US imposes sanctions on 12 Iranian officials for human rights abuses
CNN
The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on 12 Iranian officials for human rights abuses, including violent crackdowns on protesters, torture of prisoners and targeting Iranian dissidents abroad.
The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on 12 Iranian officials for human rights abuses, including violent crackdowns on protesters, torture of prisoners and targeting Iranian dissidents abroad. The sanctions were unveiled around the second anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of Iran’s “morality police.” Her death sparked massive protests throughout the country. Ahead of the anniversary, the Iranian government once again increased its crackdowns on peaceful protesters. “In the two years since Mahsa Zhina Amini’s senseless killing in the custody of Iran’s so-called Morality Police, the Iranian regime has continued to systematically violate the human rights of the Iranian people,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement. “The United States remains committed to exposing and sanctioning Iranian officials responsible for human rights abuses.” A top State Department official told CNN ahead of the anniversary “it’s important to remember that while we have a new Iranian president, a new Iranian leadership, we’re seeing continuity in this kind of human rights abuse. “It’s important for the international community to judge this government by its actions and not by its words,” said Victoria Taylor, the deputy assistant secretary of state for Iraq and Iran. The new sanctions target four members of the Iran’s security forces who were involved in the violent crackdowns in 2022. One of those sanctioned, Hamid Khorramdel, is the commander of an IRGC unit “responsible for arresting and coercing confessions from activists,” according to the Treasury Department. Another, Mustafa Bazvand, led forces responsible for “killing at least one individual and arresting several journalists covering the violence.”
The au pair who was having an extra-marital affair with Brendan Banfield when he allegedly killed his wife and another man in February 2023 is set to resume her pivotal testimony in Banfield’s double-murder trial Wednesday morning.
President Donald Trump unveiled in rapid succession last week a series of proposals aimed at reducing Americans’ cost of living, focused on housing and credit card debt.
Illinois and Minnesota sued the Trump administration over its immigration crackdown. But they may have a tough road ahead of them in court, one legal analyst says.
Whether it’s conservatives who have traditionally opposed birth control for religious reasons or left-leaning women who are questioning medical orthodoxies, skepticism over hormonal birth control is becoming a shared talking point among some women, especially in online forums focused on health and wellness.
Former election clerk Tina Peters’ prison sentence has long been a rallying cry for President Donald Trump and other 2020 election deniers. Now, her lawyers are heading back to court to appeal her conviction as Colorado’s Democratic governor has signaled a new openness to letting her out of prison early.
The Trump administration’s sweeping legal effort to obtain Americans’ sensitive data from states’ voter rolls is now almost entirely reliant upon a Jim Crow-era civil rights law passed to protect Black voters from disenfranchisement – a notable shift in how the administration is pressing its demands.
Venezuelan officials, including acting President Delcy Rodriguez, returned to X late Tuesday in an apparent reversal of Nicolas Maduro’s 2024 decision to block the site in the country.
The woman killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis last week served on the board of her son’s school, which linked to documents encouraging parents to monitor ICE and directing them to training.
During a marathon Supreme Court session Tuesday over whether states may ban transgender women from participating in women and girls’ sports, some justices were already focused on what may lie around the corner
President Donald Trump appeared to flip someone off as he toured a Michigan Ford plant in an incident caught on video Tuesday, and the White House defended the action as an “appropriate” response to someone screaming at the commander-in-chief.
White House officials are heaping blame on DC US Attorney Jeanine Pirro over her office’s criminal investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell, faulting her for blindsiding them with an inquiry that has forced the administration into a dayslong damage control campaign, four people familiar with the matter told CNN.
The interim Venezuelan government has freed at least four Americans who were imprisoned in Venezuela, a source familiar with the matter told CNN on Tuesday.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is now providing free internet access via its Starlink satellite service to users in Iran as the country’s regime continues its bloody crackdown on anti-government protests, according to a tech expert in touch with Iranian Starlink users.