Top Stories
Reuters: "Iran is prepared to discuss a possible nuclear fuel swap at talks that resume next month, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday, but he ruled out any slowdown of its atomic program. A day after the conclusion of a two-day meeting with the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany (P5+1), Ahmadinejad told those countries to drop any idea of curbing Iran's quest for nuclear technology and instead invited them to help build the 20 nuclear power stations it plans. 'We are in favor of cooperation and they should come and cooperate with us and build us 20 nuclear plants,' he said in a speech to students quoted by the semi-official Mehr news agency... Iranian chief negotiator Saeed Jalili told reporters after Tuesday's meeting in Geneva that: 'Iran will not discuss a uranium enrichment halt in the next meeting in Istanbul.' Ahmadinejad reiterated that point and specified three red lines that Iran would not cross. 'Our nuclear rights, including the continuation of enrichment, making 20 percent uranium and building nuclear plants are not negotiable,' he said... 'Cooperating in different fields like a fuel swap, and political, economic and security issues of the world are topics for negotiations,' he said." http://reut.rs/ibkgRz
NYT: "Security officials have raided one of Iran's few remaining independent newspapers, arresting three journalists and a managing director, web sites associated with the political opposition reported Wednesday. The arrests, made Tuesday, coincided with the publication of a special supplement by the newspaper, Shargh, that paid homage to Student Day, the annual commemoration of the deaths of student protesters in 1953. The section, titled 'The Student Movement is Alive,' included interviews with government critics and amounted to a daring compliment to the student protesters and others who demonstrated after the disputed June 2009 presidential elections... Iranian judicial authorities have arrested or intimidated dozens of journalists and closed at least 10 publications as part of a broad crackdown on the political opposition since the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad by a suspiciously lopsided margin that his challengers called a fraud." http://nyti.ms/gFWusi
FT: "Tehran residents are blaming the Iranian government's production of poor-quality petrol for the serious air pollution affecting Iran's capital city. Iran used to import about a third of the 66.5m litres of petrol it consumes each day because it lacks sufficient refining capacity. However, the US administration forced international companies in July to halt exports of petrol to Iran as part of its unilateral sanctions imposed over the Islamic regime's nuclear programme. The Iranian government in an emergency plan converted six petrochemical plants to produce petrol, in spite of warnings by oil experts that the poor-quality product would be too costly and ran the risk of damaging people's health and cars. 'Nobody has any doubt that this unprecedented pollution is because of the new petrol,' said Hassan, a taxi driver. The oil ministry has denied any link between the petrol produced in petrochemical sites and the month-long stifling smog. Officials insist the domestic petrol is of great quality and could not cause the alert-level pollution." http://bit.ly/gmPllt
Nuclear Program & Sanctions
Bloomberg: "Three Iranian ships were seized several days ago in Singapore waters in a move linked to financial sanctions against Iran over the country's nuclear program, Arman reported, citing the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines Managing Director. Mohammad-Hossein Dajmar, the company's head, rejected reports that the seizure is due to Iran's failure to pay back a loan received from a French bank, the newspaper said. He did not name the bank or elaborate on the reasons for the ships' seizure, which he said took place 'over' three days ago, Arman said. The three ships, named Sabalan, Sahand and Tochal do not have any cargo, Dajmar said. Negotiations are ongoing with the French bank to settle the matter, he told the newspaper." http://bit.ly/dFpKsT
Le Monde: "It's no secret that the latest round of US sanctions on Iran, set this June, are further affecting the Iranians' ability to access popular items such as electronics and foodstuffs. But prohibition breeds ingenuity, and thousands of Iranians have managed to get the everyday goods they need - whether it's tea, rice, a television or breakfast cereal - from merchants who are able to import goods from Iran's small but significant neighbour, the United Arab Emirates. Iran has had strong trade relations with the UAE, whose economy was rooted in trade, and pearl diving off its coast, long before oil was discovered less than 50 years ago. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians now live in the tiny Gulf state across the water from their homeland." http://bit.ly/eUa2hh
