Jan 23, 2023
On Sunday* morning, January 22, Islamic Republic's parliamentarians met to discuss the EU's vote on listing IRGC as a terrorist organization.
Alireza Salimi, parliament member, reported that during the meeting foreign minister, Hossein Amirabdollahian, and the IRGC commander, Hossein Salami, mentioned that the EU is making a wrong decision. They added:
“If the IRGC ends up on the terrorist list, we will also announce all the European military organizations as terrorist organizations and that will jeopardize their safety in Iran.”
Hossein Amirabdollahian said that "the Europeans have informed me that they are not looking for the implementation of the resolution against the IRGC."
Thijs Reuten, a European Parliament member reacted to these statements:
"The statements of the foreign minister of a regime that kills its own people cannot be true, but if so, it would be completely unacceptable."
Hannah Neumann, the German representative in the European Parliament, said that she expects the members of the Council of Europe to put more IRGC entities on the sanctions list and look for ways to include the IRGC on the list of terrorist organizations at the meeting on Monday.
*In the Persian calendar, weeks start on Saturday and Sunday is the second day of the week.
Another Activist in Jail
Mahya Vahedi, children’s rights activist, has been in solitary confinement for a week now. There is no further information about her case.
Mahya has a long history of supporting children in poverty. Her colleagues and friends on social media are talking about her hardworking and compassionate personality. “Activists shouldn’t be in prison.” they say.
Fajr Film Festival with Empty Seats
Reports show that the opening of the Islamic Republic’s annual film festival, Fajr, was held while most of the seats were empty.
Fajr is the most popular and well-received film festival between cinema artists and their fans. However, this year, many artists and audiences boycotted the festival due to the government’s pressure on artists. Many actresses published their photos without the mandatory hijab to show their support of the uprising and got arrested following that.
Statistically “Bright Future”
Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA), affiliated with the regime, reported a 46.3% point-to-point inflation rate in the previous month, which shows a 1.3% increase compared to the month before.
Meanwhile, "President" Ebrahim Raisi stated that: "I know the future is bright and all statistics show improvement in [the economy of] the country."