Jailed Iranian Protesters Not Allowed To Choose Own Lawyers

The IRGC announced on December 25 the arrest of seven people allegedly linked to Britain, for their role in recent protests, prompting what could amount to a new hostage situation. The foreign ministry in Tehran accused the UK of a “destructive role” following the news about the arrests.

The move by Britain, which will be announced within weeks, is supported by Britain's security minister, Tom Tugendhat, and Home Secretary Suella Braverman, the report said.

Tehran's allegations of foreign involvement in the protests have been accompanied by arrests of dozens of dual nationals, part of an official narrative designed to shift the blame away from the Iranian leadership.

Foreign Secretary James Cleverly in recent weeks had repeatedly claimed that that the IRGC was already sanctioned “in its entirety.”

The British foreign office tweeted December 27 a clip of Cleverly listing British sanctions against Iran including “the IRGC in its entirety.” Cleverly December 13 said in parliament: “We already sanction the IRGC in its entirety.”

Proscribing Iran's Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist group would mean that it would become a criminal offence to belong to the group, attend its meetings, and carry its logo in public.

The UK Home Office did not immediately respond to a request by Reuters for comment on the Telegraph report.

Britain's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Wednesday urged Iran to stop detaining dual nationals, saying the practice should not be used to obtain "diplomatic leverage".

Cohen said Monday that the “international community must stop burying its head in the sand when it comes to Iran,” and that Israel should “stop Iran from attaining nuclear capabilities in every way.”

Cohen said the new government led by Benjamin Netanyahu aimed to “deepen ties with European countries and to bolster them compared to past years.” He brushed off any human rights concerns in Europe, attacking Friday’s United Nations General Assembly resolution that sought an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the UN’s highest court, on Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. Cohen also dismissed the prospect of Israel facing war crimes suits at the International Criminal Court, which Israel and the US do not recognize. Washington voted against the resolution, which passed 87-26.

Some of the Israeli press has made much of the personal relationship between Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden. Last July, when Biden arrived for his trip to Israel, he told Netanyahu, then in opposition, “You know that I love you.”

While the latest Israeli military intelligence report favors efforts to reach an international agreement over Tehran’s nuclear program, Netanyahu has long rejected such a course, and strongly supported former US president Donald Trump withdrawing from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action). While Biden came into office committed to restoring the JCPOA, any tensions over this with Netanyahu are likely to soften as Biden officials place no ‘focus’ on JCPOA talks and extend sanctions on Iran.

Netanyahu has also said he wants to extend Israel’s Trump-brokered ‘normalization’ agreements with some Arab states, stressing an Iranian threat. But he is unlikely to convince Saudi Arabia since his government now includes ultra-Zionists committed to speeding up Jewish settlement in occupied Palestinian territory. Riyadh voted Friday in favor of the UN resolution referring Israel to the ICJ.

‘Significant contribution to regional stability’

Cohen said Monday he would meet in March in Morocco with counterparts from the ‘normalized’ states – Morocco, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan. This would, he said, develop “a significant contribution to security (and) regional stability.” The Times of Israel reported Tuesday that Netanyahu planned to visit the UAE officially for the first time, possibly next week.

After European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell highlighted in December dim prospects for the JCPOA, Ali Bagheri Kani, a deputy Iranian foreign minister and Tehran’s lead nuclear negotiator, said Tuesday Tehran would “continue serious and effective cooperation” with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

One challenge in JCPOA talks has been Tehran’s demand that the IAEA close an enquiry into uranium traces found at ‘non-nuclear’ sites, an enquiry Iran says followed accusations made by Netanyahu in 2018 but which the agency says concern Tehran’s ‘safeguards’ obligations under Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

‘The ball in the Western court’

The US and western European states successfully moved resolutions in June and November at the IAEA governors’ board censuring Iran over its approach to the agency, but Russia and China argued this is counterproductive given the main responsibility for JCPOA restoration lies with the US as the party that abandoned it. Russia’s IAEA ambassador Mikhail Ulyanov tweeted Tuesday that “the ball” was in “the Western court.”

Bagheri Kani offered his views on the JCPOA at a ceremony marking the third death anniversary of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, killed in Baghdad along with nine others January 3, 2020, by a US drone strike. Bagheri Kani stressed Soleimani’s success in “building power by relaying on the capacities in the region” so making “terrorism fail” – referring to the commander’s role mobilizing Iraqi forces against the Islamic State group (Isis, or Daesh).

