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On Friday afternoon, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to bar refugees and virtually everyone else from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya from traveling to the United States. Beyond a violation of human rights that flies in the face of the Constitution, the move ultimately shuts down artistic conversations that musicians, filmmakers and other creatives have been holding across the continents for years.

Among those directly affected by Trump's ill-conceived executive order is Ashkan Kooshanejad, a 31-year-old producer who records wiry, crowded, and often quite beautiful electronic music as Ash Koosha. His most recent album, last year's I AKA I, released by art-dance stalwart Ninja Tune, was acclaimed by Pitchfork, The Wire, XLR8R and Resident Advisor among others. Rolling Stone named him an "Artist You Need to Know" last February, adding that his album was "uncompromising, dizzying and dense." He played esteemed electronic festival Mutek and did a "virtual reality" set for the Boiler Room. Still, Ash may be a lot better known in 2017 if he hadn't been put through the "extreme-vetting" ringer while attempting to promote his album's existence.

Rolling Stone caught up with Koosha, to talk about the morass the accomplished electronic artist now finds himself in.

Why are you so eager to talk about Donald Trump's seven-country ban on immigrants and visitors?Growing up in Iran, we spent our entire lives caught in the middle of a conflict. Everyone was discriminated against for no reason other than that we were Iranian. But this is time it's worse, because it affects refugees, who are in immediate danger, as well as scholars, technology executives and everyone else. It's not a new thing for us. The difference this time is that I'm really fed up. It's a straight-on slap in the face. I want to speak out because it's not just about me anymore; everyone is involved. People have to realize that the entire population of a country like Iran isn't involved with terrorism or radical Islam or whatever they're afraid of.

As an Iranian artist, you're already under siege in your home country. As one example, can you explain why were you arrested in 2007?We grew up in post-revolutionary Iran where, after nearly 40 years, there's still a clash of ideas about tradition versus modernizing, closed doors versus globalization, and so on. I grew up wanting to make things music, film, and technology but we were never allowed to express ourselves and were banned from performing. So our band, Font, decided to turn a wedding garden into a venue and perform peacefully in the suburbs. The government raided the gig, which was portrayed on TV as a "Satanist" concert, and arrested us. My grandma asked me if I was a Satanist and all I could say was, "No, no, no! We're just a bunch of punks trying to play guitar onstage!"

When did you know you had to leave Iran?We were serious people who wanted to create, but we were disconnected from the global culture industry. We made a film called No One Knows About Persian Cats as a way to seize the means of creation without censorship. But the film caused more problems for us, and that's how I ended up in the U.K. in 2010. They pushed me out of Iran and I was forced to start another life. I felt isolated in the U.K. because I wasn't part of the network of artists that develops in school and universities. We were total outsiders.

How did you keep going?A small group of us in London, Paris, and the U.S. started working together. But whenever I crossed the border between, say, England and France, I always had this feeling, even though my work was appreciated, that I was going to have trouble. That feeling was always there, and now it's been heightened. The U.S. says I'm probably a terrorist because I'm from Iran so I have to prove I'm not a terrorist.

What does it take to get a 01-B visa "for an Alien of Extraordinary Ability" to perform in the United States?I was accepted as a refugee in the U.K., and now I have permanent-resident status. The problem, however, is that you always carry your Iranian nationality with you. So even though the visa application process is the same for all U.K. artists, the Obama administration enacted an additional administrative process where they check deeply into your past. And it takes an additional two months, which caused my 2016 tour to be canceled even though we applied four months in advance. Bookers had to cancel our shows, which damaged my promotion for I AKA I. I wouldn't necessarily call myself a "victim," though, because I'm in a fucking great situation compared to all the refugees dying in Syria.

And your second 01-B visa application was approved?Yes, but I spent $3,000 that went right down the drain with the first application. The second one cost $1,500 for a fast-track visa. I wasn't checked at the border when I arrived in the US. Well, I wasn't questioned officially but the officer asked me, "How did you get this visa as an Iranian?" Which was kind of insulting. "Are you famous or something?"

