Exiled Group Says Iran's Building a New Nuclear
Site
Radio Free Europe, reported on July 11 that an exiled Iranian
opposition group claims it has evidence of a secret nuclear site under
construction in Iran. A statement released by the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said the site was located in tunnels under a mountain close to the town of Damavand, 70 kilometers northeast of Tehran.
The People’s Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), which is part of the NCRI, said the site has existed since 2006 and that Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, فخریزاده a senior official in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), manages a company overseeing the project’s “nuclear, biological, and chemical programs.” The spokesman of the regime's foreign minister denied such a place and called it storytelling.
UN expert to investigate alleged rights
violations in Iran through Diaspora in the US and Canada
According to UN website July 10, the United
Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic
of Iran , Ahmed Shaheed, will undertake a fact-finding mission to the United States and Canada from 14 to 28 July 2013, to gather information about alleged human
rights violations in Iran. During his 14-day mission, the independent expert will meet with members of the
Iranian Diaspora, particularly victims and witnesses of alleged human rights
violations and as well as with civil society organizations to gather
information about the numerous allegations of human rights violations in Iran.
The result of these findings will be reflected in his report to the General
Assembly in October 2013. Mr. Shaheed reiterated his commitment to a constructive dialogue and
cooperation as a means of addressing and resolving human rights concerns in the
country, and encouraged Iranian authorities to cooperate with his mandate and
the UN human rights machinery.
Since his appointment in August 2011, the human
rights expert has made several official requests to the Government of Iran for
a country visit without obtaining an affirmative response. At the end of his visit, on Friday 26 July, the UN Special Rapporteur will hold
a press conference in Toronto.
UN is Warned to Act to Prevent Further Attack
on Iranian dissidents in Iraq
In a press conference in New York the association
of Iranian American in New York and New Jersey announced July 12, that U.S.
lawyers have petitioned the Security Council, Secretary-General, and High
Commissioner of Human Rights on behalf of the Iranian dissidents residing in
Camp Ashraf and Liberty, demanding action to provide security for the over
3,000 members of the Iranian opposition in Camp Liberty in Iraq. Considering
the vulnerability of Camp Liberty, the petition urges
the immediate return of the residents to Camp Ashraf as well as immediate
action to address the urgent security needs of the residents.
The Camp came under rocket attacks in February and June which left 10 killed and 170 wounded. The Government of Iraq has refused urgent requests to fortify the Camp. Serious allegations of professional misconduct have also been lodged against UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General Martin Kobler by Tahar Boumedra, former Chief of the UNAMI Human Rights Office (from 2009-2012), regarding the SRSG’s complicity in the ongoing abuses against camp residents.
The petition illustrates flagrant violations of the UN Charter, UN Security Council resolutions establishing and renewing UNAMI, and relevant guidelines promulgated by UNHCR with regards to the treatment of asylum seekers and persons of concern.
The Camp came under rocket attacks in February and June which left 10 killed and 170 wounded. The Government of Iraq has refused urgent requests to fortify the Camp. Serious allegations of professional misconduct have also been lodged against UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General Martin Kobler by Tahar Boumedra, former Chief of the UNAMI Human Rights Office (from 2009-2012), regarding the SRSG’s complicity in the ongoing abuses against camp residents.
The petition illustrates flagrant violations of the UN Charter, UN Security Council resolutions establishing and renewing UNAMI, and relevant guidelines promulgated by UNHCR with regards to the treatment of asylum seekers and persons of concern.
******
According to NCRI National Council of
Resistance of Iran July 12,
a political prisoner Asghar Mahmoudian has gone
on hunger strike in Semnan prison protesting denied medical treatment.Mr. Mahmoudian was arrested along with his wife on February 14, 2010, and sentenced to a six year imprisonment and his wife to five years. He was also a political prisoner in the 1980s and spent 10 years of his life in prison. One of his family members has also been executed by the regime. in another news the regime's supreme court upheld a death sentence for Saman Nassim, a Iranian Kurd from the city of Mariwan in west Iran. He had been sentenced to death last summer along with Mansour Arwand.
