Violence, poverty and abuse led girl, 16, to gallows
Iran Focus: Neka (northern Iran), Aug 31 The orphaned 16-year-old girl hanged in front of residents in this town close to the Caspian Sea on August 15 suffered years of brutal violence, exploitation and torture in the hands of relatives, local officials and plain strangers, and in a country where girls are the most vulnerable members of society, she had no one to go to for help.
The tragic picture emerges from dozens of interviews conducted by an Iran Focus correspondent with Atefeh Rajabis classmates, friends, relatives and neighbors in this humid, overcrowded industrial town that sits on a busy highway linking Tehran with the north of the country.
Iran Focus: Iran has arrested dozens of spies including several who leaked the Islamic Republics nuclear secrets, Minister of Intelligence and Security Ali Younessi said on Tuesday.
Iran Focus: China today for the first time admitted to having cooperated with the Tehran regime on its nuclear program.
Iran Focus: Paris, Sep. 1 - Iran has announced that it will convert tons of raw uranium, yellow cake into Uranium hexafluoride, used to produce enriched uranium, according to a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Uranium hexafluoride is spun in centrifuges to produce enriched uranium. Highly enriched uranium is used for making nuclear weapons.
Iran Focus: Tehran - A man was hanged in public in the city of Arak, (central Iran) on Sunday, August 29.
Iran Focus: Paris - Iran on Wednesday revised upwards to 31,000 from an earlier estimate of 26,000 the number of people killed in a devastating tremor in the southern Iranian city of Bam last December.
Iran Focus: Brussels, Sep. 3 - As he arrived in the Netherlands to attend a meeting of the EU three today, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the EU was concerned over Iran ignoring its nuclear obligations. We have all been perplexed and saddened that the Iranian government has not completed all the tasks it said it would, Straw noted. 
Iran Focus: Tehran, Sep. 4 In his Friday prayer sermon in Tehran yesterday, Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani said Iran would vigorously continue its pursuit for nuclear capabilities. He insisted that Tehran would never abandon its quest regardless of what the international community might think. 
Iran Focus: Iran will be sending its chief national security official, Hassan Rowhani to The Hague on Monday. The Netherlands is the current holder of the rotating EU Presidency.
Radio Farda: Sep. 3 - A court in Mashhad on Thursday sentenced two young sisters to lashes, suspended jail terms and fine for not adhering to proper Islamic dress code. Vice squads had arrested the two as a part of a nationwide enforcement campaign. 
AFP: Disappointed European leaders seem to be torn between pursuing efforts to engage Iran and calls for a harder line over Tehran's nuclear aims, to bring them closer to the US stance.
TORONTO STAR: Payam lives alone and never talks about the past. The 46-year-old Iranian with gentle brown eyes and a quiet smile is haunted by the smell of fear and death. Now working as an engineer in England, he walks with special soles in his shoes because his feet have been damaged by torture. 
Reuters: VALKENBURG, the Netherlands -- Major European powers were discussing yesterday whether to take Iran to the UN Security Council amid frustration at its failure to cooperate fully with UN efforts to make sure it is not secretly trying to develop atomic weapons. 
Newsweek - Sep. 6: Six months ago, Abu Sajjad was rolling in cash. His cloth shop is right in front of the Imam Ali shrine, a great location to attract pilgrims visiting this holiest of Shiite sanctuaries. The faithful who flocked into Najaf from Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan bought hundreds of yards of fabric to take home as souvenirs. Now Abu Sajjad looks at his storefront, riddled with bullets and shrapnel, and shakes his head. "Why did this happen?" he asks. 
AP: The European Union said Friday that Iran's nuclear program has cast a shadow over its relations with Europe, which has been at pains to forge closer trade and other ties in recent years.
Reuters: About 500 hardline vigilantes have taken to the streets of Tehran, demanding authorities crack down on women who wear colourful headscarves and figure-hugging coats which they denounce as "prostitution".
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