Referendum For ‘Secular Republic’ Iran’s Only Hope, Dissident Says

According to reports by the Islamic Republic’s state media, Raisi and his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad signed a “long-term strategic comprehensive cooperation” deal in addition to 14 other agreements in various areas, including trade, oil and energy, engineering, housing, rail and aerial transportation.

Heading a high-ranking politico-economic delegation, Raisi arrived in Damascus on Wednesday. The visit was the first by an Iranian president since the civil war broke out in Syria in 2011.

On the second day of his visit, Raisi held a meeting with representatives of militia groups fighting against Israel from Syria. These groups, which enjoy huge financial and military support from Tehran, are often called the “resistance axis” in the jargon of the Islamic Republic.

Most of these groups have representative offices in Syria.

During the meeting with the leaders and commanders of the militant groups, Raisi reiterated Tehran’s claim about the future of the region, saying that Israel’s elimination may happen very soon as signs of its decline are visible, and described “resistance” as the only way to counter “the occupying regime.”

“The Zionist regime also planned to divide Syria with the support of the United States and Western countries, as well as the fielding of terrorist groups created by the United States, but they did not succeed,” he said.

Raisi stressed the need for unity among these forces in order to expedite “the collapse of Israel, the liberation of the holy al-Quds, and the Palestinians’ sovereignty over their fate.” “Today, the initiative is in the hands of Palestinian fighters on the battlefield, not at negotiating tables. We believe that the demise of the Zionist regime is imminent as the signs of its decline are visible,” he said.

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“The only solution for Palestine is state sovereignty based on the will of the Palestinians. If the Westerners seek democracy, they should acknowledge the Palestinian people’s vote and remain committed to it,” Raisi said.

On Wednesday, Raisi addressed a host of Syrian regime loyalists and officials at a Shia shrine, saying, “The policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is to support the oppressed and hence, it stands beside the oppressed Palestinian nation as well as the resistance in Lebanon, Syria and elsewhere in the world."

Raisi had a large retinue during his visit to Syria asa majority of his cabinet was accompanying him.

Mehrdad Bazrpash, the Iranian road minister and head of the Iran-Syria Joint Economic Commission described the signed documents as “nearly unprecedented both in terms of number and importance of issues.”“A major part of these documents seeks to facilitate trade between the two countries,” he told IRIB after the signing ceremony, noting that the agreements will improve the quality and volume of bilateral trade.

Tehran and Damascus apparently also discussed the establishment of a joint bank and joint insurance company that will ease trade, said the official.

According to one of the agreements, 50,000 Iranians will be able to make pilgrimage to the shrine of Hazrat Zainab, the granddaughter of the Prophet Muhammad, in Damascus on a yearly basis, using three to five direct flights every week, Bazrpash said. He added that the operation to dispatch pilgrims will start in the next two months.

Israel has vowed to prevent Iran's entrenchment in Syria. Israeli strikes in recent weeks have seen key Iranian military figures killed from the Revolutionary Guards and the Quds Force. Israel has been regularly targeting Iranian weapons depots and shipments in Syria.

Right groups have described the promptness of the regime’s executions of Baluch prisoners in recent weeks as “an official policy to intimidate protesters in Sistan and Baluchistan province,” where anti-regime rallies have been held weekly since the "Women, Life, Freedom” protests began in September.

The Thursday execution was carried out at Mashhad Central Prison and there are unconfirmed reports that several other people from the minority group have been transferred to death rows.

As Sunni Muslims, Baluch citizens are both an ethnic and religious minority. Estimates of the Iranian Baluch population range from 1.5 to 2 million people.

The Baluch community – along with the Kurds -- has always been among the most persecuted minorities of Iran, and has the largest number of people executed in the country. Most of the Baluchs are executed over drug-related charges, but activists say their cases do not receive due process through a fair trial and that the regime uses drug charges as a pretext to avenge 30 consecutive weeks of widespread protests after their Friday prayers.