Fears mount for jailed student hunger striker
held without charge
A
student activist on Hunger strike, Arash Sadeghi, 26, is protesting against his
inhumane treatment and is believed to be at risk of torture and in need of
urgent medical care, Amnesty International said in a statement.Mr Sadeghi was arrested several times for participating in the demonstrations that followed the disputed presidential election in 2009. On April 4, 2010, Judge Pir-Abbas in Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court sentenced him to 74 lashes and six years in prison after convicting him of the vaguely-worded national security charges of ‘gathering and colluding against state security’ and ‘spreading propaganda against the system’.
He was acquitted but arrested again in January 2012 and this current detention is unrelated to his previous case but it is believed that he is being again held under suspicion of ‘gathering and colluding against state security’, although he has not been formally charged.
Amnesty International said: “Arash Sadeghi, 26, a student activist banned from pursuing his university education has been permitted only two family visits with his grandfather. He has had no access to a lawyer and, despite repeated requests, his father has been unable to visit him or obtain information about his health from prison officials. His father has been intimidated and harassed by Ministry of Intelligence officials and warned against speaking to the media about his son.
Amnesty said it was calling on the Iranian regime’s authorities to release Arash Sadeghi immediately and unconditionally if he is being detained solely for exercising his rights to freedom of expression and assembly.
The human rights body said it was also urging to protect Arash Sadeghi from torture or other ill-treatment and to provide him with all necessary medical care, and ensure he is treated humanely, and not punished in any way for his hunger strike. They also demanded that he is removed from solitary confinement and allowed family visits and access to a lawyer of his choosing.
Iran: Workers protest and
chant anti-government slogan
More than 40 employees of Rasa Wire and Cable
Company gathered in protest outside the Labour Bureau On Tuesday, July 9, and
chanted ‘down with the dictator’.The security forces immediately surrounded the area and warned the crowd to disperse within 5 minutes. This warning however made the workers to form a human chain and remains steadfast. The police then attacked the protesters with pepper spray and arrested more than 15. These workers had been laid off the previous week.
Iranian Regime's forces seize
satellite dishes in Shiraz
According
to the Iranian resistance, NCRI the Iranian regime’s
state security forces have raided homes and seized every satellite dish in Quds
district of the southern city of Shiraz. A commander of the
Revolutionary Guards Corps in the city has also told people with dishes and
receivers that they have one month to collect new digital receivers that will
only allow them to view the Iranian regime’s TV network channels.
Speaking for Friday Prayer Leaders and members of Basij in the City on Wednesday, IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps) Colonel Mansour Piroozian said the digital receivers were being given to the people to compensate for the cost of their satellite receivers.
He added: “Some areas in the city are very much affected by satellite channels. Friday Prayer Leaders and members of the Basij should act to counter this ominous phenomena.”
A regime official last week admitted Iran had failed in its bid to ban people from watching satellite TV channels.
Despite a 1994 law, making satellite dishes illegal, up to 70 per cent of families have them and their use is increasing, state-run TV network boss Fardin Ali Khah said. “Although their use is now forbidden, they can be seen everywhere. Statistics show that the use of satellite dishes has never declined, and currently there is 50 to 70 per cent use of satellite dishes in Iranian families.”
Jamming satellite signals and other methods to prevent their use had also failed, and the government now needed to increase its spending on the issue to ensure the law was enforced, Ali Khah insisted.
Speaking for Friday Prayer Leaders and members of Basij in the City on Wednesday, IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps) Colonel Mansour Piroozian said the digital receivers were being given to the people to compensate for the cost of their satellite receivers.
He added: “Some areas in the city are very much affected by satellite channels. Friday Prayer Leaders and members of the Basij should act to counter this ominous phenomena.”
A regime official last week admitted Iran had failed in its bid to ban people from watching satellite TV channels.
Despite a 1994 law, making satellite dishes illegal, up to 70 per cent of families have them and their use is increasing, state-run TV network boss Fardin Ali Khah said. “Although their use is now forbidden, they can be seen everywhere. Statistics show that the use of satellite dishes has never declined, and currently there is 50 to 70 per cent use of satellite dishes in Iranian families.”
Jamming satellite signals and other methods to prevent their use had also failed, and the government now needed to increase its spending on the issue to ensure the law was enforced, Ali Khah insisted.
