Moscow seems to be undoing the power of economic sanctions against Iran – A comedian accused of promoting anti-Semitism loses again – Gruesome video might have shocked Brazil out of its blindness to its horribly violence prisons – A significant resignation might put an African trouble-spot back on the road to peace.

Russia and Iran on the verge of an oil-for-goods deal that could considerably weaken US led economic sanctions which led Tehran to accept the nuclear deal with the rest of the world.  Russia would get up to 500,000 barrels a day, a substantial increase in Iranian oil exports.  In exchange, Iran gets Russian equipment and goods.  Because Russia is a major oil producer itself, Moscow would be acting as the middleman in exporting Iranian oil, most likely to Asia.

Protesters and riot police clashed in the Ukrainian capital Kiev, injuring several people including the former interior minister and leading opposition figure Yuriy Lutsenko, who appears to have suffered head injuries.  The melee broke out in a crowd that had gathered to protest the jailing of three rightwingers convicted of a 2011 plot to blow up a statue of revolutionary Communist Vladimir Lenin.

A senior American official says the United States is “very open” to building a new relationship with Cuba, although it must come with political reform on the Communist island.  Senior State Department official Edward Alex Lee has said the talks with Havana center on migrants.  However, the fact the two capitals are talking signals a new pragmatism replacing the last vestiges of the Cold War.

A court in Orleans, France upheld the ban of a second show by comedian Dieudonne M’bala M’bala, accused by the government of being an anti-Semitic “peddler of hate” in violation of France’s anti-racism laws.  An earlier show in Nantes was prevented by an act of France’s highest court.  Some free-speech advocates support Dieudonne, although his biggest audience is cobbled together from Islamist radicals and the right wing extremists.

(Warning:  The following story contains a link to graphic video that may be unsuitable to more sensitive readers)

Brazil is reeling from a newspaper expose showing exactly thoroughly violent criminal gangs control its prisons.  The Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper’s website posted a video of three decapitated men inside the Pedrinhas Prison Complex in Maranhao state last month.  And what’s worse, the video was created by inmates with their own mobile phones.  Military police have since been sent in to the prison, and a judge is ordering the government to regain control from the gangs.  The UN and several NGOs are also severely criticizing Brazil for its chaotic. Grossly overcrowded prisons.

The Central African Republic’s president has resigned less than a year after deposing his predecessor in a coup and plunging the nation into chaos.  Thousands of people took to the streets of CAR's capital Bangui to celebrate the news.  French troops and African Union peacekeepers are doing their best to keep a lid on the violence, and it’s hoped Michel Djotodia’s resignation will push the nations back towards normalcy.

Workers in a Kenyan mortuary got a surprise when one of their corpses woke up.  Paul Mutora tried to kill himself by drinking insecticide, and was pronounced dead at hospital.  But he got better.  The poison apparently slowed his heart rate enough for a doctor to make a really, really bad mistake.  Mutora woke up before embalming commenced. 

Bad neighbors China and Japan are criticizing each other’s policies in Africa.  Japan's leader Shinzo Abe is touring three nations in Africa, suggesting that China is buying off African leaders with lavish gifts while ignoring the people.  Beijing counters that Japan is allegedly courting African support for a place on the United National Security Council.  Abe is trying to get more Japanese corporations to do business in Africa.