"I don't know," I said. "Google me." You're automatically problematic if you're Iranian. Conservative Member of Parliament Nadhim Zahawi, who represents Stratford-upon-Avon, is now banned. A Syrian refugee is banned. And I'm banned. We're in deep trouble on a global scale.

I understand you're not even Muslim. How do you prove that to an American official?Please tell me how [laughs]. I'm an atheist, which is probably a bigger problem for me. I wouldn't even have a problem talking with someone about my past, because I like talking. The problem is that this goes way beyond that. This blanket order bans anyone who's remotely Iranian.

With the possible exception of "Shah" on I AKA I, your work doesn't seem particularly political. Do you see that changing?I don't directly put politics in my work. It's based on research and progress in the media. The social message is embedded in the work as expression rather than directly.

How do you see all this playing out?I think they'll sort it out within the next 90 days and U.K. citizens will be OK. And I'll be a U.K. citizen in two or three months. But agents have stopped booking me for shows in the U.S. They can't risk it. They'll stop booking everyone from Iran. I'm on hold now and can't say for sure what will happen. All I know is that it will cause a lot of problems for everyone, but especially businesses, universities and the cultural sector.

How frustrated are you?I'm frustrated but I'm not going to let this affect me. I'm probably going to do a holographic show where I can be present by augmented-reality tech. Either that or I'm going to have to start a Three Doors Down cover band [laughs].

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Read the original post:
Ash Koosha: Acclaimed Iranian Musician on Being Newly Banned From US - RollingStone.com

The executive director of USA Wrestling said Monday that the American team still plans to compete next month in Iran, one of seven Muslim-majority countries whose citizens were temporarily banned from the U.S. by an executive order from President Donald Trump.

USA Wrestlings Rich Bender told The Associated Press that the Americans have every intention of travelling to Kermanshah for the mens freestyle World Cup on Feb. 16-17. Bender said the U.S. federation been given assurances from the Iranians that special attention is being given to their applications.

The scheduled trip to Iran will be the first major test for U.S. athletes travelling to one of the seven nations affected by Trumps 90-day ban, issued last week.

Were going to respect the laws and orders of those in leadership positions in government and figure out how to embrace those and work with them to secure proper documentation for athletes to come here and us to go there, Bender said.

Irans senior vice-president Ishaq Jahangiri, through the official IRNA news agency, said Monday that Trumps executive order was illegal, inhumane and against human rights.

The U.S. and Iran two of the worlds top wrestling countries have long found common ground on the mat. The U.S. wrestling team was the first American sports team to compete in Iran in nearly 20 years back in 1998, and the Iranian team has competed in the U.S. 16 times since the 1990s.

Wrestling has shown a long, rich history of transcending politics and participating despite governmental disagreements, Bender said. Thats the beauty of sport and the Olympic movement. Its about competition, not politics.

USA Wrestling plans to send 13 wrestlers, two coaches, a referee, a medical staff member, a videographer and other official delegates to Kermanshah, which is in western Iran some 310 miles southwest of Tehran.

The annual World Cups in each discipline are among the most prestigious tournaments in the world. Iran will also host the Greco-Roman World Cup in Tehran in March.

Continued here:
US wrestlers plan to travel to Iran despite Trump's ban - The Globe and Mail

Marzieh Moosavizadeh and her grandson follow a routine when she visits almost every year from Iran.

The 75-year-old, who travels in a wheelchair and speaks little English, struggles to find direct flights to Phoenix, where he and his family live. So they meet in Los Angeles and he escorts her on the last leg of her trip.

This time was different.

Moosavizadeh landed at Los Angeles International Airport a day after President Trump signed an executive order banning citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iran, from entering the United States.

Moosavizadehs plans to catch her last flight were upended when she said shewas held at LAX for nine hours with dozens ofother passengers who, like her, had no idea whether they would be released or sent back to their native country.

Sitting there for eight hours, for somebody who has arthritis, is very, very hard,Moosavizadeh saidwhile recounting her detention in an interview with The Times in Persian while her son translated by phone. Please, tell Mr. Trump when they make these kind of decisions, think it all the way through.

For Moosavizadeh, who her grandson said hasheld a green card since 1997, the anxiety set in when she landed shortly after 4 p.m. on Saturday.

