TEHRAN – Pope Francis on Friday used the word “Rohingya” for the first time during his current trip to Asia to refer to Muslim refugees who have fled in large numbers from violence in Myanmar. “The presence of God today is also called Rohingya,” he said in an improvised remark after meeting 16 refugees brought […]

In late 2006, I traveled to Saudi Arabia on behalf of Human Rights Watch to discuss human rights with Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, then the assistant interior minister for security affairs. He explained to me the merits of his country’s project to rehabilitate extremists by detaining several thousand Saudis until religious leaders declared them reformed. […]

Stop the state visit. Britain should not allow the U.S. president’s racism to be dressed up in pageantry All relationships have boundaries. Those between nations can be particularly fraught, freighted with ties forged in history and culture. In diplomacy the manners, customs and morals of others need to be acknowledged and respected. But humanity begins […]

America’s diplomatic professionals have issued a dire warning about the crisis facing the State Department: Scores of top diplomats, including some of our highest-ranked career Foreign Service officers, have left the agency at “a dizzying speed” over the past 10 months. “The rapid loss of so many senior officers has a serious, immediate and tangible […]

Moscow is “preparing” to reduce its military presence in Syria, Nikolay Patrushev, the head of Russia’s National Security Council, said Thursday. According to Russian media reports, Patrushev announced that “preparations are underway” for a military withdrawal from Syria. Until now, it remains unclear whether the officials were referring to a partial or total military withdrawal […]

TEHRAN  – British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Thursday that US President Donald Trump was wrong to retweet a video from a far-right British group which she said was “hateful” and spreads division. Trump sparked outrage in Britain with a sharp rebuke of May on Twitter after she criticized him for retweeting anti-Islam videos […]

TEHRAN –Russian foreign minister says there is little difference between policies of Trump and Obama. The actions of US President Donald Trump’s team are similar to the policies of his predecessor Barack Obama, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview, state-run RIA news agency reported on Thursday. “Unfortunately, many actions of Donald Trump’s […]

TEHRAN – US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley on Wednesday said North Korea’s latest missile test brings Washington and Pyongyang “closer to war.” “If war does come, it will be because of continued acts of aggression like we witnessed yesterday and if war comes, make no mistake, the North Korean regime will be utterly […]

TEHRAN–The United States on Nov. 29 expressed its objections to Ankara’s gas pipeline project with Russia, the Turkish Stream. According to Hurriyet Daily, John McCarrick, the US Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Department of State’s Bureau of Energy Resources, stated that the US opposed to multiple Turkish Stream gas pipeline projects planned by Russia to […]

TEHRAN– A statement released by the spokesperson of Germany’s federal foreign office voices the support of the German government for the Syrian peace talks underway in Geneva and Riyadh. According to the latest statement issued by a federal foreign office spokesperson issued on Tuesday on the latest round of the Syria negotiations in Geneva and […]