أليكس فاتانكا

Following the January 19 collapse of Plasco, a 17-story historic building in downtown Tehran, mass anger against the authorities in the Iranian regime has been building up. Twenty people were killed in the disaster. The mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Ghalibaf, a former Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C) commander, who remains close to his comrades, appeared in front of the members of the parliament but refused to apologize.

Ahmad Khatami, a hardline cleric close to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on February 3 defended Iran’s latest ballistic missile test. “In a world of wolves, we need weapons,” Khatami was quoted as saying to worshippers at the Friday prayer in Tehran.

Ahmad Tavakoli, a prominent hardliner and a former member of the Iranian parliament, has urged for members of the public with information about corruption inside the Iranian regime to be “applauded.” “Transparency must be part of the duties of officials,”

Iranian authorities have denied any involvement in a coup attempt in the neighboring country of Azerbaijan.

Abbas Akhoundi, Iran’s Minister for Roads and Urban Development, has insisted that the Trump administration cannot cancel the 80 aircraft and $16.6 billion deal that Iran reached with the US company Boeing in December 2016.

Since the Trump administration last week introduced a ban on Iranian travelers to the United States for a certain time period, hardliners in Tehran have been pressuring President Hassan Rouhani to retaliate.

On Iran’s 9th National Day of Space Technology, President Hassan Rouhani unveiled the country’s latest communications satellite. “Nahid 1” was unveiled with “Payam,” a remote sensing satellite, and “Saman 1,” an orbital transfer system as reported by Iranian media. 

Kayhan newspaper, arguably Iran’s most reactionary paper whose editor-in-chief is appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ran an extensive background of what it claimed to be Israeli fears about Lebanese Hezbollah’s missile arsenal. “Zionists [Israel] are deeply worried about Hezbollah’s missile strength,” the paper said.

While the Trump administration is said already to have put Iran “on notice” for its latest ballistic missile test, the Iranians began to sense a new push by the United States for more punitive actions against Tehran even while President Obama was still in the White House. For example, in her last speech to the United Nations as the U.S. ambassador to that body, Samantha Power called for more international efforts to stop Iranian military exports and specifically to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

President Hassan Rouhani has again come out to strongly argue that his government’s bid to attract maximum foreign investment is to “promote national interests.” “We are Muslim and revolutionary Iranians. We neither idolize nor fear outsiders and will use constructive interaction with the world to advance public and national interests,” Rouhani was quoted as saying by Iranian media.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif has warned the Trump administration against “politicizing” Iran’s military activities. “We hope that the issue of Iran’s defense program… does not turn into a pretext for political games,” Press TV quoted Zarif as saying.  Zarif, who spoke alongside visiting French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, was specifically responding to the latest reports that Iranian forces have test launched a new ballistic missile.

Ali Tayyeb-Nia, Iran’s Minister of Economy, appeared in front the parliamentarians and defended the Rouhani government’s policies to combat large-scale smuggling operations that hurt the Iranian economy. Tayyeb-Nia claimed that the value of smuggled good into Iran has decreased from “$25 billion to $15 billion.”

Fars News, an outlet affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (I.R.G.C.), has published an interview with the spokesperson of the Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Force), on the question of the military campaign to free the Iraqi city of Mosul from the Islamic State. Ahmad al-Assadi, the spokesperson of the Shiite-dominated Iraqi paramilitary organization, claimed in the interview that the next phase of operations to liberate west of Mosul from the Islamic State is underway.  

Tasnim News, an outlet that is affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), has published a rare video footage of its correspondent’s account of Shiite militia operations in Iraq. In what the outlet calls “exclusive” video, the correspondent is seen accompanying fighters from Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Force) in the battle for Mosul against fighters from the Islamic State.