Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani hailed the unveiling of a new ballistic missile, saying that Iran “will not ask for permission or abide by any resolution” to procure any weapons it needs, Reuters reported Saturday. Rouhani’s declaration challenges the terms of United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231, which endorsed the Joint Comprehensive...

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The United Nations stood behind condemnation of the Syrian government issued by special envoy Staffan de Mistura after Sunday airstrikes on a busy marketplace in Douma, a rebel-held suburb of Damascus, left a reported 96 people dead, the Associated Press reported yesterday. In a statement Monday, de Mistura condemned the government...

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Despite proclamations that the nuclear deal with the P5+1 powers represents “a turning point for Iran,” Hamid Yazdan Panah, a lawyer and human rights activist, wrote that “the facts on the ground” show an increased rate of executions in the Islamic Republic, in a commentary published by Reuters today. Since...

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Iranian dissidents fear that the nuclear agreement between the P5+1 powers and Tehran will free the regime to treat them more harshly, Saeed Ghasseminejad, a former Iranian political prisoner who is currently an associate fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, wrote in an op-ed published yesterday in the...

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Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) – Qods Force commander, General Qassem Suleimani, traveled to Russia last month following the agreement on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as the nuclear deal with Iran is known, in violation of sanctions imposed the United Nations (UN), European Union (EU) and United...

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Zeid Raad al-Hussein, the UN high commissioner for human rights, criticized Iran for sentencing Mohammed Ali Taheri, the founder of alternative medicine movements in Iran, to death for the crime of “corruption on earth.”Al-Hussein made his comments in a press release issued today. “Iran’s use of the death penalty has long...

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Iran has launched a campaign to discredit Ahmed Shaheed, the United Nations special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, featuring coordinated media coverage of fabricated documents, The Guardian reported Sunday. Iran has launched a sophisticated smear campaign against the UN special rapporteur investigating its human rights violations by widely spreading...

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A central claim in support of the nuclear deal with Iran has been that the heavy sanctions that have been placed on Iran will, under the terms of the deal, “snap back” in the event of Iranian violations. The White House has been explicit on this point, declaring on multiple occasions that...

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United States intelligence agencies have confirmed that Syria’s President, Bashad al-Assad, remains in possession of chemical weapons, The Times of Israel reported today. In 2013, Assad capitulated to international demands that he relinquish Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal after his regime used sarin gas against civilians in Damascus. According to the...

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Brig. Gen. Mohammad Reza Naqdi, commander of Iran’s Basij militia, said that the language of the recently concluded nuclear agreement, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JPOA), shows that the United States holds a “deep grudge” against Iran, the semi-official Fars news agency reported today. The Basij militia is a...

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