German Daily Decries Instagram's Restrictions On Posts By Iranians

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) announced Wednesday the joint night maneuvers were staged at the outskirts of Homs Governorate where Al-Tanf base is located.

Al-Tanf is a US military base within territory controlled by the Syrian opposition. It is located 24 km west of the al-Tanf border crossing along the Iraq and Jordan-Syria border.

The Syrian Observatory says heavy weapons were used to raise the fighting readiness of their forces, coinciding with explosions heard in Al-Omar oil field, which is the largest “International Coalition” base in Syria.

Earlier this month, SOHR said it was informed that “Russian officers, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard officers as well as Afghan Fatemiyoun militia are present east of Palmyra in eastern Homs countryside near Al-Tanf base.

Fatemiyoun Brigade is an Afghan Shia militia formed and supported by Iran since 2014 to fight in Syria on the side of the Bashar al Assad’s forces.

“These drills were designed to train Iranian-backed militiamen on the use of short and medium-range Iranian-made missiles on inanimate targets in the Syrian desert and Palmyra military airbase,” added SOHR.

The region has been the scene of clashes between Iranian-backed forces and US troops.

Iran has long backed the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad’s, government in Syria’s grinding civil war. Iran says it has no troops in Syria but the IRGC military “advisers”.

The last-minute amendment was rejected with 25 against, six in favor and 15 abstentions.

China's envoy Jiang Yingfeng told the council that the motion led by Germany was "overwhelmingly critical" of Iran. "It obviously will not help resolve the problem," he added, calling for a key paragraph to be deleted.

The paragraph in question would establish an "international fact-finding mission" that would be operational until early 2024. Iran's representatives also repeatedly criticized the motion which it called "completely biased".

Representatives from the dozens of countries backing the motion, including the United States and Britain, criticized the last-minute change and called for the 47-member Geneva council to vote it down.

"(The amendment) denies the survivors, the families, the victims, the right for their suffering to be recorded," said British Ambassador to the UN in Geneva Simon Manley. The US ambassador for human rights Michele Taylor said she was "appalled" by China's last-minute revision.

Earlier in the day UN officials and dozens of countries and human rights organization backed a probe into Iran's use of force against protesters and the violation of their rights, as well as treatment of women.

The Islamic Republic’s mission to the UN in letters to members of the Security Council claimed that its attacks on Kurdish groups in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region “aim to defend the country’s national security.”

The clerical regime has renewed its attacks on Kurdish targets in the Iraqi Kurdistan region since protests in Iran broke out in September, launching sustained missile and drone attacks in the past five days, on the pretext that separatist Kurdish groups are fanning the flames of conflict in Iranian Kurdish cities by supporting the protesters.

In its letters to UNSC member, Tehran alleged it “has recently launched necessary and proportionate military operations against terrorist groups’ bases in the Iraqi Kurdistan region, which was meticulously planned and precisely targeted on terrorist locations.”

It also noted that the Islamic Republic has shared “irrefutable evidence and credible information” with the central government in Iraq about the use of their territory by “terrorist and separatist groups to plan, support, organize and carry out terrorist and subversive acts” against Iran.

This letter was sent in a situation when the United Nations Human Rights Council is scheduled to hold an emergency meeting about the ongoing protests in Iran on Thursday.

Hossein Salami said both the enemies and the Iranian nation must know that no killing will go unanswered.

However, he added that “the resistance front, which is a united front, takes revenge of the martyrs from the Zionists on a daily basis.”

The ‘resistance front’ is a term coined by the Islamic Republic to refer to its proxies and allies in the region.

“Of course, every martyr has a separate revenge, and these revenges will be taken at the right time and place. The levels of these measures will be different, but they will be done in time,” threatened Salami.

Government media in Iran carried a statement by the Revolutionary Guard November 22 saying that one of its senior officers has been killed in Syria.

The IRGC statement said Colonel Davoud Jafari, a senior aerospace commander lost his life in a roadside bomb blast on the outskirts of the Syrian capital, Damascus.

The IRGC said the incident took place on Monday, accusing Israel of executing the attack and pledging to respond to it. But it is not clear if Jafari died in a road side bomb or in one of frequent Israeli air strikes.

Iran has been deeply involved in the Syrian civil war for more than a decade, deploying tens of thousands of its own forces as well as hired Afghan, Iraqi and Pakistani Shiite fighters, who helped save Bashar al-Assad’s regime, with help from Russia.

Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said the person had not been detained for taking part in demonstrations but confirmed that Australian officials have not been allowed to get in touch with the inmate to assess his welfare.

“The Australian government holds concerns for the welfare of one Australian-Iranian citizen believed to be detained in Iran,” said a department spokesperson, adding that “We continue to seek confirmation of their welfare, and consular access.”

The spokesperson reiterated that the Islamic Republic was refusing to accept Australia’s right to access as it does not recognize dual nationality.

Iran’s Judiciary Spokesman Masoud Setayeshi told a press conference November 22 that forty foreign nationals implicated in recent “riots” have been arrested, but he did not elaborate on the nationalities of those detained.

Iranian officials have repeatedly accused Western governments of stoking the protests over Mahsa Amini's death in police custody.

While the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Iran in the last two months due to regime’s violence against protesters, Australia has not acted.

However, recently Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong announced in a tweet that the country is determined to “continue to work with international partners and within government to increase pressure on Iran over its egregious human rights abuses.”