Bagheri Kani repeated Tehran’s previous threats that the foreign ministry and judiciary were continuing, along with Iraq, to follow routes under international law against “the agents of the assassination” of Soleimani, whose death the UN special rapporteur called ‘unlawful killing.’ The deputy foreign minister gave no details.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency HRANA reported Monday that Mehdi (Shayan) Mohammadifard, who was arrested in the northern city of Nowshahr on October 2, has received two death sentences issued by a Revolutionary Court.

He has also been sentenced to seven years of penal service on charges of “insulting the Supreme Leader”, “acting against the county’s security”, as well as “propaganda against the institution”.

HRANA added that this political prisoner was deprived of the right to have a lawyer and in the absence of his chosen solicitor, the court accused him of "directing and planning" the protest rally on September 21 in Noshahr.

According to judiciary claims and the issued verdict, five people were killed during the protest.

An informed source close to Mohammadifard's family said, “all the confessions by the defendant during the interrogation were obtained under duress.”

“The only documents against him, which led to the death sentence, are the forced confessions obtained during the interrogation, as well as a film attributed to Mehdi, in which the face of the person is not clear at all,” added the source.

HRANA also wrote that in recent days, it has identified 58 citizens who are sentenced to death or are at risk of receiving the death sentence.

Ukraine said waves of Iranian-made Russian drones targeted infrastructure in Kyiv and surrounding areas on Monday, damaging energy facilities and causing some power outages, officials said, as Russia extended its bombardment into the second day of 2023.

Ukraine’s air force said that its air defense systems destroyed all of Russia's 39 Iranian-made Shahed 131 and 136 drones that targeted Ukraine overnight in what it said was a “massive attack”.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani in his weekly briefing implicitly denied the use of Iranian-made drones and said Kyiv has never produced any evidence.

Ukraine said December 13 that it provided Iran with the evidence. "We are not surprised by yet another objection from Iran regarding the supply of weapons to Russia. During the technical meeting, Ukrainian experts provided the Iranians with the sufficient evidence," Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko said during an interview with Kyiv-based news agency Interfax-Ukraine.

Iran’s decision to supply weapons to Russia has played a major role in the deterioration of its already frayed ties with Europe that has put nuclear talks with Tehran on the back-burner since evidence emerged of the kamikaze drones being launched by Russia in October.

Kanaani also spoke about these talks, having little to offer as a sign of any positive movement. After 18 months of negotiations to revive the 2015 nuclear accord known as the JCPOA the talks broke down in early September. The United States has said i tis not focused on the diplomatic effort any more because Iran presented last-minute extraneous demands.

Meanwhile, nationwide antigovernment protests in Iran have posed the most serious challenge to the Islamic Republic in its 43year history, with the economy in serious trouble. Consequently, Tehran has been showing renewed interest in reviving the nuclear talks, because the process, if successful, could end harsh US sanctions and bring a much-needed financial relief to the embattled regime.

Kanaani insisted that Iran is ready to conclude the nuclear talks based on a draft agreement prepared "after months of difficult talks," referring to what the European Union submitted in August to all sides to wrap up the negotiations. It was at this juncture when Tehran and Washington were giving their feedback to the draft that talks came to a standstill.

Kanaani also tried to put a positive spin on chances of improving relations with Saudi Arabia and Egypt, amid its regional isolation. Iran was not even invited to tripartite defense talks between Russia, Turkey and Syria last week, although it is a major player in the Syrian conflict. It has also not been invited to a similar meeting of foreign minsters to take place in the second half of January.

Asked about why Iran has not been invited, Kanaani simply replied that "Russia, Turkey and Syria are well aware of Iran’s decisive role in the fight against terrorism in Syria and its support for the people and the government [of Syria]".

The source told IRNA Sunday that Nasrallah has the flu and is "going through his treatment process", however, independent sources and media in Lebanon have not yet confirmed this claim about Nasrallah's illness.

The Hezbollah leader was scheduled to give a speech to his supporters on Friday, but al-Manar TV, affiliated with Hezbollah, said in a statement that the speech was canceled due to Nasrallah's illness.

After that, unofficial reports were published about Nasrallah's "stroke".

Hossein al-Ghawi, a Saudi journalist, wrote in a tweet that Nasrallah was transferred to a hospital in Beirut after suffering a second stroke.

In recent years, numerous reports have been published about Nasrallah's physical condition.

Four years ago, reports about Nasrallah's "heart attack" were published, but Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who was the foreign policy advisor to Iran’s parliament speaker at the time, denied it.

Groups like Hezbollah and governments like the Islamic Republic do not provide clear and accurate information about the physical condition of their leaders.

Hezbollah, supported by the Islamic Republic, is recognized as a terrorist group by several countries, including the United States.