Customs officers scanned her passport, held it up next to her head and told her to wait. Then, they ushered her to a room where she said a couple dozen passengers Iranians, Africans and Asians were being held.

She sat there for two hours before officers led her, along with a handful of others passengers from her flight, to another room filled with travelers from Iran.Shespent the next several hours there.

At about 6 p.m., Moosavizadehs wheelchair attendant offered her a cellphone to call her grandson.

She told him to go eat and rest she heard shed be held for a few more hours. He told her to stay calm, he wasnt going anywhere.

Every hour or so, Moosavizadeh said, officers would come by to escort passengers to the bathroom or drop off 8-ounce water bottles. The English-speakers implored them for answers.

Its out of our hands, the officers said. Their fate was up to their superiors.

Passengers were afraid to talk to one another, Moosavizadeh said. No one knew whether theyd be released or sent back to Iran.

Most of them, they thought they were going to get deported, she said, through her son.

At one point, she was taken elsewhere for questioning. Customs officers asked her when she last visited the U.S., who she lives with in Iran and where she gets her income.

When she returned, she snacked on almonds shed packed in her purse.

Thank God I put them in my purse, otherwise I didnt have anything on me, she said.

Meanwhile, in Phoenix, her sons frantically refreshed news articles and peppered her grandson, Siavosh Naji-Talakar, with questions he couldnt answer. Huddled amongthrongs of boisterous protesters demanding the detainees be released,Naji-Talakar could do little but wait.

Over and over, they chanted, Let them in! They said theywouldnt leave otherwise.

Some offered Naji-Talakar food and a couch for the night, others money for a hotel room.

Nearby, the detainees heard the cries, faintly. They had no idea, though, if those who had gathered were there to support or decry them. A customs officer, Moosavizadeh said, told the group that it wasnt safe for them to let them go.

Eventually, officers began calling passengers one by one. Detainees were taken away, alone or in pairs, while those left behind wondered if they were being released or deported.

We all thought they were going to give us hard time first and then send us back, Moosavizadeh said.

She added that she wants Trump to know that Muslims condemn Islamic State.

They might be Muslim, but theyre not a part of us, she said. We are all brothers and sisters and we dont believe in their values at all.

Moosavizadehs name was among the last ones called, at about 1 a.m.

Finally, she said, she was released from prison.

When she spotted her grandson in the crowd, she felt like she was flying.

He saw her too,and bolted.

I pushed people out of the way, I was like, Get out of my way, Naji-Talakar said. I ran up to her and gave a big old hug.

Thats when the cheering and chanting started again.

Over and over, We got grandma!

alene.tchekmedyian@latimes.com

Twitter: @alenetchek

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View post:
75-year-old grandmother from Iran tells the story of her detention at LAX - Los Angeles Times

Vienna was always the transit point for people facing religious persecution in Iran who wanted to reach the U.S. Now, hundreds have been told to go back to their tormentors.

BERLIN, GermanyMaybe, just maybe, President Donald Trump will feel something akin to sadness to know that his new border rules prompted Austria to cancel three hundred transit visas, which had been intended for Iranian Christians, Jews and Bahai trying to flee religious persecution at home.

For decades, Austria has been acting as the go-between for refugees from Iran who have a prospects of admittance to the United States (which doesnt have an embassy in Tehran). The program began originally as an endeavor by the late U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg to help Jews and Evangelical Christians out of the Soviet Union, but developed into a national program focused on Iran, which also makes other religious minorities in Iran eligible for refugee status, most notably the much-persecuted Baha'is.

This week, around 300 hopeful applicants were getting ready to travel from Iran to Austria with documents that would allow them to stay there for about six months. The stay itself hardly rates raves, given there is little to do but trudge through the asylum application process with help from a local NGO, go to the U.S. embassy for interviews, and bite ones nails while waiting for official approval from the United States come summertime. It was a nerve-wrecking experiencebut worth it.

No longer, though. U.S. authorities told us that the onward trip for people to the USA, who received visas from Austrian authorities as part of the program, would be put on hold for now, Thomas Schnll, the Austrian Foreign Ministry spokesman, told the Associated Press. The message reportedly arrived several days before Trump signed the decree on Friday.

