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Reuters: "Iran has resumed amassing enriched uranium at a steady pace after possible cyber sabotage and a mysterious albeit brief halt in its nuclear activities late last year, diplomats and experts say. Technical woes, toughened international sanctions and the Stuxnet computer worm may all have figured in hampering Iran's nuclear progress, potentially pushing back estimates for when it might be able to assemble an atomic bomb if it decided to do so. But despite such problems, the Islamic Republic is pressing ahead with its disputed nuclear energy program and its stockpile of low-enriched uranium (LEU) is continuously growing. It is now believed to have enough material for one or two nuclear bombs if refined much further, even though it is unclear how soon it could build such a weapon, which would entail the technical feats of compressing highly-enriched uranium (HEU) into a missile cone and assembling a delivery vehicle." http://t.uani.com/icQpyn
FT: "On the face of it, the mathematics are compelling. Iran's fuel-thirsty drivers consume roughly 100,000 barrels a day of gasoline more than the country's refineries can produce. Scenting an opportunity, the US government last June barred international companies from doing business there if they were found selling refined petroleum products to Iran. The tightened sanctions form part of efforts to force Iran to end its nuclear programme. Leading international trading houses had stopped selling petrol to Iran in the spring. By October, the US said other groups, such as India's Reliance Industries, Turkey's Tupras, Kuwait's Independent Petroleum Group and Russia's Lukoil had also halted sales. Yet, in spite of stiffer sanctions, Tehran is finding gasoline on the open market, analysts say. It has diverted production from some of its petrochemical plants and, working through intermediaries, is paying a premium to Chinese and smaller international trading companies outside the reach of the US." http://t.uani.com/hJDy36
NYT: "With democracy tremors rocking the Arab world, Iran's opposition has challenged its hard-line leaders to allow a peaceful demonstration - ostensibly in support of the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. The request to hold a rally on Monday falls short of an open call for supporters of Iran's 'green' movement to return to the streets after more than a year, but it is the closest that Iran's opposition has come so far to trying to join in the historic events. 'In order to declare support for the popular movements in the region, in particular, the freedom-seeking movements of the people of Egypt and Tunisia, we request a permit to invite the people for a rally,' read the open letter from Mir Hussein Moussavi and Mehdi Karroubi, two of the presidential candidates who were defeated by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in what they said were rigged elections in 2009. The letter, dated Saturday, was addressed to Iran's Interior Ministry and published Sunday on Web sites affiliated with Iran's opposition." http://t.uani.com/gpXlbN
Nuclear Program & Sanctions
AFP: "Iran is mass-producing a ballistic missile which can travel at more than three times the speed of sound and hit targets on the high seas, a top commander said on Monday. Commander Mohammad Ali Jafari, who heads the elite military force, the Revolutionary Guards, said the missile had a range of 300 kilometres (185 miles). 'Iran is mass producing a smart ballistic missile for sea targets with a speed three times more than the speed of sound,' Jafari was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA. He said the missile was 'undetectable and can't be neutralised by enemies,' without specifying the name. 'It has very high precision in destroying targets,' Jafari added." http://t.uani.com/gsk43E
WSJ: "Describing the India-Iran relationship as 'cordial and strong' at a press briefing in New Delhi on Tuesday, the Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to India said he was confident business and political ties between the two countries will stay strong despite 'international pressure.' Predictably, Ambassador Seyed Mahdi Nabizadeh singled out the U.S., on which he lay much of the blame for a recent oil payment dispute with India. Last December, the Reserve Bank of India, the country's central bank, barred Indian companies from carrying out a range of transactions through a regional trade-finance clearinghouse, which India and Iran had used extensively." http://t.uani.com/hJTa19
AFP: "Iran's daily oil output rose by around 100,000 barrels with the opening on Tuesday of the second phase of Darkhovin field in the southeast of the country, the oil ministry's news agency reported. Shana agency said Oil Minister Masoud Mirkazemi attended the opening, which raises the field's total output to around 160,000 barrels per day (bpd), from first phase production of around 50,000 bpd. Iran's total output is running at around 3.7 million bpd, according to latest data from OPEC. The second phase of Darkhovin was developed by a consortium comprised of Italy's ENI, which signed a 1.3-billion-dollar contract, making it the largest Western firm operating in Iran, and local companies." http://t.uani.com/ghs4rG
AP: "A Turkish official says no action is planned against two Turkish associates of an Iranian businessman who has been charged in the U.S. with helping Iran's missile program by smuggling materials from the United States in violation of a trade embargo. Zafer Caglayan, the minister who oversees foreign trade, said Tuesday the charges against Milad Jafari are not binding in Turkey and that his Turkish associates, Muammer Kuntay Duransoy and Cagri Duransoy, will not be questioned or investigated." http://t.uani.com/fuThum
Human Rights
AFP: "Iran accused the Netherlands on Tuesday of backing 'terrorists' amid a diplomatic spat between the two countries over the execution and hushed burial of a Dutch-Iranian woman in Iran. Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast accused the Netherlands of making 'a human rights issue out of an indefensible drug case and applying political pressure' on Iran... The Netherlands on Monday summoned Iran's ambassador in The Hague to protest the hushed burial of Zahra Bahrami, who was hanged on January 29 after being convicted of a drugs offence. The Netherlands said the Dutch ambassador to Tehran was also being brought back to The Hague for consultations after Bahrami was buried in the absence of her family, who had wished to be present." http://t.uani.com/gPpbVs
