a reductionism is the biggest mistake that institutionalizes corruption.

Abdi said that the Debsh case, which broke all corruption records in terms of the amount and the level of officials involved, shows that the country’s unclear and non-transparent regulations along with a lack of effective supervision or independent oversight pave the ground for widespread corruption. He said that justifications such as the need to circumvent sanctions or reduce prices open the way to corruption.

The rial has lost its value 12-fold since 2018 when the United States withdrew from the JCPOA nuclear accord and imposed sanctions. The government is desperate to control currency rates hoping that it can artificially keep the Iranian rial high. It created multiple exchange rates for rial against the dollar and other foreign currencies, providing subsidies – or cheaper dollars – for the import of essential items. However, the system is manipulated by regime insiders or businesspeople with government connections.

Another former chief banker, Abdolnaser Hemmati, an outspoken critic of the current administration’s economic policies, also said last month that the government has failed to control inflation or the devaluation of the rial. He said that the measures the government has taken to control the economy has led to more corrupt manipulations.

Systematic corruption is not something new in Iran's oil-dependent economy and has been repeatedly highlighted by various officials. Mohammad Sarafraz, the former chief of Iran's state television, who resigned his post in May 2016 has accused the government and banking system of systematic corruption that has led to vast income gaps among Iranians. He has argued that most of this corruption exists in quasi-public companies that enjoy the benefits of private firms but pretend to be government entities when they are paying taxes or reporting their financial status.

According to a report by the World Bank, Iran is among the worst countries in the world in terms of the Control of Corruption index, which evaluates the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain. According to Transparency International, which measures Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), Iran ranked 150 out of 180 countries in 2021, one stop lower than a year earlier. Last month, former member of parliament Heshmatollah Fallahatpisheh claimed that the total embezzlements in major corruption cases in the Islamic Republic have reached a staggering $57 billion.

The sentence was carried out on Wednesday, leading to widespread condemnation, after she posted a touching personal account in a social media post.

“These lashes did not just come down on the body of one woman, they hit all those who dream of a life with normal freedoms alongside each other. Enough is enough. Don't disgust the society any more than this,” prominent political and social commentator Abbas Abdi said in a tweet.

Lashing women for not abiding by the strict hijab rules demanded by religious revolutionaries was very common in 1980s and 90s, but not carried out often in the past two decades.

Many argue that the execution of the lashing sentence violates the law since the recent hijab law passed by the parliament does not include lashing as a punishment.

Persian social media has been flooded this weekend with angry comments since the incident was publicized. People praised Heshmati for her courage to reject the forced hijab, even after her lashing.

In a statement published by its official news website, Mizan, the judiciary claimed on Sunday that Heshmati was sentenced and flogged because she had connections to "an organized group outside Iran" and had received money to defy hijab rules publicly "in a very indecent manner," presumably to encourage others to do the same. The statement added that the sentencing to 74 lashes was confirmed due to the extent of her actions, which were seen as a violation of public chastity and morals.

Some female politicians including prominent female dissident Zahra Rahnavard, who has worn the hijab by choice for decade, and Azar Mansoori who leads the Reformist Front and the People’s Unity Party of Islamic Iran have objected to the lashing of the young woman for hijab.

“You who rule! You whip Roya Heshmati’s body but she, the one with an alert and resilient conscience, laughs bitterly at you. I abhor your manner of governance,” Rahnavard who has been under house arrest since 2011 along with her husband Mir-Hossein Mousavi as leaders of Iran's anti-regime Green Movement said in a message while Mansoori said one could not be a Muslim and stay silent about Heshmati’s flogging for hijab.

The 23-year-old Heshmati, a vocal critic of compulsory hijab, was arrested at her home in April after posting a photo that showed her dressed in a modest red shirt and black skirt from behind while walking in the street without a headcover.

Heshmati who lives in Tehran was held in custody for eleven days on charges of “appearing in public without religiously prescribed hijab”. The charges of “propaganda against the regime”, “violating public decency and order”, “creating indecent social media content and encouragement of people to immorality” were brought against her later.

She was initially sentenced to thirteen years in prison, a cash fine of around $25 and 74 lashes. The appeals court dropped the prison sentence but withheld the lashing order and cash fine.

In a note published on Instagram after being lashed, she vividly described how a man hit her shoulders, back, backside, and legs with a leather whip in a small room, resembling a medieval torture chamber, while she whispered a song named “Rise, for Woman, for Life, for Freedom” under her breath.

She also said court agents kept trying to cover her head because upon entering the courtroom she had refused to wear her headscarf despite threats of harsher flogging and further prosecution.

“[The lashing] was over. We left the room. I didn't let them think I had experienced pain…We went up to the judge in charge of execution of the sentence. The female agent walked behind me and was careful not to let my headscarf drop from my head. I threw off my scarf at the courtroom entrance. The woman asked me to wear the headscarf. I didn't stop and she pulled it over my head again," she wrote.

Reza Rostami, the head of the Transportation Commission of the Iranian Chamber of Commerce, said that with the exception of Italy, European nations are not issuing visas to Iranian drivers, meaning prolonged queues at borders, hindering the smooth flow of transportation.

"Since the beginning of 2024, Iran's central insurance has been sanctioned, posing significant challenges to the country’s transit," added Rostami.

Expressing concern for the future, Rostami emphasized a potential shortage of heavy goods vehicle (HGV) drivers in the coming years. He underscored that the transportation sector, vital for economic development, has not received adequate attention from any government, including the seventh development plan.

In a related development from November, an Iranian official disclosed that economic hardships, coupled with the government's neglect of truck drivers' demands, have prompted many to contemplate emigration.

Jalal Mousavi, Vice President of the Association of Truck Drivers, explained that challenging economic conditions, including an oversupply of trucks and decreased cargo volume, have substantially reduced drivers' income, fueling the desire for migration. Mousavi highlighted that Iranian drivers, often operating aged trucks in difficult conditions, perceive emigration as a pathway to a better future.