The Foreign Ministry in Vienna has been trying to contact the 300 applicants to inform them that they cant come to Austria after all. But so far, theyve only reached 100 people. We dont know many of the remaining 200 are already on the move from Iran to Austria. The Foreign Ministry in Vienna has been spending the weekend searching through its records for airline bookings in order to track down these remaining applicants and put a last-minute stop to their quest for refuge.

Three Iranians (one elderly couple and one young woman) were left stranded at the airport in Vienna on Saturday, despite having valid travel documents and tickets for flights to the U.S. The woman took a flight back to Iran, while the elderly couple spent the night in Vienna.

Meanwhile, Schnll has said it is legally impossible for Austria to accept the Iranian asylum seekers in the USAs stead. And the small countrys tough line doesnt just come as a response to Washingtons latest. Austria, strained by 2015s influx of refugees, has been introducing caps and stricter security measures ever since. It was never interested in being more than a short-term transit point for the Iranians, and it certainly isnt now.

And this was made coldly clear in a State Department email on Tuesday: Any previously approved applicant who now tries to enter Austria anyway will be blocked permanently.

As for the estimated 30 Iranian applicants who are already in Austria on a short-term visa, their fate is uncertain. In prior years, The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS, a processing centre in Vienna) told refugees who got rejected in Austria not to go back to Iranbecause the discrimination and harassment that forced them to leave in the first place was likely to get even worse upon their return.

So where else can they go? By way of Austria, Iranian Jews can travel to Israel, but that is not an option for other religious minorities. (And it is very difficult to immigrate to Israel from Iran directly).

We dont know yet how Trumps hasty orders will shake out once the courts are done with him, and how nations that have acted as points of transit for the United States so far will reshape their own border policies accordingly. Austrias government, like several other European countries, hasnt even made a statement condemning Trumps actions yet. (German Chancellor Angela Merkel, despite a polite phone call with Trump, finally had her spokesman come out Sunday and denounce Trumps unjustifiable general suspicion against people of a certain origin or a certain religion).

In the past, there have been several discussions about curbing the Iranian Lautenberg immigration program, which, according the HIAS, eases the burden of proof for members of historically persecuted groups. Critics have argued that many other refugees would benefit from a move to the United States more than religious minorities in Iran.

But for now, these discussions are finished, because US officials have simply suspended the program. If, when and on what terms it will begin again? No one knows.

If this is what happens to the refugees that Trump supposedly favors, one must wonder what on earth can we expect to happen to all the immigrants that he so obviously loathes?

Link:
Iranian Jews, Christians, and Bahai Stuck in Iran - Daily Beast

A Long Island PhD student from Iran who was detained at JFK Airport for 24 hours after President Trumps executive order instituting extreme vetting of Muslims was finally released Sunday.

A visibly relieved Vahideh Rasekhi hugged friends as she was released. She had arrived at the airport Saturday from Iran, where she had been visiting family.

Its so embarrassing. I feel happy to be here, and it feels great, the Stony Brook University student said.

Rasekshi had twice been placed on flights headed back to Iran on Saturday but was then rescued at the last minute when a federal judge issued an emergency ruling that halted Trumps order. Another man who made it through security detailed his 12-hour ordeal.

The 31-year-old, who declined to give his name, was born in Iran but has lived in Austin, Texas, for the past nine years.

He had been there visiting family but jumped on a plane to return to the States once he learned of the executive order, saying he was in shock.

When his plane landed at JFK, he was pulled aside with four others but was given no reasoning.

[The agents] brought us in and werent friendly, he said. They were interviewing me telling me Id be out in 5 minutes and asked me the same questions.

The 31-year-old had been detained alongside a man visiting his daughter, one student with a visa and an elderly Sudanese woman in a wheelchair.

He said he was asked the same questions by three different officers: What is your name? What is your address? What you were doing in Iran? Why did you come back to the United States?

The man said he will return to Austin but wont ever travel outside the U.S. until hes ready to leave permanently.

Mr. President, he said in conclusion, good job for not making America great.

View post:
Iranian PhD student released after detainment at JFK - New York Post