The region is among the most impoverished ones across Iran and given the high rate of unemployment and no proper infrastructure, smuggling fuel, goods and in some cases drugs are their only lifeline.

More than 110 people from the community have been reportedly executed during the past four months, with activists voicing worries that the number is higher and there are cases that have not been reported in the media.

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Journalist and activist Mehdi Nakhl-Ahmadi told Iran International that one of the common characteristics of these recent cases is the “unfair trials” and a “lack of due judicial process,” highlighting that a large number of these people do not have access to lawyers. “We are witnessing a rise in the number of executions in Sistan-Baluchestan, which, people believe, are meant to affect the public opinion of the residents of the province... particularly to put pressure on Sunni Leader Mowlavi Abdolhamid, several of whose aides as well other Sunni clerics have been arrested,” he said.

The Baloch campaign website, run by a group of ethnic rights activists, described “the new wave” of executions as a strategy by the regime to warn the people of the Sistan-Baluchestan province against holding further anti-government demonstrations, claiming that such measures have been taken by the regime before to crack down on earlier bouts of protests. Condemning the mass executions, the group also expressed concern about the violation of human rights as a form of "political game to put pressure on and create fear among the people."

Haalvsh website, a local news outlet that monitors rights violations in Iran's Baluchestan region, cited remarks by family members of the executed people, claiming that they confessed to crimes they had not committed under duress and that there were flaws and ambiguities in their cases, but the judiciary ignored them and carried out the death sentence anyway.

To raise awareness about the executions, Iranian social media users have launched a twitter campaign, denouncing the killings as a “Baluch genocide.”

Masih Alinejad, well-known journalist and political activist, warned Thursday that three Baluch citizens, all of them about 30 years of age, are in imminent danger of being executed, urging people to “be the voice of people of Baluchestan.” "They are the ones who chant death to the dictator on the streets after seven months of torture, imprisonment and bullets," she said.

According to a report released by the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) in December, the number of the regime’s executions increased by over 88 percent in 2022. A glance at the rights group’s recent report clearly shows a sharp rise in reported human rights violations since mid-September when the 22-year-old Kurdish woman Mahsa (Jina) Amini died in the custody of the so-called “morality police” following which protests swept across the country.

Amnesty International also published a report early in March, revealing a “chilling execution spree with escalating use of the death penalty against persecuted ethnic minorities” by the regime. “The Iranian authorities have executed at least one Ahwazi Arab, 14 Kurds and 13 Baluchis following grossly unfair trials, and sentenced at least a dozen others to death since the start of the year,” the right group said, adding that the Islamic Republic “executed at least 94 people in January and February alone.”

Earlier in the day, 23 human rights organizations and four activists, along with the "Keep It On" coalition condemned the frequent internet disruptions in Sistan-Baluchestan province. Keep It On is a coalition of more than 300 organizations from 105 countries around the world that has been fighting internet shutdowns.

Every Friday when people of the province are set to begin their rallies, the regime shuts down the internet to stop people from uploading footage from the protests and communicating with each other.

A bid to "cover up human rights violations," the signatories said the repeated disruption of the Internet has led to "significant challenges for local communities that rely heavily on online communications for their daily activities".

Organ trafficking has become a major problem with people selling kidneys, liver, cornea, bone marrow, sperm, and ovum out of poverty.

Jahan-e-Sanat daily wrote Thursday that some middlemen send the prospective donors to neighboring countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, and Iraq to sell their body parts for $7,000 to $15,000.

This is the result of the country’s economic crisis, which has left many people struggling to survive. In some cases, people have even been forced to sell their organs to pay for medical bills or to support their families.

The organ trafficking industry has been estimated to be worth millions of dollars, with organs being sold to wealthy individuals. The organs are usually obtained through coercion or deception, with some being promised money and then never receiving it once the organ has been taken out.

Although Iranian law prohibits the sale or purchase of body organs, the online market is booming, and no one is taking action.