JoongAng Daily: "The only Iranian bank in Korea will start operating again on Friday, with the government deciding not to extend a two-month suspension of its operations, a diplomatic source said yesterday. In October, the Financial Services Commission, Korea's top financial watchdog, imposed the suspension on the Seoul branch of Bank Mellat as part of international moves to sanction Iran for its suspected nuclear weapons program. The measure expires Friday. 'The suspension was made to implement UN Security Council resolutions sanctioning Iran's nuclear development,' the source said. 'For now, the government is not reviewing an additional measure to suspend its operations.' The source said the bank will remain under 'strong' regulation that requires the Bank of Korea to approve most of its financial transactions in Seoul." http://bit.ly/ehwl1o
Human Rights
AP: "China's crackdown on ethnic reporters and Iran's sustained suppression of critics has helped push the number of journalists jailed worldwide to 145 - the highest level in 14 years, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Wednesday. The committee counted nine fewer journalists behind bars globally at the end of 2009. The New York-based press advocacy group said in a report released Wednesday that with 34 imprisoned journalists each, China and Iran together account for nearly half of the reporters, editors and photojournalists imprisoned worldwide." http://wapo.st/hyTncS
Reuters: "Five students in Iran have been detained after one of several anti-government protests held earlier this week, opposition websites said on Thursday. The Kaleme site reported that around 1,000 students rallied at Tehran's Polytechnic University on Tuesday, an annual 'students day' which was marked by several other small demonstrations at various campuses around Iran." http://bit.ly/gz55El
AP: "An Iranian rights group says a pioneering Canadian-Iranian blogger has been temporarily freed from prison on bail of about $1.5 million. Hossein Derakhshan is serving a more than 19-year sentence as part of Iran's widespread crackdown on the media and web. The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said Thursday that Derakhshan is expected back in prison in a few days, but gave no further details. It's unclear who posted the bail." http://wapo.st/hII4EY
Domestic Politics
Reuters: "Acute air pollution in Tehran cannot be blamed on gasoline produced in an emergency plan to foil sanctions over Iran's nuclear programme, officials said on Wednesday, instead blaming the weather and domestic heaters. A weather system has trapped air in the Iranian capital for four weeks, posing a major health risk for people with respiratory problems and pushing up hospital admissions by more than 20 percent, according to the Health Ministry. In an attempt to clear the air, several public holidays were declared and cars can now only circulate on alternate days, squeezing even more people into Tehran's buses and metro. The severe smog occurred a few months after Iran announced it had become self-sufficient in gasoline by implementing an emergency plan to refine gasoline in petrochemcial plants, foiling international sanctions. Previously it needed to import up to 40 percent of its automotive fuel needs. 'Low quality of vehicle fuel the main cause of air pollution,' ran the headline of Ettelaat daily, one of many newspapers pondering the reasons for the smog." http://bit.ly/fqpqd3
Foreign Affairs
AP: "After two days on the warfront in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates was turning his attention Thursday to countries where the U.S. is looking to avoid full-blown conflict - Iran and Yemen. During a meeting with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Gates was expected to discuss ongoing regional security worries about Iran, the terror threat in Yemen and the UAE's continuing interest in developing a more sophisticated missile defense system... Gates' visit to Abu Dhabi - the fourth in his Pentagon tenure - comes on the heels of the summit of six U.S.-allied Gulf Arab nations here, where leaders urged a peaceful end to the ongoing dispute over Iran's nuclear program. And they sought a greater voice in the talks with Iran." http://wapo.st/haC1qE
Opinion & Analysis
