No food, no water, no medicine, and the greater risk of extrajudicial torture & executions. This is the reality for #wrongfullyimprisoned Dr. Ahmadreza Djalali in #Iran’s Evin Prison. @ruchikumar.com reports on the increasingly dire conditions for Dr. Djalali in @foreignpolicy.com:
Today, Dr Djalali is just one of thousands of political prisoners at risk in Iran, both from US-Israeli airstrikes and from a vengeful Iranian regime.
Through broken phone calls, short texts, and letters smuggled out of prisons, activists are piecing together situation developing in prisons in Iran
Dr Ahmadreza Djalali, Swedish-Iranian scientist, was arrested in 2016 during a visit to Iran. On Mar3, he spoke to his wife from inside Evin Prison as bombs fell on Tehran. “He told me they hear explosions closeby but gates to their wards are locked shut,”she said
foreignpolicy.com/2026/03/16/i...
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The Iran conflict has a strong element of cyber warfare, which predates recent events (investigation on that out soon). But, more worryingly, as internet goes down again, activists are concerned from recent experience of what it means for civilians, those in opposition.
www.wired.me/story/hacked...
So unknown anti-regime actors hacked into a prayer app used by over 5 million & sent messages of “surrender” minutes after US/Israel strikes began
www.wired.me/story/hacked...
An article I recently worked on, on Iran's digital censorship and surveillance, came out this morning. And then Israel/US struck Iran, and everything went offline again.
But if you have a moment, you can read here how Iran controls a nation's presence in digital spaces
www.wired.me/story/irans-...
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The relentless noise of sirens and Russian drones is a deliberate, psychological warfare strategy, @ruchikumar.com reports from Ukraine. newlinesmag.com/spotlight/ho...
“There was really nowhere we could go. The explosions were happening all around us.”
What was supposed to be a short delivery of cargo turned into a months-long nightmare. They were eventually rescued and repatriated thanks to efforts of @itfglobalunion.bsky.social but thousands remain abandoned
Video footage from ship’s deck that night, shared with @theguardian.com shows explosions and large flames close to the vessel. Sounds of prayers in multiple languages can be heard in some clips, punctuated by loud explosion.
www.theguardian.com/global-devel...
The relentless noise of sirens and Russian drones is a deliberate psychological warfare strategy. @ruchikumar.com spoke to over 40 Ukrainian civilians about such trauma, which is now being dubbed “drone-induced anxiety,”
Streets of Izium in the Kharkiv region are covered in anti-drone nets.
How quickly our reality changes. Only a few years ago, the idea that we would need to cover our streets to survive the russian 'human safari' seemed absurd. Now it’s our life...
🎥: place-kharkiv (tg)
Adults, too, report a profound, chronic exhaustion… said the greatest stress comes not from the sound but from the “uncertainty — whether it would strike or fly past.”
Read the full article on drone induced anxieties on @newlinesmag.bsky.social
newlinesmag.com/spotlight/ho...
Olena Valentynivna Kozina, a 39-year-old economist, described the sound of a Shahed drone, “the terrible buzzing of their engines,” a sound that brings “the greatest fear and panic … this feeling of impending mortal danger.”
newlinesmag.com/spotlight/ho...
“As Russia’s invasion of its southern neighbor grinds on, with no clear end in sight, the noise of war has become an inescapable backdrop to daily life, a soundscape of sirens, drones and explosions.” | @ruchikumar.com
This is why frontline towns and cities in Ukraine cover roads with nets.
This is a russian lancet drone struck one of those nets. It very likely saved someone’s life.
On nights of attacks, the buzzing of a drone cuts through darkness. “If the sound gets louder, it’s closer, but then starts to fade and you feel momentary relief,” Ruzhenkova said.
But a drone that has passed is a terrible redirection, still flying toward her 3 granddaughters who live nearby.
Every Ukrainian is now an involuntary sound engineer, acutely sensitive to ambient noise, mentally calculating threats from high-pitched buzz or faint whistle.
In interviews with over 40 Ukrainians I’ve attempted to understand the psychological toll of drone sounds w/ @newlinesmag.bsky.social
NEW: The relentless noise of sirens and Russian drones is a deliberate, psychological warfare strategy, @ruchikumar.com reports from Ukraine, for @newlinesmag.bsky.social newlinesmag.com/spotlight/ho...
“In four years of relentless war, the psychological toll of these sounds is the latest, most insidious weapon. It is a kind of sonic warfare.” | @ruchikumar.com
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Iranians are literally out there dying in thousands for what they believe in. And yet, our anti-imperialist political pundits keep saying we should listen to the “real” Iranian voices, while shutting down Iranian dissidents as “foreign backed”. Anti-imperialism is nothing more than a fetish!
And somehow using that simplistic view to define and declare (thank you social media) what they feel Iran deserves, often talking over Iranian voices, dismissing them as “western/US/Israel backed”.
I’ve seen it before; in Afghanistan, in Ukraine, and even in India.
Perhaps what’s been most frustrating watching the commentary on #IranProtests from outside Iran has been how people seem to view the country and its people from within a single lens of their choosing instead of the diverse, complex civilisation they are.
💥 Russia has fired a ballistic missile from occupied Crimea at Dnipro, with local outlets reporting an explosion in the city.
“The Iranian lion has awoken,” this Georgian protest banner says.
Day 410 of #GeorgiaProtests
📷 MOSE
