Two important facts emerged from the Iran elections on 21 February. The first is that the country actually held elections — a rarity in that region. The second is that the outcome was almost wholly negative for the regime. The candidate list had been purged of anyone not loyal to...
On February 21, yet another nominal election will take place in Iran, coming on the heels of widespread protests in over 100 cities at the end of last year. It was the third time that the Iranian government faced protests in the last decade and the biggest since the Islamic Revolution of...
The last time Iranians staged a revolution, they overthrew the oppressive Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who ruled his country from 1941 to 1979 with an iron fist. Pahlavi was a staunch US ally, but his reign left millions disgruntled due to unemployment, corruption, soaring inflation and...
Disregarding the vital role of Iran’s non-Persian minorities can only divide and weaken the opposition, leaving it with insufficient support to challenge or overthrow the current regime. Throughout history, dictators and authoritarians have expended great efforts in presenting their nations...
Tehran’s defiant attitude is part of a desperate strategy to compel the international community to stand down. The Islamic Republic of Iran has maintained a defiant tone in the face of the “maximum pressure” campaign pursued by Donald Trump’s White House. The campaign reached new heights...
Iran’s history shows that its ethnic minorities have always been the Achilles’ heel for any regime. On February 1, 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran from exile and, 10 days later, 2,500 thousand years of monarchy came to an end. Although the majority of those who started the...
In this edition of The Interview, Fair Observer talks to exiled Iranian poet and journalist Sepideh Jodeyri. Iran’s relations with the United States seem to have come to a nadir under the current administration. One of the first decisions President Donald Trump took after entering the White...
Since December 2017, the authorities in Iran have intensified their crackdown, specifically targeting journalists, social media and women’s rights activists, Ahwazi Arabs, Kurds and their families. In a recent summary of human rights abuses in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Amnesty...
Iran has been successful in dividing public opinion in the West over supporting the Iranians’ struggle for freedom and democracy. When the 1979 Revolution in Iran was still in its nascent phase, the majority of the groups involved were secular and left-wing. However, the religious factions...
What is behind Iran's low ranking in the 2018 World Happiness Report? Iranians are unhappy for a number of reasons, like in all countries where people are sometimes more and sometimes less happy. However, the root cause of unhappiness in Iranian society is of a different nature: It’s...
