Month: November 2013

Major carmakers and parts suppliers showed up in Tehran on Saturday to assess the Iranian market’s “considerable potential,” just one week after Iran’s historic nuclear agreement with world powers. The International Conference of the Automotive Industry, the first such event in Iran, has brought together more than 150 companies from around the globe, according to organisers. The key industry has been battered for more than a year by Western sanctions on Iran over its nuclear programme. Iran and world powers reached an interim deal last week in Geneva, with Tehran agreeing to partially roll back its nuclear work in exchange for limited sanctions relief, including measures imposed on the car industry.

A court in the Egyptian city of Alexandria is to hear an appeal on December 7 from 14 Islamist women protesters sentenced to 11 years in jail, their lawyer said Saturday. Ayman Dali told AFP that an appeal by seven other girls, all under the age of 18 and part of the same case, will also be heard that day by a separate court for juveniles. On Wednesday, an Egyptian court in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria sentenced the women who it said were members of the Muslim Brotherhood movement to 11 years in jail. The verdicts triggered an outcry from activists and rights groups, with some calling on Egypt’s interim president Adly Mansour to pardon them.