Iran Revolutionary Court Convicts Two Top Science Students

Hashemi, who is the daughter of former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and a pro-reform politician, recently said that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) should remain on the United States' list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO), arguing that its removal is not in Iran's interest.

The petition page of the Fars news agency, affiliated to the IRGC, is designed with a maximum target of 50,000 signatures that Fars claims it would be enough to make the case considered for a public discussion in Iran’s parliament. The petition for Hashemi’s persecution has collected nearly 53,000 signatures in one day.

Echoing similar sentiments, conservative politician Hamidreza Taraghi, a senior member of Motalefeh (the Islamic Coalition party), also told the news agency that prosecution of Hashemi is a public demand now and “people are completely dissatisfied with and complain about her repeated stances”.

Taraghi added that when such remarks are not dealt with seriously, Ali Motahari, a former deputy speaker of the parliament, dares to make “nonsensical” comments about the country’s nuclear program “in order to be seen”.

Motahari had said on Sunday that Iran’s aim from the beginning was to produce nuclear weapons as a deterrent force, but it failed to keep the project secret after the Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) opposition group revealed the program to the world.

Fars News, with links to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, published the piece on Monday, two days after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged the Islamic Republic to release Sharghi and stop its policy of holding people as political pawns.

In a tweet on Saturday, Blinken called on Iran to stop this “inhumane practice” saying, “For four years, the Shargi (Sharghi) family has waited anxiously for the Iranian government to release Emad”.

Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley and Republican Senator Marco Rubio also twitted for his release, noting that he remains unjustly detained in the Evin Prison under false charges.

Fars News said, “Sharqi's family and the US government must answer why he had documents at the time of his arrest that showed his interest in spying on the Iranian military”.

It added that his business activities were a cover for espionage, “especially in the field of helicopter warfare”, claiming that “he had gathered information about the helicopter industry with the help of his accomplices”.

The article speculated that he probably sought to disrupt the supply chain for helicopter repairs.

The 56-year-old businessman was arrested on December 6, 2020. According to reports, he has been sentenced to ten years in prison on charges of espionage and collecting military.

Claiming responsibility for the attack, the hacking group "Uprising till Overthrow" sent pictures and videos to Iran International showing that about 50 domains of the Agriculture Ministry and its affiliated offices have been hacked.

A deputy director for the security of Iran’s information center, Meysam Maghsoudi Goudarzi, said late on Sunday that a security loophole in a software frequently used by governmental organizations made the large-scale cyberattack possible.

He said that the attack was “neutralized” in its early stages, noting that “The hackers obtained information from the websites but did not obtain the basic information of these government centers”.

Maghsoudi Goudarzi also claimed that no damage was done to the infrastructures of the organizations, adding that “This cyberattack was designed like a 'time bomb’ to attack more than 100 [online] services of the country at a certain time and date to disrupt their activities”.

He said the IPs used for the cyberattack belonged to the Netherlands, Britain and the United States, and that due legal action will be taken in the future.

In mid-March, the portal of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance (Ershad) and its affiliated websites were hit by a cyberattack.

Hackers posted on the website photos of leaders of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) opposition group, Maryam and Masoud Rajavi, as well as a photo of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei with a large red X, drawn on his face.

"The fifth round of talks between Saudi Arabia and Tehran were held in Iraq and the talks were progressive and positive," foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh told a televised weekly news conference.

The resumption of talks come as Iran’s nuclear negotiations with the United States came to a standstill in March, after Tehran demanded the removal of its Revolutionary Guard from the US list of terrorist organizations. The US in return has asked for a wider discussion of Iran’s destabilizing role in the region.

Predominantly Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia and Shi'ite Iran, which are locked in proxy conflicts across the Middle East, started direct talks last year to try to contain tensions.

But Iran suspended the talks in March without giving a reason after Saudi Arabia executed 81 men in its biggest mass execution in decades. Tehran condemned the executions that activists said included 41 Shi'ite Muslims.

On Sunday, Iraq's Foreign Minister Fouad Hussein said Baghdad would host a new round of talks.

Khatibzadeh said "initial talks were underway between Tehran and Riyadh on sending 40,000 Iranian pilgrims to the haj in Mecca" this year.

Riyadh severed ties with Tehran in January 2016 after Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in the Tehran following the execution of a Shi'ite cleric in Saudi Arabia.

The embassy said in a tweet on Sunday, “The information that appeared in some media about the supply of Iranian weapons to Russia is fake and does not correspond with reality”.

The Guardian had quoted Iranian-backed Iraqi militias and regional intelligence services on April 12 as saying that undercover networks were used in the past month to supply rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), anti-tank missiles and Brazilian-designed rocket launcher systems to Russia.

The embassy rejected the report about 12 days later probably because reports have emerged saying that flights by Iranian military-affiliated planes to and from Russia have increased since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24.

The Iranian embassy in London also dismissed the Guardian article as “baseless storytelling”.

A source who helped organize the transport said the Iranian authorities had also donated an Iranian-made Bavar 373 missile system, similar to Russia’s S-300, to Moscow. Tehran also returned an S-300 to Russia, the source said.

Earlier in April, The Telegraph reported that Russia was running out of some weapons because critical parts were made in Ukraine, including Kh-55 nuclear capable cruise missiles that are also used by Iran and China.