US President Barack Obama has ordered unprecedented sanctions against senior Iranian officials for “sustained and severe violations of human rights”.

The eight men include the head of the Revolutionary Guards, a former interior minister and the prosecutor general.

The treasury department said they would face a travel ban and asset freeze.

  Executions and Stoning Since last year’s disputed Presidential election, the Iranian government has instituted a hyped-up campaign of executions, virtually all of which have followed unfair trials. Amnesty International estimates that Iran executed 388 people in 2009, 112 of them in the two months following the election. In 2005, when Ahmadinejad took office, Iran [...]

In spite of massive repression, the freedom movement in Iran is still very much alive and more than ever in need of international support.