NPT withdrawal option is on parliament’s table, Iranian MP says
Withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is under consideration in response to the IAEA Board of Governors’ resolution against Iran, the spokesman for Iran’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee said Thursday.
“The resolution issued by the Board is purely political and lacks legal or technical legitimacy,” MP Ebrahim Rezaei told Tasnim.
“It shows the Agency’s independence has eroded under Western influence.”
Rezaei said recent developments, including the resolution and the US move to evacuate some personnel from the region, aim to pressure Iran into retreating from its nuclear position.
"The measures announced so far—such as establishing a third enrichment site and upgrading from first-generation centrifuges—are only part of Iran’s planned response," he added.
The killing of 24-year-old Elahe Hosseinnejad by a driver from a ride-hailing app has deeply jarred Iranian women who say they live in daily fear on buses, in taxis and on the streets.
Hosseinnejad, a nail technician from Eslamshahr south of Tehran, vanished on her way home late last month, and her body was found days later riddled with stab wounds.
Police later arrested the man driving her, whose account of the murder varied from an altercation over payment to his alleged gendered slur that she had been "shameless", according to Iranian media citing police.
Voice messages and texts sent to Iran International's submissions line point to a deep well of shared trauma and anger in the male-dominated theocracy.
“I was nearly abducted in broad daylight,” one woman said. “I ran into a stranger’s house because I had no other way to escape. And this wasn’t even a remote place—this was a residential street.”
Dozens of accounts tell similar stories. One woman said her Snapp ride-hailing driver changed course three times, laughing when she protested. Another described how a man posing as a Tapsi driver sexually assaulted her on a highway outside Isfahan.
Snapp and Tapsi are Iran’s two leading app-based ride services modeled on Uber.
“These stories have always existed,” another woman said. “What Elahe’s death has done is rip the veil off.”
Hosseinnejad’s body was released under heavy security and buried without a public funeral.
Systemic fear and silence
In the messages submitted to Iran International, women described persistent sexual harassment in taxis, parks, workplaces and schools.
Some said they were assaulted while taking rides, others while walking to university or boarding a bus.
One woman described sitting quietly in a shared car when the driver suddenly pulled over and exposed himself. “I kicked the door open and ran,” she wrote. “But for weeks, he called me from different numbers, threatening to find me.”
“I went to file a complaint, and they asked if I had a witness,” another woman wrote. “I said if I had one, I wouldn’t be in this situation. They told me to drop it if I cared about my reputation.”
Two young women walk along a sidewalk while being closely watched and harassed by some men.
Several others shared versions of the same response: authorities demanding impossible evidence, mocking victims or advising them to stay quiet.
“The law is not on our side,” said another woman. “If something happens to you, they treat you like the criminal.”
Ride-hailing platforms in focus
Snapp and Tapsi, Iran’s dominant ride-hailing apps, came under renewed scrutiny following Hosseinnejad’s death.
Many contributors noted that both apps have faced growing criticism for weak driver vetting and limited response to complaints.
“I was 18, and the driver kept making crude comments,” one woman wrote. “When I reported him to Snapp, they told me they’d investigate. Nothing happened. He kept calling me from different phones.”
In several cases, riders said drivers had pressured them to adjust their clothing or implied they could be dropped off mid-trip to avoid fines under Iran’s hijab regulations.
“I wore my scarf just to avoid trouble,” wrote one student. “But the way they looked at me … it was like they were waiting for an opportunity.”
The cost of inequality
Women who contacted Iran International repeatedly returned to one point: gender-based inequality under the law.
“I don’t want revenge,” one woman said of Hosseinnejad’s accused killer. “I want justice. But how can there be justice when our lives are worth half as much under the law?”
Under Iranian law, murder is punishable by death, but when a man kills a woman, the victim’s family must first pay half the standard blood money—set annually by judicial authorities—to the killer’s family before an execution can take place. Activists say this devalues women’s lives and deters families from pursuing justice.
Elahe Hosseinnejad’s story has ignited anger—but also a grim sense of recognition. “She did everything right,” one woman said. “She worked, cared for her family, shared her beliefs—but still, she ended up dead."
Atomic Energy Organization head Mohammad Eslami on Thursday accused the US, three European countries, and IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi of politically targeting Iran under Israeli influence.
“What we are witnessing is a series of political actions by the three European countries, directed by the United States, and aided by the IAEA Director General, serving the agenda of the Zionist regime to pressure us for concessions,” Eslami said.
Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf condemned the IAEA Board of Governors’ resolution against Iran, calling it a “biased move that proves cooperation with the agency yields the opposite result.”
Ghalibaf warned that the Islamic Republic would respond decisively.
“In response to this excessive demand, the Islamic Republic of Iran will take reciprocal and forceful measures,” he wrote in a post on X on Thursday.
“Enrichment with advanced centrifuges, launching a new facility, and reducing oversight are a legitimate response to the breach of the engagement path,” Ghalibaf added.
The evacuation of some US embassy personnel from Iraq and other areas in the Middle East was a “regulatory precautionary measure” taken by Washington and not based on any credible security threat within Iraq, Iraq’s military spokesperson said Thursday.
“Intelligence and field reports do not indicate actual threats that would affect the work of diplomatic missions,” the spokesman said, according to Iraq’s state news agency.
"[The decision] has nothing to do with the presence of any field security indicators within Iraqi territory.”
Israel called on the international community Thursday to “respond decisively” after the IAEA formally declared Iran in breach of its nuclear safeguards obligations for the first time in nearly two decades.
“Iran has consistently obstructed IAEA’s verification and monitoring, it removed inspectors, and it sanitised and concealed suspected undeclared locations in Iran,” Israel’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on X.
“These actions undermine the global non-proliferation regime and pose an imminent threat to regional and international security and stability,” it added, urging coordinated international pressure to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
