According to a Farsi report by Khabar Online, Hariri said that Iran lost a man who was among founders of the Islamic Republic of Iran and was an outstanding figure known for his moderate style.
He used to forge interaction with countries on the basis of friendly relations, he added.
According to Turkish media reports, the Governorship of Ankara, Turkey’s capital city, has banned all demonstrations, protests and other similar activities in public places in Ankara for 30 days due to information related to terrorism.
“According to the information our Governorship has received, we have found that illegal terrorist organizations were in search of terrorist actions and made preparations for that purpose. It is estimated that they want to take action especially in meetings, demonstrations and similar activities held in open and close places where people gather in masses.”
The governorship has announced that all demonstrations, presentations, plays and other shows, press statements and opening stands were banned in all public spaces in Ankara for 30 days in accordance with Article 11 of the State of Emergency Law No. 2935.
The measures are increases as the Turkish parliament voted on Tuesday to press on with debate about a constitutional reform package that would expand the powers of President Tayyip Erdogan, taking another step on the path towards an executive presidency.
Erdogan and his supporters argue that Turkey needs the strong leadership of an executive presidency to prevent a return to the fragile coalition governments of the past, but opponents fear the reform will fuel authoritarianism.
The initial vote, an early indicator of support for the bill, was passed with 338 votes, indicating that some deputies from the ruling AK Party and the nationalist opposition MHP, which backs the reform, had not voted in favour.
The bill needs the support of at least 330 deputies in the 550-seat assembly to go to a referendum, expected in the spring. The AKP has 316 deputies eligible to vote and the MHP 39.
Under the reform, Erdogan will be able to appoint and dismiss government ministers, take back the leadership of the ruling party, and govern until 2029, Reuters reported.
Debate on the individual articles is set to begin on Tuesday and the AKP plans to complete debate of the package by Jan. 24.
According to a Farsi report by the Iranian Department of Environment (DoE), while demonstrations are reminder of blood and fire just some kilometres away from Sardasht, people in this Kurdish-majority border town chose a peaceful way to show their protest.
They held flower pots in their hands to protest against the destruction of oak habitats in Zagros Mountains, which has led to the death of more than 18 million trees.
Mohammad Darwish, the DoE’s Director of Education and Public Participation, appreciated this refined move, describing it as “the greenest protest at the destruction of green fields”.
“This is an example for all Iranian environmental activists,” he wrote in his Telegram channel.
“Light a lamp instead of cursing the darkness. I praise my Kurd compatriots who teach us magnanimity, morality and the real love of environment through their actions.”
Darwish criticized Iranian media for not covering such activities inside Iran.
“This face of Iran has been rarely shown to the world. But we don’t pay enough attention to them inside Iran, neither, among all the depressing news. Even the biggest Iranian news agencies said nothing about this environmental activity.”
Sardasht is a mountainous town near Iran’s frontier with Iraq. It was attacked by chemical weapons during Iran-Iraq war, and some of its inhabitants still suffer from the grave effects of mustard gas.
According to a Farsi report by Al-Alam, the winners of cartoon section of Made in Iran Festival, an Iranian cultural event aimed at promoting knowledge-based products made in Iran, were announced on Sunday, January 8.
Here you can see the top cartoons submitted to the festival:
In a Farsi interview with Mizan, Tajik noted that he had moved to London in 2006 to continue his studies but during his stay in the British capital, he was captured by security forces under the flimsy excuse of seeking to purchase night vision cameras.
Tajik, a former Iranian ambassador to Jordan and a senior diplomat, says the arrest was based on an order from the US government.
Only two days after his capture, the Iranian diplomat was indicted by a British court and was about to be extradited to the US based on an agreement between London and Washington for extradition of criminals.
Immediately after the verdict was announced, Iran’s Foreign Ministry managed to convince the court to grant him a bail set at €500,000. However, after his release, Tajik was under house arrest for the next 6 years. Finally, on Sunday, 27 November 2016, the Iranian diplomat was exonerated of the charge.
He says on October 26, 2006, Scotland Yard forces invaded his house a few minutes after the call for morning prayers (dawn), and after 6 hours of interrogation, they said they were ordered by the US government to place him under arrest.
Tajik said he was later jailed in London with an addict who kept threatening he would kill him in order to receive a life sentence so he would stop abusing drugs.
The diplomat believes the main reason for his capture was that the US government had been given some information that showed he had played a role in the recruitment of new forces for the Lebanese Resistance Group Hezbollah.
He said the US government had also ordered his arrest on charge of hatching a plot to export military items including night vision camera and military equipment from the US to Iran without obtaining the required authorization.
