Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From Economic Crisis to Nasrin Sotoudeh's Hunger Strike (Arseh Sevom)

Detained lawyer Nasrin SotoudehEconomic instability continues to rock Iran while executions for drug offenses continue despite international protest. The work of children’s activists is recognized internationally, and gender segregation becomes more widespread. Sanctions against the banking center have left many in Iran without access to needed medication and imprisoned lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh begins a hunger strike.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- Another Day Older and Deeper in Debt (Arseh Sevom)

Iranian workers protest over unpaid wage in front of the Ministry of Industry, 14 August 2012

---

Another Day Older and Deeper in Debt

According to Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) [fa], the Saipa car factory in Kashan has dismissed more than 10,000 employees. Saipa in Tehran has also reduced the shifts from three to just one. Asr-e Iran reports that the automobile production rate has been reduced by 66.2%.

More than 600 steel workers demonstrated in front of the Ministry of Labor, demanding five months of unpaid wages. The protest was a follow-up

to the workers' claim of eight months of unpaid salaries --- despite a settlement, only three months were paid.

About 200 members of Tehran’s Metropolitan Vahed Bus Company gathered Wednesday in front of the Tehran Municipal Building to protest discrimination in pay. They also called for the dismissal of the managing director of the company and an investigation into their unpaid salaries.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- Collapsing Currency, Closed Embassy, No to Women Watching Volleyball (Arseh Sevom)

This was a week beginning with 24 medals, 10 of them gold for Iranian Paralympic athletes in London 2012 and continuing with record increases in the cost of dollars in Iran.

Gold Goes Up, The Rial Goes Down

On Tuesday, Mesghal.com reported that the Rial hit a record low with an open-market price of 24,520 Rials per dollar. This compares to the official bank rate of 12,260:1.

Fars News reports the street rates have skyrocketed because Iran’s Central Bank has not issued dollars to customers for about three weeks now. The head of Parliament's planning and budget committee, Gholamreza Mesbahi-Moghaddam said, "Unfortunately the Government has made the biggest mistake in history by not injecting dollars to answer the demand of the foreign exchange market.”

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From Earthquakes to Islamic Law in Outer Space (Arseh Sevom)

"Our Hearts Are With You, Azerbaijan"

---

It was a week that began with medals and international sportsmanship yet ended with disaster as two earthquakes hit an area close to Tabriz in northwestern Iran. Netizens were shocked by the lack of Iranian media coverage of the quakes and an MP called for direct donations and volunteerism. Many inside and outside Iran are using social media to organize and report on assistance to the quake stricken areas.

The Supreme Leader turns a deaf ear to pleas from student organizations to "open prison gates" and a news agency affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards acknowledges the mass executions of the 1980s. There are questions about a doubling of US wheat imports while sanctions blocking the payments for needed medications are in place. A community exchanges waterpipes for sports equipment and a seminary promotes Islamic jurisprudence in outer space.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From Health Care to Hijab to Identity Crisis (Arseh Sevom)

The UNAIDS Executive Director presents the Red Ribbon Award in the category "Prevention Among/By People Who Use Drugs" to representatives of the Afraye Sabz Association. Credit: UNAIDS/C. Kleponis

---

This week --- Iranian organizations and individuals receive awards for their work on HIV/AIDS as Mississippi doctors try to fix healthcare inequalities by learning from Iran. The Supreme Leader puts an end to family planning. The "Unveil a Woman's Right to Unveil" goes from Facebook to the streets of Iran, residents in Neyshapour take to the streets to protest inflation,and a report shows the lopsided impact of economic sanctions on women. A group of citizens cleans a park in Isfahan and the loss of Iranian identity is lamented.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From Repression 1999 to Repression 2012 (Arseh Sevom)

The 18 Tir Protests, 199918 Tir Anniversary

Sunday was the anniversary of the 1999 crackdown on demonstrations of Iranian students, described on page 10 of our report "Attack on Civil Society".

Many consider the 1999 demonstrations as a turning point that paved the way for later developments within non-violent movements in Iran. The events of that time also led directly to the strategies used to control later protests:

A strengthened and more professional Basij militia, under the control of the IRGC and acting on their behalf, answered the rise of the student movement with a renewed mission to protect the nation against the perceived domestic threat posed by liberalizing influences.

The opposition site Kalemeh offers an illustrated review of “18 Tir” events.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From House of Cinema to "Forbidden City" (Arseh Sevom)

Photographer Hoda Rostami in her "Forbidden City"

---

After the Streets, “Campaign against Bad Hijab” Reaches Parks and Mountains

Last week we reported on the national re-launch of the so-called “moral security” project. The campaign has now gone beyond streets and reached mountains and parks as well.

The Forbidden City

While the Moral Security project is implemented with full force, the Iranian-Swedish artist, Hoda Rostami, challenges the treatment of her peers through the lens of her camera. Rostami’s collection of photographs from Tehran shows Iranian women freed from imposed hijab in current day-to-day situations. In an article on Tehran Review, the artist describes the motivation for her work:

My street photography soon turned into my concern for myself and others around me in a city and country that I loved, [so] I depicted it in another way, as I liked it to be. This collection is more of a manifest and an expression of words that appear to have been forbidden for years in this city.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- Standing Against Homophobia, Defending Students, and More (Arseh Sevom)

---

Anti-Homophobia Campaign in Iran

May 17th marked the International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia. With sodomy remaining an offence which can be punishable by death, youth in Iran have begun a Facebook campaign to give voice to a message of anti-homophobia.

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- Attacks on Journalists, A Death Bounty for A Rapper, A Woman Dragged from the Book Fair (Arseh Sevom)

Claimed photo of women being dragged from the Tehran International Book Fair for inappropriate dress

---

Summary: 126 Iranian journalists signed a letter protesting the arrests and harassment of journalists, sending it to the head of the judiciary and the Speaker of Parliament. After a cartoonist faced lashing for his drawing of an MP, colleagues all over the world launched a campaign of support. An MP assaulted a journalist who asked a sensitive question. Publishers banned from attending the International Book Fair received support from a prisoner of conscience. Women were targeted for bad hejab. The Minister of Communicatoins calls for government institutions to host their email and sites on domestic servers. Rapper Shahin Najafi wakes up to find a price on his head, offered by an anonymous Gulf resident, after his new song satirising the wait for the 10th Imam hit the airwaves. And more...

Click to read more ...

Iran Feature: The Week in Civil Society --- From Forbidden Books to a Shrinking Middle Class (Arseh Sevom)

Official Book Fair and Unofficial Books

The annual International Book Fair of Tehran opened on 1 May and will continue to the 11^th, even as the list of forbidden books grows. Authorities collect “illegal copies", sometimes turning them into paper paste (recounted in our review of 23 April). Meanwhile, a shadow book fair has sprung up featuring the forbidden texts.

Click to read more ...