Domestic Politics
AFP: "Iran's main opposition leaders charged on Tuesday that the Islamic republic is being run by 'anti-religion... hooligans,' in a statement on the eve of its 32nd anniversary. The bitter criticism from Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, once seen as pillars of the Islamic establishment, came three days before the anniversary of the February 11, 1979 Islamic revolution which toppled the US-backed shah. 'Today, the regime is hiding behind this concern that if it does not exist, religion will vanish and, by repeatedly voicing alarms, it tries to rally and organise the religious strata behind itself,' the opposition leaders said. 'But in reality what has hurt the religious atmosphere of society the most is the anti-religion and oppressive behaviour of the regime itself,' they said in the joint statement on their websites, Kaleme.com and Sahamnews.org." http://t.uani.com/g75G0c
Reuters: "A 25 km-long oil slick off Iran's Gulf shore will take at least two months to clean up and could do irreparable damage do the local marine environment, news agencies reported on Monday. The Oil Ministry declined to comment on the spill, which reports said was caused by an explosion in a corroded pipeline last week at the port city of Daylam in Bushehr province. ISNA news wire said the leak was fixed the following day by diverting the oil flow into an auxiliary line. But stormy weather last Wednesday washed the crude out to sea, polluting a 25 km (16 miles) stretch of coastline." http://t.uani.com/f50aAI
Foreign Affairs
WSJ: "Iran and its ally Hezbollah have been quick to claim kinship with the mass demonstrations in Egypt, describing them as part of a 'regional Islamic awakening,' but the reaction from Egypt's own Islamic movement has been lukewarm... During Friday's prayer sermon, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the oppressed people of Egypt and Tunisia were aspiring for an Islamic state modeled after Iran and that the street demonstrations were 'liberating Islamic movements.' Meanwhile, the Muslim Brotherhood acted quickly to distance itself from Iran and Hezbollah, saying it 'regards the revolution as the Egyptian people's revolution, not an Islamic revolution.'" http://t.uani.com/fBqlUc
AFP: "Iran's elite military force, the Revolutionary Guards, denied on Monday that it is holding former FBI agent Robert Levinson as reported on some websites. 'We deny the arrest of the FBI agent and if the Guards had arrested an enemy, it would announce itself,' the head of the Guards, commander Mohammad Ali Jafari, told reporters, according to ILNA news agency. Jaafari said news reports of Iran holding Levinson were nothing more than attempts by the Islamic republic's 'enemies to find excuses and weaknesses' about Iran. Mystery shrouds the fate of Levinson, who disappeared on Iran's Gulf island of Kish in March 2007." http://t.uani.com/i5b6m8
AFP: "Afghanistan on Monday dismissed a claim by Tehran that the two countries had reached an agreement for Iran to supply all of its private sector fuel, drawing out a long-running dispute between the neighbours. Ghulam Mohammad Aylaqi, deputy commerce minister, denied comments made Sunday by Iranian Oil Minister Masoud Mirkazemi that an agreement was made under which the private sector would buy 'all its needed products' from Iran. Aylaqi said Kabul could not afford such a deal with Iran." http://t.uani.com/h7gPvO
Opinion & Analysis
Jennifer Rubin in WashPost: "A debate among Efraim Halevy, former head of Mossad (who departed in 2002); Danielle Pletka of AEI; Brian Katulis of Center for American Progress; and Gen. Ephraim Sneh, Israel's former deputy minister of defense, was held this morning. I was not surprised that Katulis would say fantastical things. He asserted that U.S. power and influence is on the rise in the region and that we can live with a nuclear China, so we can do so with Iran. Nor am I surprised that Pletka would decimate the argument that Iran is containable. (We don't have the nerve or will to contain Iran now, let alone do the sorts of things we did during the Cold War to contain the former Soviet Union.) What is distressing is to hear a former head of Mossad caution that we really shouldn't talk about doing everything to deprive Iran of a nuclear weapon. (Halevy has made a post-Mossad career of feeding the narrative that Iran is much to do about nothing.) We shouldn't imagine, Halevy says, that Israel and the U.S. would be at a disadvantage when Iran goes nuclear because Israel has always checked Iran. In fact, he says obtaining a nuclear weapon would be a bigger problem for Iran, citing how isolated North Korea is. Umm. But isn't a tiny, impoverished North Korea holding the world hostage? In the Halevy-Katulis universe we are winning the battle against Iran. Oh, Syria and Turkey are linked at the hip; an Iran surrogate now rules Lebanon; an Iran surrogate wages war on Israel from Gaza; the Iranian regime terrorizes its own people; and Iran, while slowed by espionage, is still close to becoming a nuclear-armed Islamic revolutionary state. How do they manage a world view that is so divorced from recent events?" http://t.uani.com/dF0ZIn
Daniel Brumberg in The Iran Primer: "Strategically, Iran is hedging its position on the new Middle East turmoil. The theocrats like to publicly portray the democratic revolts in Tunisia and Egypt as an Islamist tsunami sweeping away corrupt autocracies to replace them with Islamic regimes. But the same leaders are also nervous about doing or saying anything that might, in turn, encourage Iran's own opposition movements. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamanei heralded Egypt's 'Islamic awakening. The Egyptian nation has achieved great honors in the path of Islamic struggle and promoting innovative Islamic thoughts,' he said. 'There is no doubt that this nation will not tolerate the treachery of its leaders and will confront them.' The supreme leader also cautioned, however, that Iran would not 'get engaged and wake up a nation such as the Egyptian nation to its duties.' Tehran appears to be as concerned that Egypt's popular rebellion echoes-and might even inspire-Iran's opposition Green Movement." http://t.uani.com/g0GBU4
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