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Iran Football Legend Daei Targeted by ‘Threats’ after Backing Protests 

Iranian football legend Ali Daei. (AFP)
Iranian football legend Ali Daei. (AFP)
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Iran Football Legend Daei Targeted by ‘Threats’ after Backing Protests 

Iranian football legend Ali Daei. (AFP)
Iranian football legend Ali Daei. (AFP)

Iranian football legend Ali Daei on Monday said he had been targeted by threats after backing ongoing protests in Iran triggered by the death of Mahsa Amini.  

Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin, died on September 16, three days after her arrest by the notorious morality police while visiting Tehran with her younger brother.  

Daei, whose 109 goals at international level was long unsurpassed until he was overtaken by Cristiano Ronaldo, played in Iran's legendary 1998 2-1 World Cup victory against the United States. 

He decided not be go to the World Cup in Qatar due to the Iranian authorities' deadly crackdown on the protests.  

"I have received numerous threats against myself and my family in recent months and days from some organizations, medias and unknown individuals," Daei said in a statement on Instagram.  

"I was taught humanity, honor, patriotism and freedom.... What do you want to achieve with such threats?" he added.  

In the post, Daei also called for the "unconditional release" of prisoners arrested in the crackdown on the protests in Iran.  

Daei earlier this month said he would not be travelling to Qatar for the World Cup, despite having an invitation from the organizers, saying he wanted to be "with my compatriots and express sympathy with all those who have lost loved ones" in the ongoing crackdown.  

His comments come as Iran prepares to face the United States on Tuesday, in a repeat of the 1998 showdown, with Team Melli seeking to reach the final stages of a World Cup for the first time in its history.  

There has been intense scrutiny on football as the protests continue in Iran, posing the biggest challenge to the regime since the 1979 revolution.  

Daei himself reportedly had his passport confiscated when returning to Iran in the early phase of the protests but subsequently had it returned.  

Prominent Iranian footballer of Kurdish origin Voria Ghafouri, who has been outspoken in his support of the protests, was arrested last week.  

Iranian media reports said he had been released on bail. But Norway-based Kurdish rights group Hengaw denied this and said he had been transferred from the west of Iran to jail in Tehran. 

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7 Killed by Russian Attacks as Moscow Pushes Ahead in Ukraine's East

Ukrainian rescuers work at the site of a missile strike on a private building in Cherkaska Lozova, Kharkiv region, northeastern Ukraine, 31 August 2024, amid the Russian invasion. EPA/SERGEY KOZLOV
Ukrainian rescuers work at the site of a missile strike on a private building in Cherkaska Lozova, Kharkiv region, northeastern Ukraine, 31 August 2024, amid the Russian invasion. EPA/SERGEY KOZLOV
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7 Killed by Russian Attacks as Moscow Pushes Ahead in Ukraine's East

Ukrainian rescuers work at the site of a missile strike on a private building in Cherkaska Lozova, Kharkiv region, northeastern Ukraine, 31 August 2024, amid the Russian invasion. EPA/SERGEY KOZLOV
Ukrainian rescuers work at the site of a missile strike on a private building in Cherkaska Lozova, Kharkiv region, northeastern Ukraine, 31 August 2024, amid the Russian invasion. EPA/SERGEY KOZLOV

Russian shelling in the town of Chasiv Yar on Saturday killed five people, as Moscow’s troops pushed ahead in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.
The attack struck a high-rise building and a private home, said regional Gov. Vadym Filaskhin, who said the victims were men aged 24 to 38. He urged the last remaining residents to leave the front-line town, which had a pre-war population of 12,000.
“Normal life has been impossible in Chasiv Yar for more than two years,” Filaskhin wrote on social media. “Do not become a Russian target — evacuate.” A further two people were killed by Russian shelling in the Kharkiv region. One victim was pulled from the rubble of a house in the village of Cherkaska Lozova, said Gov. Oleh Syniehubov, while a second woman died of her wounds while being transported to a hospital.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Ministry of Defense said it captured the town of Pivnichne, also in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The Associated Press could not independently verify the claim.
Russian forces have been driving deeper into the partly occupied eastern region, the total capture of which is one of the Kremlin’s primary ambitions. Russia’s army is closing in on Pokrovsk, a critical logistics hub for the Ukrainian defense in the area.
At the same time, Ukraine has sent its forces into Russia’s Kursk region in recent weeks in the largest incursion onto Russian soil since World War II. The move is partly an effort to force Russia to draw troops away from the Donetsk front.
Elsewhere, the number of wounded following a Russian attack on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Friday continued to rise.
Six people were killed, including a 14-year-old girl, when glide bombs struck five locations across the city, said regional Gov. Oleh Syniehubov. Writing on social media Saturday, he said that the number of injured had risen from 47 to 96.
Syniehubov also confirmed that the 12-story apartment block that was hit by one bomb strike, setting the building ablaze and trapping at least one person on an upper floor, would be partly demolished.
Ukrainian officials have previously pointed to the Kharkiv strikes as further evidence that Western partners should scrap restrictions on what the Ukrainian military can target with donated weapons.
In an interview with CNN on Friday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said that Kyiv had presented Washington with a list of potential long-range targets within Russia for its approval. “I hope we were heard,” he said.
He also denied speculation that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ’s decision to dismiss the commander of the country’s air force Friday was directly linked to the destruction of an F-16 warplane that Ukraine received from its Western partners four days earlier.
The order to dismiss Lt. Gen. Mykola Oleshchuk was published on the presidential website minutes before an address which saw Zelenskyy stress the need to “take care of all our soldiers.”
“This is two separate issues,” said Umerov. “At this stage, I would not connect them.”
The number of injured also continued to rise in the Russian border region of Belgorod, where five people were killed Friday by Ukrainian shelling, said Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov. He said Sunday that 46 people had been injured, of whom 37 were in the hospital, including seven children. Writing on social media, Gladkov also said that two others had been injured in Ukrainian shelling across the region.