Top Stories
AP: "Iran's nuclear chief says sanctions could delay
Tehran's controversial atomic program but would not stop it. Program head Ali Akbar Salehi says the
sanctions could 'slow down the job but they would not stop activities,'
according to the semiofficial ISNA news agency." http://bit.ly/cTKknI
National Post: "Iran has been running a sophisticated
procurement operation in Canada to acquire materials for its nuclear and
weapons programs, according to a senior Canadian official. Canadian customs officers have seized
everything from centrifuge parts to programmable logic controllers that were
being illicitly shipped to Iran through third countries, George Webb said." http://bit.ly/aDe5pX
AFP: "Iran on Tuesday set September 1 as a possible date
to resume nuclear talks with six world powers that have been stalled since
October, but insisted its conditions must first be met. Washington responded saying it was willing to meet Iran
over its nuclear program if Tehran's offer was 'serious.'" http://yhoo.it/diAgz0
Nuclear Program
VOA: "In wide-ranging talks at the White House, Israel's
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Barack Obama discussed
what both leaders say is the threat posed by Iran's pursuit of nuclear
weapons. Mr. Netanyahu says Iran's
nuclear program has been de-legitimized by new U.N. Security Council sanctions,
while President Obama underscored the U.S. commitment to Israel's security." http://bit.ly/d9YRE1
Reuters: "Iran's first nuclear power plant is set to be
launched by late September now that an important final test has been carried
out at the reactor, the head of the Islamic state's Atomic Energy Organization
said on Wednesday." http://bit.ly/cSHWQf
Bloomberg: "Iran may bar trips to the United Arab
Emirates after the U.A.E.'s envoy to the U.S. said his country supports
military action against Iran's nuclear facilities. 'I hope the government of the U.A.E. will
correct this viewpoint,' said Kazem Jalali, the spokesman for the parliament's
National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, according to the state-run Mehr
news agency. The U.A.E. should clarify whether the ambassador's 'foul' comments
are government policy, he said." http://bit.ly/cNwFXr
AFP: "Telecommunication Minister Reza Taghipour said on
Wednesday that Iran is expected to launch a new satellite, Rasad 1, in the last
week of August, the Mehr news agency reported. 'Rasad 1 (Observation) satellite is expected to be
launched into space on the back of a domestic carrier during the period marking
the government week (last week of August),' Taghipour said." http://bit.ly/cnb4Em
AFP: "Iran has summoned the Swiss charge d'affaires to
protest the 'abduction' of a nuclear scientist by US intelligence agents, state
television's website reported on Wednesday." http://bit.ly/dBDEj4
AFP: "A top Iranian lawmaker said on Sunday that Tehran
could stop refining uranium to 20 percent purity level, the most controversial
part of its atomic program, if it gets nuclear fuel required for a research
reactor." http://bit.ly/9hlsE1
Human Rights
BBC News: "Two gay men who said they faced persecution in
their home countries have the right to asylum in the UK, the Supreme Court has
ruled. The panel of judges said it had
agreed 'unanimously' to allow the appeals from the men, from Cameroon and Iran."
http://bit.ly/93DmCn
CNN: "Sajjad Mohammedie Ashtiani travels to a Tabriz jail
in Iran every Monday to see his mother. And
for 15 minutes each week, he speaks to his mother, Sakine Mohammedie Ashtiani,
through the prison glass that divides them. Neither mother nor son ever know if the visit will be their last. Convicted of adultery in 2006, Ashtiani has
been sentenced to be stoned to death for her alleged crime." http://bit.ly/96D0ke
Domestic Politics
AP: "Protests by merchants in Tehran's main bazaar forced
authorities to back off of plans to increase taxes on their businesses, Iranian
media reported Wednesday, in a sign of the government's difficulties in
implementing economic reforms." http://bit.ly/9yYRZK
Radio Farda: "Iran has denied reports that some countries
are refusing refueling to Iranian passenger planes due to sanctions over Iran's
nuclear program. Foreign Ministry
spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said today that Iranian planes are getting fuel at
airports around the world, and that reports that fuel supplies had been blocked
in three countries were part of a propaganda war against the Islamic republic."
http://bit.ly/9OiyhD
Opinion
Lee Smith in WSJ: "Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution
energized Shiites throughout the Muslim world, an epochal event that Fadlallah
welcomed. The revolution's most successful export was Hezbollah-the Party of
God-an Arab Shiite organization created by Iranian Revolutionary Guard troops
in the Bekaa Valley." http://bit.ly/cmNP9t
Bernard-Henri Lévy in Huffington Post: "This major event
absent from all the main radars, this geopolitical reversal that has not earned
a thousandth of the media coverage devoted to Hillary Clinton's changing moods,
is the United Arab Emirates's decision to inspect ships more or less directly
linked to Iran or to trade with Iran arriving in their territorial waters and
to freeze 41 bank accounts belonging to Iranian entities that may serve as a
screen for contraband operations to further Tehran's nuclear program." http://huff.to/bhyLsn
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