Seyyed Ali Qazi-Askar, the representative of Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei for Hajj, said on Monday that Iran had “officially received Saudi Arabia’s invitation to meet and hold bilateral talks on the Hajj.”
He added that the talks would focus on accommodation, transportation, safety, medical care, visas and banking, and that Iran would respond to the invitation over the next few days.
Last week, a senior Iranian official dismissed reports that Saudi Arabia had invited Iran to discuss the resumption of Iranians’ participation in Hajj pilgrimage.
“Contrary to the report published by some media outlets about the extension of an invitation by Saudi Arabia for Iran’s participation in this year’s Hajj rituals, we have received no invitation,” the head of Iran’s Hajj and Pilgrimage Organization, Hamid Mohammadi, had said.
In September 2015, a deadly human crush occurred during Hajj rituals in Mina, near Mecca. Days into the incident, Saudi Arabia published a death toll of 770 but refused to update it despite gradually surging fatality figures from individual countries whose nationals had been among the victims of the crush. Iran said about 4,700 people, including over 465 of its nationals, lost their lives in the incident.
Earlier that same month, a massive construction crane had collapsed into Mecca’s Grand Mosque, killing more than 100 pilgrims, including 11 Iranians, and injuring over 200 others, among them 32 Iranian nationals.
Serious questions were raised about the competence of Saudi authorities to manage the Hajj rituals in the wake of the incidents, and, facing Saudi intransigence to cooperate and refusal to guarantee the safety of Iranian pilgrims, officials in the Islamic Republic subsequently decided to halt pilgrimages over security concerns.
Saudi Arabia unilaterally severed its diplomatic ties with Iran in January this year after protests in front of its diplomatic premises in Tehran and Mashhad against the execution by Riyadh of prominent Saudi Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr.
The funeral service of Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani began in the University of Tehran, where Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei performed the ritual ‘prayer for the deceased’ (Salat al-Mayyit) for Rafsanjani.
Nearly all top Iranian officials, including President Hassan Rouhani, Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani and Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani attended the event, Tasnim reported.
A funeral procession was also held in the streets of Tehran after the prayers. Ayatollah Rafsanjani was then laid to rest at the mausoleum of late founder of the Islamic Republic Imam Khomeini south of Tehran.
The iconic cleric died at the age of 82 on Sunday. The cabinet has declared three days of national mourning and announced Tuesday as a public holiday.
Here are photos of Iranian people and officials attending the ceremony:
A huge crowd of Iranians attended the funeral of prominent cleric, former president, and chairman of the Expediency Council Ayatollah Rafsanjani at the University of Tehran.
Nearly all top Iranian officials, including President Hassan Rouhani, Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani and Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani attended the event.
Here are photos of the ritual prayer for the deceased led by Ayatollah Khamenei:
According to a Farsi report by Al-Alam, the cartoon released by Al-Hayat shows a Saudi employee who rides a wheel on a rope while carrying a barbell with two weight plates. On one plate is written “low wages” and on the other “lack of job opportunities”. At the same time, he is staring at a black rat named “foreign workers” that chews the rope to cut it.
Many Saudi citizens and foreign workers slammed this cartoon and described it as offensive and racist. Ghassan Yassin, a Syrian journalist, urged Al-Hayat to apologize for publishing such an inappropriate picture.
“Is it right to describe foreign workers like that?” wrote Wael Kurdi, a Saudi activist, in his Twitter page.
The Saudi National Organization for Human Rights noted that by publishing this cartoon, Al-Hayat has insulted human dignity and violated the principles of international humanitarian conventions.
However, Nasir Khamees, the designer of this cartoon, refused to apologize and justified his move by saying, “The audience misunderstood my cartoon. I was just referring to some particular foreign workers.”
Imam Khamenei is planned to lead the prayers at the funeral service, due to be held at the University of Tehran, for the iconic cleric who died in Tehran at the age of 82 on Sunday.
Ayatollah Rafsanjani will be laid to rest at the mausoleum of late founder of the Islamic Republic Imam Khomeini south of Tehran.
Iran’s cabinet on Sunday declared three days of public mourning and announced Tuesday as public holiday following the death of the former president.
Five days of mourning will also be observed in the southern province of Kerman, where Ayatollah Rafsanjani’s hometown of Rafsanjan is located.
Ayatollah Rafsanjani was an influential figure in a campaign led by Imam Khomeini that resulted in the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. The deceased became president for two terms and was the chairman of the Expediency Council for some 20 years.
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