WashPost Editorial Board: "The Obama administration's assessment is that Iran's very participation in the talks shows that its policy is working. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has been arguing that sanctions adopted by the U.N. Security Council in June, and additional measures imposed by the United States and Europe, are 'having an impact inside Iran.' She told an interviewer from the BBC last week: 'So I think Iran comes to the table with a much more sober assessment of what isolation means, what the impact on their economy has been, and we hope that will cause them to have the kind of serious negotiation we are seeking.' There was no evidence of that in Geneva... There is another logical explanation for Iran's willingness to talk - that it seeks to delay further sanctions, create dissension among the United States and its allies, and distract attention from its continuing crackdown on the opposition Green movement. As Iran scholar Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations points out, it's probably not a coincidence that in the weeks before the Geneva talks, there were dozens more arrests of civil society activists and new interventions on university campuses. This does not mean that the United States and its allies should not participate in further meetings. But it does mean that they should press forward simultaneously with other strategies to stop the Iranian nuclear program. That could include more sanctions, such as a full ban on landings by Iranian airliners in Europe. But it also should include greater efforts to support Iran's internal resistance - which is the only force that in the end is likely to stop the drive for a bomb." http://wapo.st/eXT1ad
Greg Thielmann and Peter Crail in CSM: "Long before the mysterious Stuxnet computer virus struck an apparent blow at Iran's nuclear program, Tehran's nuclear effort was being delayed by a far more mundane problem: bad technology. The technical hurdles that Iran continues to face with its nuclear program help explain why US officials say Iran is still 3 to 5 years away from acquiring the bomb. This provides time and leverage for diplomatic approaches to be pursued. The most fundamental problem with Iran's enrichment program appears to be its own centrifuge design. Called the P-1 after a Pakistani mock-up of a Dutch design pilfered in the 1970s, the centrifuge that Iran has been attempting to operate is known to be temperamental and fault-prone. Centrifuge technology is already a very difficult process to master, since it requires constructing complex machinery at precise specifications to allow the cylindrical devices to spin at supersonic speeds, day in and day out. Reverse engineering faulty, smuggled equipment, as Iran has tried to do, only makes this challenge worse... If Stuxnet indeed crippled Iran's nuclear program as several headlines read, it was already limping." http://bit.ly/gJcw0n
Jennifer Rubin in WashPost: "This prompts the question: Then, what are we doing there? And more specifically, it raises the concern that we really have no effective policy to thwart an Iranian nuclear program. As Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute told me this morning: 'Plan A to get Iran to give up nuclear weapons is talking. Plan B is sanctions. There is no plan C, so we keep retrying Plan A and Plan B, offering greater concessions to Iran when we talk, and tougher sanctions when we don't. Every negotiation is like Groundhog Day, but at the end of the process, instead of spring, Iran gets a nuclear weapon.' Others foreign policy watchers see the Obama approach as more coherent. A senior advisor to a key senator on national security issues e-mailed me: 'As long as the pressure keeps ratcheting up in the real world, there is no harm in sitting at a table with the Iranians. The problem is when the former (engagement, or the desire for it) is raised as a reason not to do the latter (pressure) -- when people say, we need to diminish the pressure to demonstrate our good faith, or to try to get them to the table in the first place, or to build trust, etc.' But he asserted: 'That is emphatically not where the administration is, however, as far as I can see. The view in the White House is that we need to squeeze the Iranians harder, because they are so clearly not serious about negotiating. And regardless, there is going to be a bipartisan push in Congress to ensure that they do so.' The danger, of course, is that by our conduct in the negotiations (e.g. the secretary of state scurrying after the Iranian foreign minister), we project not seriousness, but desperation." http://wapo.st/fRnNSi |
Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) a program of the American Coalition Against Nuclear Iran, Inc., a tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Eye on Iran is not intended as a comprehensive media clips summary but rather a selection of media elements with discreet analysis in a PDA friendly format. For more information please email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com
United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a non-partisan, broad-based coalition that is united in a commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons. UANI is an issue-based coalition in which each coalition member will have its own interests as well as the collective goal of advancing an Iran free of nuclear weapons.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment