Billionaire entrepreneur and philanthropist Richard Branson has called for Iranian authorities to release popular rapper Toomaj Salehi, whose health has reportedly deteriorated since he was arrested during Tehran’s clampdown on nationwide anti-government protests in October. "As his life hangs in the balance after 8 months+ of imprisonment and torture, we all must give our voice to him and call for his release," Branson said in a tweet. In November, Iran’s judiciary charged Salehi with spreading “corruption on earth,” a charge that could see him sentenced to death. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Radio Farda, click here.

A local official in the Russian city of Vladimir, 200 kilometers east of Moscow, was detained on June 7 after she threw Molotov cocktails at a military recruitment center. Media reports identified the woman as Zhanna Romanovskaya, a 55-year-old official from the local Architecture and Construction Ministry. Since Russia launched its ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, dozens of military recruitment centers have been targeted by arsonists, but Romanovskaya appears to be the first official to have done so. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Russian Service, click here.

The European Commission said on June 7 that it is launching legal action against Poland over its creation of a controversial body probing "Russian influence," which is seen as targeting the opposition. The announcement of the infringement procedure came despite Polish President Andrzej Duda saying last week that he would propose amending the law on the panel after criticism from the EU's executive and the United States.

Poland has deported to Russia a former officer of the Federal Security Service (FSB), Emran Navruzbekov, who fled the country in 2017 and claimed the FSB fabricated terrorist cases against residents of the North Caucasus. The Vot Tak media project quoted Navruzbekov on June 6 as saying Polish authorities had handed him to Russian officials in the Kaliningrad exclave. Polish authorities rejected Navruzbekov’s asylum request, citing security issues. Navruzbekov's wife said earlier that she and the couple's children were granted political asylum in Poland. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Caucasus.Realities, click here.

Norway rescued a Russian in need of emergency medical assistance on board a scientific vessel stuck in ice near the North Pole in a spectacular helicopter operation, its rescue services said on June 7. The evacuation took place on June 6 in the evening from the Russian ship Severny Polyus located at the 86th parallel north, some 444 kilometers from the North Pole. "It's the extreme limit of what the helicopter can do" in terms of range, a Norwegian spokesman told the AFP news agency. The operation was carried out despite a deterioration of relations between the two countries since the start of Russia's war in Ukraine.

Germany is preparing to host the biggest air deployment exercise in NATO’s history, a show of force intended to impress allies and potential adversaries such as Russia, German and American officials said. Air Defender 23 exercise starting next week will see 10,000 participants and 250 aircraft from 25 nations respond to a simulated attack on a NATO member country. While the drill, which is being led by Germany, has been planned since 2018, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year has jolted NATO into preparing in earnest for the possibility of an attack on its territory. To read the original story by AP, click here.

Russia's Investigative Committee said on June 7 that it has started investigating the disappearance of the wife and teenage son of the North Korean Council Choi En Nam in the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok. Media reports quoted sources as identifying the missing persons as Kim Kum-Sun, 43, and Park Kwon-Chu, who went missing on June 4. Some investigators suggested that the woman and her son are on their way to defect to South Korea via China. Some reports say the two used a taxi to reach the city of Khabarovsk, from where they took a plane to the city of Krasnoyarsk. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Siberia.Realities, click here.

Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said on June 7 that a resident of the country’s Far East had been detained on a charge of high treason amid a growing number of such cases in recent months. According to the FSB, the suspect, whose identity was not disclosed, had allegedly passed classified information about law enforcement and military infrastructure to Ukrainian intelligence. In the last five months, 20 treason probes have been launched, while in 2022, the number of such cases launched in the country was 22. Almost half of the probes were launched against residents of Russia's Far East. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Siberia.Realities, click here.

A jury at the Moscow City Court has found 45-year-old Moscow activist, Vitaly Koltsov, not guilty of attempting to murder 12 Russian National Guard officers. However, the jury concluded on June 6 that Koltsov was guilty of an arson attack but recommended a lenient punishment. The charge against Koltsov, who went on trial on May 10, stems from his throwing two Molotov cocktails at a bus that was parked near Teatralnaya Square in Moscow after it brought National Guard troops to the site to prevent anti-government rallies a year ago. Koltsov was found guilty of deliberately setting fire to a police vehicle. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Russian Service, click here.

Water levels have risen several meters in the Kherson area, trapping dozens of people in their homes and killing scores of animals, with health authorities warning of possibly contaminated drinking water after the destruction of a major dam on the Dnieper River that has prompted massive flooding and the hasty evacuation of tens of thousands.

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on June 7 that hundreds of thousands of people have been left without drinking water following the collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam, pointing the finger once again at Russia as the perpetrator of an "absolutely deliberate" act.

Russia has blamed Ukraine for the incident.

"At least 100 thousand people lived in these areas before the Russian invasion," Zelenskiy said on Telegram, referring to Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

"At least tens of thousands are still there. Hundreds of thousands of people have been left without normal access to drinking water. Our services, all those who can help people, are already involved. But we can only help on the territory controlled by Ukraine. In the Russia-occupied part, the occupiers are not even trying to help people," Zelenskiy said.

While water levels were rising in some areas, they began dropping upstream, Oleksandr Khorunzhy, a spokesman for Ukraine's State Emergency Service, said on June 7.

"As of this morning, the water level has risen by approximately five meters at the Kherson post since the incident. In Nikopol, we have a water drop of up to 2.2 meters," he told Ukrainian television.

Nikopol is located 125 kilometers upstream from the dam. Kherson Governor Oleksandr Prokudin previously had said the water level may rise by another meter within the next 20 hours.

Prokudin said that more than 1,450 people have been evacuated from the Ukrainian-controlled right bank of the Dnieper, where some 1,850 houses have been flooded.

"As of 6 a.m., 1,457 people have been evacuated, including 1,286 people from [Kherson city's] Korabel neighborhood," he added.

Ihor Syrota, the head of Ukrhydroenerho, Ukraine's hydroelectric power authority, said the water -- more than 30,000 cubic meters of it has poured out of the reservoir held back by the Soviet-era dam -- was expected to peak early on June 7 and would recede over the following days.

The Ukrainian Health Ministry on June 7 warned about the possible contamination of water in wells and open bodies in the flooded area.

"Chemicals, agents of infectious diseases from cemeteries, latrines, and landfills may end up in wells and open water bodies in the flooded area," the ministry said on Telegram, also warning against the consumption of fish from the area.

Ukrainian authorities meanwhile continued the evacuation of tens of thousands of people as the flooding was expected to peak downstream on June 7.

Ukraine has estimated that some 42,000 people were at risk from flooding.

The Russia-installed mayor of Nova Kakhovka, Vladimir Leontyev, said "thousands of animals" at the Nizhnedniprovsky National Nature Park had been killed in the flooding, along with other domesticated and farm animals in the region.

In the Moscow-controlled part of Kherson, Russia-installed authorities imposed a state of emergency on June 7, the TASS news agency reported.

The British Ministry of Defense estimated that, since the reservoir had been filled to a record level, continued water pressure will further erode the breach and more flooding could be expected.

"The water level in the Kakhovka Reservoir was at a record high before the collapse, resulting in a particularly high volume of water inundating the area downstream," the ministry said in its daily intelligence report on June 7.

"The dam’s structure is likely to deteriorate further over the next few days, causing additional flooding," it said.

The breach of the Russian-held dam early on June 6 unleashed a massive torrent of water that flooded tens of settlements downstream and sent tens of thousands people fleeing.

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Dnieper Dam Breach Unleashes Floods In Southern Ukraine

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"Such deliberate destruction by the Russian occupiers and other structures of the hydroelectric power station is an environmental bomb of mass destruction," Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres labeled the destruction of the dam a "monumental humanitarian, economic, and ecological catastrophe" in a statement but stopped short of blaming Russia directly.

• RFE/RL

Satellite images taken before and after the destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam show the catastrophic impact of the extensive flooding caused by the collapse of the structure that spanned the Dnieper River in southern Ukraine.

Ahead of an emergency UN Security Council meeting, Guterres called it “another devastating consequence of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.”

The UN’s humanitarian agency said it was gravely concerned about the destruction of the dam and the severe humanitarian impact on hundreds of thousands of people on both sides of the front line.

UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told the Security Council's emergency meeting late on June 6 that thousands of people in southern Ukraine were facing "the loss of homes, food, safe water, and livelihoods."

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Water Rising To 'Critical' Levels, Says Ukrainian Official After Dam Break

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Oleksiy Kuleba, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, said the destruction of the dam will cause a large ecological problem, noting that more than 400 tons of lubricating oil had been stored in tanks at the Kakhovka hydropower plant.

"We cannot be sure yet what amount has already ended up in the Dnieper River, but it will be a huge problem and an ecological disaster," Kuleba told RFE/RL.

"We are also anticipating that the water level in the Kakhovka basin will drop dramatically and this will lead to a complete change of the ecological environment of the Kherson region. It is necessary to get ready for that as well," he said.

Russia denied it carried out the attack, with the Kremlin instead calling it "deliberate sabotage" by Kyiv.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu charged that Ukraine destroyed the dam to prevent Russian attacks in the Kherson region after what he alleged was a failed Ukrainian counteroffensive.

The Nova Kakhovka dam -- which is 30 meters tall and 3.2 kilometers long -- is part a vital route for transport and irrigation, as well as supplying water to Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and the Zaporizhzhya nuclear plant, which are both under Russian control.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said the power plant has enough water to cool its reactors for "several months" from a pond located above the reservoir.

With reporting by AP and Reuters

Ukrainian forces have gone on the offensive in Bakhmut, the Donetsk city that has been the epicenter of the war in eastern Ukraine, Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said on Telegram on June 7. She said Ukrainian troops advanced in different areas by as much as 1,100 meters over the past day. "The enemy in this direction went on the defensive, trying to hold occupied positions," Malyar said. Earlier, the commander of Ukraine's ground troops, Oleksandr Syrskiy, said his forces continued to advance on the northern and southern flanks of Bakhmut. Ukrainian defenders put up a stark, monthslong defense in Bakhmut. To read the original stories by RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service, click here and here.

Finland will expel nine diplomats from the Russian Embassy in Helsinki for "acting in an intelligence capacity," the Finnish president's office said on June 6. "Their actions are contrary to the Vienna convention on diplomatic relations," the president's office said in a statement, adding that it would inform the Russian ambassador of the expulsions. The decision was made at a meeting between Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and the country's ministerial committee on foreign and security policy. To read the original story by Reuters, click here.

Iranian student organizations have reported a significant wave of summonses at the University of Science and Technology in Tehran in a continued tightening of supervision of the dress code after months of unrest sparked by the death of a young woman for allegedly wearing a head scarf improperly.

The country's Student Guild Councils reported on June 5 that, during the past week, a significant number of students from the University of Science and Technology were summoned to the Disciplinary Committee, as well as at least 11 professors. The reasons cited for these summonses ranged from a refusal to comply with mandatory hijab rules to what university authorities have termed "inappropriate dress".

In addition to the summoning of students to the Disciplinary Committee, patrolling security forces have reportedly harassed students under the pretext of the dress code while they are walking on the university campus.

The Student Guild Councils said the intrusion into the lives of students has even extended to the dormitories, where curfew infractions have been cited.

In addition to students, at least 11 professors at the University of Science and Technology have also been summoned by the Faculty Disciplinary Board in recent days. They said they were summoned for signing a statement protesting against "the attacks carried out on schools and female students."

Iranian universities have become a hotbed for unrest since the death of Mahsa Amini in Tehran in September. The 22-year-old died while in police custody for an alleged violation of the country's mandatory head-scarf law.

Police have tried to shift the blame onto Amini's health, but supporters say witnesses saw her being beaten when taken into custody. Her family says she had no history of any medical issues and was in good health.

There have been clashes at universities and schools between protesters and the authorities, prompting security forces to launch a series of raids on education facilities across the country, violently arresting students, especially female students, who have defiantly taken off their head scarves, or hijabs, in protest.

According to a report by the "Committee for Following Up on the Situation of Detainees," since the beginning of the nationwide protests in September 2022, more than 720 students have been arrested, some of whom are still under arrest.

Written by Ardeshir Tayebi based on an original story in Persian by RFE/RL's Radio Farda

Iran reopened its embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on June 6, Saudi media reported, months after the two regional rivals agreed to end a diplomatic rift under a China-mediated deal. Iran and Saudi Arabia agreed in March to reestablish relations following years of hostility that has endangered stability in the Middle East and fueled regional conflicts including in Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon. The deal was struck seven years after Sunni Saudi Arabia severed relations with Shi'ite Iran following the storming of its embassy in Tehran during a dispute over the execution of a Shi'ite Muslim cleric. To read the original story by Reuters, click here.

Russian anti-war activist and anarchist Aleksei Rozhkov was deported from Kyrgyzstan in late May and is currently in pretrial detention in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg for allegedly setting the building of a military recruitment center in the town of Beryozovsky on fire in March 2022, the Zona Solidarnosti (Solidarity Zone) rights project said on June 6. Rozhkov left Russia for Kyrgyzstan in December after Russian authorities equated arson attacks targeting military recruitment centers to terrorism amid a sharp rise in such incidents after Russia launched its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

Belarusian tennis star Aryna Sabalenka says she does not want her country to be in any conflict and she does not support the war in Ukraine or its authoritarian ruler. "I don't support war, meaning I don't support Alyaksandr Lukashenka," Sabalenka told a press conference on June 6 after her quarterfinal victory against Elina Svitolina of Ukraine at the French Open. Sabalenka opted out of press conferences last week, citing mental health reasons after being grilled about Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Belarus being used as a staging ground for Russian troops. To read the original story by Reuters, click here.

Prosecutors have asked the Minsk City Court to sentence self-exiled opposition activist Vadzim Prakopyeu to 25 years in prison on multiple charges, including coordinating an attempted arson attack at the house of a pro-government lawmaker, the chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party of Belarus, Aleh Haydukevich, in June 2021.

Prosecutor Maksim Chuprys asked Judge Syarhey Khrypach on June 6 to convict Prakopyeu on 14 charges related to terrorism and the illegal possession of firearms.

Prakopyeu and two former law enforcement officers, Ihar Chamyakin and Dzyanis Khamitsevich, are being tried separately in absentia after they fled the country and whose current whereabouts are unknown.

Fifteen other defendants in the case are involved in a separate trial that started on March 6.

Also on June 6, the @MAYDAYMog human rights group said that police in the city of Barysau near Minsk had arrested noted rights defender Aleh Matskevich on unspecified charges last week.

Separately, the Belarusian Interior Ministry published a video on June 6 which shows the leader of the People's Student Chorus at the Belarusian State University, Volha Minyankova, offering an apology for her refusal to bring her chorus to parts of Ukraine's eastern Donbas region controlled by Russian troops.

It is not clear whether Minyankova's "repentance" video statement was recorded under duress, or if she is currently in custody.

Many journalists, rights activists, and representatives of democratic institutions have been jailed in Belarus since an August 2020 presidential election where Lukashenka was officially announced as the winner.

Rights activists and opposition politicians say the poll was rigged. Thousands have been detained during countrywide protests over the results and there have been credible reports of torture and ill-treatment by security forces. Several people have died during the crackdown.

Lukashenka has refused to negotiate with the opposition and many of its leaders have been arrested or forced to leave the country.

The United States, the European Union, and several other countries have refused to acknowledge Lukashenka as the winner of the vote and imposed several rounds of sanctions on him and his regime, citing election fraud and the crackdown.

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The United States has sanctioned seven individuals and six entities from Iran, China, and Hong Kong who the U.S. Treasury Department says have helped Tehran get key technology for ballistic missile development.

In a statement on June 6, the department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), accused the individuals and entities of conducting financial transactions facilitating the network to procure parts needed for missile development.

The statement said the six companies sold sensitive centrifuges, metals, and radar materials to key actors in the previously sanctioned Iranian Defense Ministry and Armed Forces Logistics (MODAFL) agency.

The sanctions come as Washington steadily increases pressure on Iran to stop expanding its missile program.

“The United States will continue to target illicit transnational procurement networks that covertly support Iran’s ballistic missile production and other military programs,” said Brian Nelson, undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.

U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller has called Iran’s development and proliferation of these missiles “a serious threat to regional and international security.”

He told reporters at a briefing late last month that the United States will continue to use a variety of tools, including sanctions, “to counter the further advancement of Iran’s ballistic missile program and its ability to proliferate missiles and related technology to others."

Included in the sanctions are Chinese companies Zhejiang Qingji and Lingoe Process Engineering. Additionally, the director of Zhejiang Qingji and an employee of the company have been personally designated for financial dealings and acting as transport for MODAFL in Iran.

Two other companies, Hong Kong Ke.Do International Trade and the Chinese based Qingdao Zhongrongtong Trade Development, which the Treasury Department said collaborated to sell tens of millions of dollars’ worth of metals for Iranian missile system development.

The Chinese based Beijing Shiny Nights Technology Development Company was also hit with sanctions for acting as a front company for MODAFL to procure electronics for Iranian end-users. The same accusation is levied against Iran’s defense attache in Beijing, Davoud Damghani.

The sanctions freeze all U.S. assets held in any entity’s possession, including U.S. dollar bank accounts at foreign institutions, and bar people in the United States from dealing with the individuals and companies.

With reporting by Reuters and AP

Jailed Kazakh journalist Duman Mukhammedkarim's father, Almaz Tilepov, has joined his son's hunger strike to demand his immediate release. Tilepov started his hunger strike on June 6 in front of a district prosecutor’s office in Almaty. Mukhammedkarim launched his hunger strike on May 28 after he was handed a 25-day jail term over a video he posted online that called on Kazakhs to defend their rights. Just two days before that, Mukhammedkarim finished serving a similar sentence over his online calls for Almaty residents to rally against the government's move to introduce visa-free entry to Kazakhstan for Chinese citizens. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Kazakh Service, click here.

The International Cycling Union (ICU) has suspended Savely Laptev, a member of Kazakhstan's Astana Qazaqstan DT cycling team, over his online support of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. Laptev, who is Russian, was suspended last week from participating in UCI's tournament. His father said on June 5 that the decision was "a misunderstanding" and claimed that his son's social network account had been hacked. The UCI ruled earlier that Russian and Belarusian riders can resume their participation in its events as neutral athletes on condition that they stay away from supporting Russia's aggression against Ukraine. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Kazakh Service, click here. https://www.azattyq.org/a/32445513.html

A Kazakh court has sentenced a woman to three years in prison for saying online that Russia should "take over North Kazakhstan and its capital, Petropavl, like it took Crimea" from Ukraine in 2014. Media reports in Petropavl said on June 6 that the woman, identified as Tatyana, was sentenced last week. The charge stemmed from the woman’s statement she made in a Chatroulette messenger chat in September 2021. In April, three members of a group called the People's Council in Petropavl were arrested on separatism charges and face up to seven years in prison if convicted. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Kazakh Service, click here.

Bulgaria's parliament on June 6 approved a coalition government led by Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov, giving the Balkan member of the EU and NATO a new government after five elections within two years.

The government has the backing of the parliament's two biggest political groups -- the center-right GERB and Continue the Change/Democratic Bulgaria (PP-DB).

Lawmakers held three separate votes, one to approve Denkov for the position of prime minister, one to establish the composition of the cabinet, and one to nominally approve each member of the cabinet.

Last week, the GERB-PP-DB coalition announced it had reached an agreement on the composition of the government.

According to the agreement, Denkov, from the PP-DB, will be premier for the first nine months and then the position will be taken over by Maria Gabriel from GERB, who until then will be deputy prime minister and foreign minister.

A total of 132 lawmakers supported the government -- all from the PP-DB coalition, all but one from GERB, and two MPs from DPS - while 69 people's representatives voted against.

The cabinet was chosen after negotiations that lasted more than two months following the fifth consecutive parliamentary elections on April 2, in which former Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's GERB came first but it failed to gather support to form a one-party government.

According to the agreement, the coalition government will have a pro-European Union agenda, with obtaining membership in the Schengen passport-free area and the euro monetary union as top priorities along with fighting Russian influence in Bulgaria's security sector.

Bulgaria has been governed mainly by caretaker governments appointed by President Rumen Radev since public anger over years of corruption boiled over into massive protests in 2020. In February, Radev dissolved parliament and announced the April 2 vote.

Last year in June, the pro-Western government of Prime Minister Kiril Petkov fell after a no-confidence vote in parliament after only six months in power.

Petkov and his fragile coalition took over in December 2021 following eight months of political impasse and two interim administrations after protests against high-level corruption ended the decade-long rule of Borisov -- the head of GERB.

The political crisis has prompted Bulgaria to postpone adopting the euro by one year to 2025. In December, Austrian and Dutch opposition blocked Bulgaria and neighboring Romania from being admitted in the Schengen area.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that Russian authorities failed to adequately investigate the poisoning in 2020 of Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny, thus violating his right to life and a proper investigation under the European Convention of Human Rights.

Navalny fell violently ill during a flight in Siberia in August 2020 and was then urgently flown to Germany where he was treated and survived what Western laboratories later established had been an attempted poisoning with a Novichok nerve agent.

The findings led the European Union to impose sanctions on six Russian officials and a state research institute.

Russian doctors claimed that tests performed in their laboratories before Navalny was flown to Germany had found no trace of a poisonous substance in his blood and refused to open a criminal investigation into the incident.

Navalny has blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for his poisoning. The Kremlin has denied any involvement.

The ECHR said in its June 6 ruling that it "found in particular that the inquiry conducted by the Russian authorities had not been open to scrutiny and had made no allowance for the victim’s right to participate in the proceedings."

The Russian authorities' measures "had not been capable of leading to the establishment of the relevant facts and the identification and, if appropriate, punishment of those responsible," the ruling said, adding, that "it therefore could not be considered adequate."

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5 Things To Know About Russian Opposition Leader Aleksei Navalny

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Navalny recovered and voluntarily returned to Russia in 2021, where he was arrested upon arrival and sent to prison for charges that he and his supporters say are politically motivated.

"As evidence obtained with the assistance of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) indicated that Mr Navalniy had been poisoned with a chemical nerve agent from the [internationally banned] Novichok group, Russia, as a party to the Chemical Weapons Convention, had been under an obligation to open a criminal investigation into any activities breaching the prohibition of chemical weapons," the ECHR said in its ruling.

The EHCR ordered the Russian state to pay Navalny 40,000 euros ($42,800) in damages.

Putin in June last year signed a law under which Russia will not follow ECHR's rulings made after March 15, 2022.

However, since Russia was a member of the Court and the Council of Europe at the time of the alleged poisoning, the judgment must be enforced, an ECHR spokeswoman told Reuters.

With reporting by Reuters

A former member of Iran's police force who resigned in protest against the suppression of demonstrators, is said to have died under what colleagues say were suspicious circumstances.

Medical officials in the southwestern Iranian province of Ilam confirmed the death of Mansureh Sagvand, a law student from Abadan who had previously resigned from her collaboration with the Law Enforcement Force.

The official news agency IRNA quoted Seydnour Alimoradi, the head of the pre-hospital emergency department of Ilam University, as saying the cause of Sagvand's death was "cardiac and respiratory arrest".

But friends of Sagvand said they doubted the official report.

Issa Baziar, a civil activist from Abadan living abroad, revealed on his Twitter page that Sagvand, died after being released from detention.

Meanwhile, Sagvand herself had reported a death threat on her Instagram account just hours before she perished, writing: "They scare us with death, as if we are alive. Forever and ever, my life is a sacrifice for the homeland. Long live Iran."

This incident follows numerous reports of "suspicious deaths" during recent nationwide protests sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini while in police custody for a dress-code offense last September.

The Twitter account "Voice of Shahrivar," which covers protest news, noted that Sagvand was formerly a member of the Law Enforcement Force and that she cut off cooperation with this entity during the recent nationwide protests. She had been in custody for a while, it said, without giving a specific time period.

An Instagram account under the name "Mansoreh Sagvand" featured a picture of her in the uniform of women working in the Law Enforcement Force.

"I am Mansureh Sagvand from Lorestan, I used to work in the honorary police of the Law Enforcement Force of Khorramabad. From now on, I will not have any cooperation with the armed forces and I will proudly stay with my compatriots," the caption read.

Following widespread reactions among Iranian social network users regarding the suspicious death of Sagvand, IRNA dismissed the speculation as "baseless" and attributed the rumors to "opposition media."

Written by Ardeshir Tayebi based on an original story in Persian by RFE/RL's Radio Farda

Students at the Turkmen Cultural Institute in Ashgabat have been forced by their teachers to go to theaters at least once a week. Some students told RFE/RL that they have been forced to buy tickets to the theaters distributed by their teachers. According to the students, they have neither the money to buy the tickets that cost between 10-30 manats ($2.8-$8.5) nor the time. The administration of the Cultural Institute was not available for immediate comment. Theaters, schools, and other public institutions are under the government's full supervision in the tightly controlled former Soviet republic. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Turkmen Service, click here.