Protests in Iran Continue Over Water Shortage in the South
By Roshanak Astaraki
A protest over severe water shortage and power cuts that started on July 15 in Hamidiyeh in the southwestern province of Khuzestan has now spread to 15 other cities in the province.
Antiriot...
Iranian Teachers Stage Protests in 200 Cities, Demanding Better Pay
By Roshanak Astaraki
Iranian teachers staged a new wave of nationwide protest between Jan. 29 and 31. In the first two days of the protests, teachers across the country staged sit-ins in the administrative offices...
ANALYSIS: Iran’s Water Resources Require Urgent Action
By Hamed Mohammadi and Roshanak Astaraki
Water has always occupied an important and unique place in the global culture and literature of Iran. It is no accident that the Persian nouns Abadi and Abadani (development, settlement, village) start with...
Kayhan Life Exclusive: Interviews With Iran’s Striking Oil Workers
By Roshanak Astaraki
For the first time in four decades, workers in the Iranian oil industry are staging nationwide strikes. The strikes started at 19 oil refineries, petrochemical factories, and power plants on Aug. 1....
OPINION: Iranian Women and the Removal of the Veil
By Roshanak Astaraki
It has been 88 years since a law was passed in Iran authorizing the removal of the hijab (known as the kashf-e hijab). Nearly nine decades later, Iranian women are mounting a...
Iran Protests Escalate After Abadan Tragedy, With Calls for Regime Change
By Roshanak Astaraki
Anti-government protests across Iran have escalated since the start of the Persian New Year in March. Despite a brutal crackdown by the security forces, demonstrators have poured out into the streets of...
The Taliban Cannot Control Afghanistan, Says Former Afghan MP Pedram
By Roshanak Astaraki
Dr. Abdul Latif Pedram, writer, poet, a former member of the Afghan Parliament, and the National Congress Party of Afghanistan leader is a campaigner against Taliban rule.
The Islamist group Taliban rapidly took...
Iranian Banks Facing Severe Cash Shortage, Expert Says
By Roshanak Astaraki
Under international trade laws, most if not all Iranian banks should have filed for bankruptcy by now, given that they lack the minimum cash reserves required to meet international banking requirements, Ahmad Hatami-Yazd, the former manager...
Wheat Flour Used in Iranian Bakeries Contains Dirt and Sand, Head of Food Agency...
By Roshanak Astaraki
Some 700,000 tons of wheat flour used by bakeries in the country every year, with an estimated retail value of $237 million, consists mostly of dirt, sand, gravel and bran (husk), according...
Iran’s Health Ministry Urged to Punish Private Hospitals That Cut Nursing Staff
By Roshanak Astaraki
In a letter to the Iranian Minister of Health and Medical Sciences, Dr. Saeed Namaki, the director of the Nursing Organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran (INO), Dr. Mohammad Mirzabeigi, has...
