The 8 Approved CandidatesThe disqualifications of former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s former chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashai were big news, if not entirely surprising.
The electoral field is now dominated by hardliners loyal to the Supreme Leader.
However, the fictional campaign of Zahra continues to pick up steam with the endorsements of prominent lawyers Shirin Ebadi and Mehrengiz Kar.
Iranian Women Walk DogsThe cost of currency combined with crippling sanctions is hurting all sectors of Iran's society from business owners to pharmaceutical manufacturers to the population at large.
Iron sellers went on strike, a food for oil deal with Shell was blocked, and children are malnourished.
Iran's workers suffer from unpaid wages and poor safety regulations. Medical subsidies are being slashed, and a a new generation in Iran faces unemployment.
Meanwhile, Iran's morality police have identified the true source of Iran's woes: women in "bad hijab" and their lapdogs.
The discussion included the strict house arrests, since February 2011, of opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi.
Lawyer and Nobel Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi has said that the report of United Nations Special Rapporteur Ahmad Shaheed (see 0625 GMT) is a solid basis for other countries to impose sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
And Reporters without Borders has said it will file a complaint against the Islamic Republic because of the illegal arrests of journalists.
Some people in Iran are feeling the effects of shortages of medicine and high prices, while an artist challenges passersby at the United Nations to confront the growing problem.
Nasrin Sotoudeh and Jafar Panahi receive the prestigious Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in absentia, sending messages for justice and freedom, as imprisoned human rights activists call for others to spread the call for dignity. Mohammad Maleki, the former Chancellor Tehran University, is summoned to serve a six-year prison term. Journalists call for an end to the intimidation of political prisoners' family members by interrogators.
The Supreme Leader gets a Facebook page, as Parliament debates election reform and reduced powers for the President and Human Rights Watch issues a report on the more than 40,000 Iranians seeking asylum abroad while a photographer shows us that life in Iran goes on.<
Faraz Sanei talks to CNN about the suppression of civil society in Iran over the last decade
Although most of the hundreds of thousands who took to the streets to protest the June 2009 presidential election result had not been political or civil society activists, they nonetheless found themselves targets of security and intelligence forces. After public protests came to an end, the authorities continued their relentless assault on all forms of dissent, targeting civil society groups and activists who had little if any connection to the protests themselves but whom they deemed to be supporters of a “velvet revolution” working to undermine the foundations of the Islamic Republic.
Along with members of the political opposition, human rights activists, journalists and bloggers, and rights lawyers bore the brunt of these attacks. Security forces arrested and detained scores of activists, including those advocating on behalf of ethnic minorities, women, and students, and subjected many to trials that did not meet international fair trial standards. Dozens remain in prison on charges of speech crimes such as “acting against the national security,” “propaganda against the state,” or “membership in illegal groups or organizations".
The European Parliament awards the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in absentia to detained lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh and filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who is threatened with imprisonment
1602 GMT: A Death in Detention. Human rights activists claim participants in the 40th day memorial for blogger Sattar Beheshti, who died on 3 November under interrogation in Evin Prison, have been beaten, with several arrested.
Security officers reportedly raided the services at the Imam Mohamad Taghi Shrine in Robat Karim,, near Tehran.
Beheshti's mother was said to have sustained leg and knee injuries. Beheshti’s brother was detained for two hours.
Not so long ago, my colleague Nasrin Sotoudeh was the lawyer so many of us human rights defenders in Iran would call when our government harassed us or put one of us, or one of our family members, in jail. Sadly it is now Nasrin who is in jail. The government's accusations against her include acting contrary to "national security", "propaganda against the state", and "membership" of the Center for Defenders of Human Rights, an organisation I founded in 2001. The government has also accused her of failing to wear hijab, the traditional Islamic covering for women. On some of these trumped-up charges she has been sentenced to 11 years in jail, and is now banned from practising law for 20 years.
2025 GMT: Oil Watch. Gholamreza Mesbahi Moqaddam, an influential member of Parliament's Economy Committee, has said the State budget for the next Iranian year may assume exports of only 1 million barrels of oil a day, less than half the level of 2011.
"Apparently, the government wants to decrease the 1392 (March 2013-March 2014) state budget's reliance on oil exports to one million barrels a day," Mesbahi Moqaddam said.
Industry data indicated that Iranian exports fell as low as 860,000 barrels per day this summer before rebounding in October to 1.3 million bpd. Last year the Islamic Republic shipped 2.2 million bpd.
Nasrin SotoudehQuestions remain unresolved concerning the death of blogger Sattar Beheshti, while authorities deny that any hunger strikes have taken place among women in prison. Iran’s Health Minister faces parliamentary scrutiny for the depletion of medical supplies, public executions continue, and international airfares double. A single exchange rate is announced and Parliament considers a bill that would require single women under 40 to get permission in order to obtain a passport.
The aftermath of the earthquake in the province of East Azerbaijan still dominates news coming out of Iran.
Meanwhile, 130 political prisoners have been released. the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit will mean 5 days of holiday for those living and working in Tehran. Graffiti messages call for the release of political prisoners and United4Iran calls on the NAM to put pressure on The Islamic Republic of Iran to adhere to international human rights agreements.
The number of female breadwinners in Iran has doubled over the past 5 years. Shirin Ebadi has issued a letter to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon protesting the denial of education to female students and joined in a rebuke against the US channel NBC for turning war into a reality show with Stars Earn Stripes. Iranians and Israelis share messages of peace via Facebook.
The pro- and anti-sanctions debate causes rifts among expat Iranians. Saeed Mortazavi is removed from his post as head of the Social Security Organization while actor Mahmoud Basiri complains he cannot get any work because he looks too much like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Sunday, May 26, 2013 at 9:34
The 8 Approved CandidatesThe disqualifications of former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s former chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashai were big news, if not entirely surprising. 