“My blood type is O negative, and I am 22 years old. I will sell my kidney for 5 billion rials (10,000 USD). Due to my financial issues, I have no choice but to sell my kidney. If you want my liver, I will sell a part of it for 2 billion rials (4,000 USD),” a young man told Jahan-e-Sanat.

According to government figures, more than 1,480 people receive a kidney transplant from a living donor in Iran annually, which is about 55 percent of the total of 2,700 transplants each year.

In the latest escalation in a series of attacks on commercial vessels since 2019, Iran seized a second oil tanker in a week on Wednesday in Persian Gulf waters.

The Bahrain-based US Fifth Fleet said the Panama-flagged oil tanker Niovi was seized by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN) at 6:20 a.m. (0220 GMT) while passing through the narrow Strait of Hormuz.

TankersTrackers.com said Wednesday that “given the tanker’s history of receiving Iranian oil during the sanctions era as well as being currently empty of cargo, we believe today’s actions were entirely staged.”

Its satellite imagery shows the empty tanker was forcefully redirected by around a dozen IRGC Navy speedboats to the anchorage of Larak and Qeshm Islands south of Iran.

The Niovi oil tanker had been travelling from Dubai toward the UAE's Fujairah port when it was forced by IRGC boats to change course towards Iranian territorial waters.

Claire Jungman, Chief of Staff of US-based non-profit advocacy organization United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) said a tweet that after reviewing leaked documents UANI strongly suspects the seizure of the Niovi is related to a dispute over a shipment of Iranian oil, tied to the sanctioned company ASB Group.

She further claimed that the oil from the Niovi was sold to another company, without ASB Group's permission while there are numerous mentions by ASB Group stating that it did not receive payment for the cargo.

“We believe that this seizure was the result of a judicial order following a complaint by a plaintiff,” added Jungman.

ASB is a group of companies owned by a Turkish businessman, which is under US sanctions due to cooperation with the IRGC Quds Force.

Meanwhile, Vedant Patel, a Deputy Spokesperson at the US State Department, told reporters that the Biden administration and the "international community" want Iran and its Navy to release the ships and crews.

According to Patel, Iran's harassment of vessels and interference with navigation rights in regional and international waters violates international law and threatens regional security and stability.

Separately, Senator James Lankford in reaction to the vessel seizure said Iran remains the top threat in the Middle East. “President Biden must push policy of strength to stop Iran’s behavior,” he added.

The seizure of the Panama-flagged vessel comes after Iran seized a Marshall Islands-flagged oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman called the Advantage Sweet last Thursday.

Maritime security firm Ambrey said it believed the Advantage Sweet's seizure by Iran was in response to a recent seizure via a court order by the United States of an oil cargo aboard the Marshall Islands tanker Suez Rajan.

“The anger of an evil regime, whose wind was taken out in Syria and the entire region by Iran and the axis of resistance is natural,” Iran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kanaani blasted on Thursday.

Kanaani threatened that Washington must end its “aggressive presence” in war-torn Syria.

The US State Department warned Wednesday that closer ties between Iran and Syria should be of great concern not only to US allies, but also to the world more broadly.

"These are two regimes that have continued to partake in malign destabilizing activities, not just in their immediate countries, but also in the region," State Department Spokesperson Vedant Patel said.

That same day, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi met his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad in Damascus in his first visit since Syria's war began in 2011, underlining close ties as Syrian relations with Arab states thaw.

In an interview with pro-Iran broadcaster al-Mayadeen before his trip, Raisi said he planned to "consolidate and develop" ties with Syria and other allies, including the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah.

Assad and Raisi signed a memorandum of understanding on long-term comprehensive strategic cooperation while the delegates signed 15 separate documents.

Raisi's visit comes as Iran and regional rival Saudi Arabia rebuild relations after years of tensions, and as Arab states that shunned Assad - including Riyadh - rebuild ties with his government.