Top Stories
AFP: "A nuclear-armed Iran would be a nightmare scenario marking the death knell of the Arab-Israeli peace process and global non-proliferation efforts, experts said Monday as US lawmakers sought tighter sanctions. As the European Union beefed up its own sanctions regime on Tehran, US Senator Mark Kirk and others unveiled a bill that would boost enforcement of existing sanctions, bring fresh pressure on Iran's oil sector and military, and shine a spotlight on the regime's poor human rights record. The bilateral legislation, called the Iran, North Korea and Syria Sanctions Consolidation Act of 2011, aims to increase pressure on companies still doing business with Iran's energy industry, notably Chinese firms that are on existing US lists of violators but have not been sanctioned. 'What we ought to do is enforce the sanctions that are already on the books,' Kirk told the annual meeting of the powerful pro-Israel lobby AIPAC. The bill would expand an asset freeze on companies selling conventional military goods or technology to Iran, North Korea or Syria, and would also 'put forward dramatically tougher sanctions against Iran's Republican Guard,' he added. The sanctions, which need congressional approval, would also target Iranian banks involved in such sales." http://t.uani.com/iiA3VZ
Reuters: "Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Monday one of his ministers will take his place at the next OPEC meeting, the official IRNA news agency reported, a move seen as retreat in a power struggle with hardline rulers. The president and his allies have been fiercely criticized by conservative politicians, hardline senior clerics and the elite Revolutionary Guards in the past weeks for trying to obtain wide-ranging powers. Ahmadinejad took control of OPEC's second biggest crude producer's lucrative oil and gas industry after dismissing the oil minister earlier this month as part of a plan to merge eight ministries, including oil and energy to slim down size of the government." http://t.uani.com/kkPLDf
WashPost: "A deadly blast during the inauguration of a major oil refinery by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad killed at least four and injured 20, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported Tuesday. Authorities ruled out any form of sabotage and instead spoke of an industrial incident caused by a gas leak at the Abadan oil refinery, in one of the largest and oldest industrial complexes in Iran. According to Mehr, a 'testing machine' exploded almost directly after it was placed in the area where Ahmadinejad was preparing to give a speech." http://t.uani.com/kstcgJ
Nuclear Program & Sanctions
WSJ: "European Union foreign ministers agreed to sanction an Iranian-owned bank based in Hamburg that the U.S. says has been at the center of Tehran's efforts to expand its nuclear program, European officials said. The decision Monday to freeze banking activity at the European-Iranian Trade Bank came as part of a broader effort by the EU to sharpen its sanctions against Iran.In addition to imposing strict controls on EIH, as the bank is known under its German acronym, the EU ministers agreed to sanction more than 100 people and entities with suspected ties to Iran's nuclear program, including the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Line and Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to a European Commission spokeswoman. The full list of designated entities and individuals will be published Tuesday, the spokeswoman said... After more than three years of deliberation about EIH, the EU concluded that the bank executed transactions on behalf of firms that were procuring technology for Iran's nuclear program in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions and EU regulations. The sanction directive imposes a freeze on accounts held at the bank and prohibits the bank from doing business within the European Union. The EU foreign ministers based their decision on allegations of sanction violations detailed in an addendum to the decision. According to the EU allegations, in August 2010 EIH froze accounts in Hamburg controlled by two Iranian banks, which were sanctioned by the U.N. Security Council, but then shortly afterward, EIH resumed euro-denominated business with the two banks via accounts held at an unsanctioned Iranian bank, according to a copy of the EU sanctions directive reviewed by The Wall Street Journal." http://t.uani.com/igisaA
WSJ: "The Obama administration issued an executive order Monday that grants the Treasury Department more authority to enforce sanctions against Iran. The order authorizes the Treasury to implement and enforce certain sanctions under the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996, or ISA, when imposed by the Secretary of State, a Treasury spokeswoman said. Sanctions would apply to people that have invested in Iran's energy sector or those doing certain business with its oil sector. 'It's putting in place additional authority we need to implement and fully enforce sanctions,' said an administration official. The Treasury will now have the power to prohibit U.S. financial institutions from providing credit worth more than $10 million in a year to an individual under sanctions-unless the person is working to relieve human suffering, or the funding is going to that purpose. The Treasury will also be able to block property, imports of goods to the U.S., and prohibit foreign exchange transactions and transfers of credit by that person under ISA sanctions." http://t.uani.com/laMTC7
JPost: "The Swiss daily NZZ has reported that the international airport in Geneva is refusing to refuel Iran Air flights. Anton Kohler, a spokesman for the Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA), which is responsible for aviation development and the supervision of civil aviation activities in Switzerland, told the Swiss wire service SDA that 'at this time aircraft from Iran Air will no longer be refueled at Geneva's airport.' Kohler declined to comment on whether the move was connected with sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program and violation of UN sanctions. He said Swiss authorities were seeking a 'pragmatic solution' and that Iran Air could refuel in other countries, such as Serbia, until a remedy was found. Airports in Holland and Vienna have already refused to provide fuel to Iran Air planes. Meanwhile, the US has dismissed the accuracy of a report in the German daily Die Welt that said Iran was planning to build a missile base in Venezuela and was gearing up to begin construction." http://t.uani.com/iOZCFX
Human Rights
AP: "Iran says it is a 'joke' to use the term hikers to describe three Americans charged with espionage. The state TV report suggests Iran is not easing its claims despite failing to hold a court session earlier this month for unexplained reasons. The report Tuesday quotes Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast as saying that using the description hikers is a 'joke.' Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal have been held since being taken into custody along the Iran-Iraq border in July 2009. Bauer's fiancee, Sarah Shourd, was released on bail last year but is charged in absentia. A trial session was set for May 11, but Bauer and Fattal were not brought into court. The Americans deny the charges." http://t.uani.com/lyWcdB
The Guardian: "Ofcom has ruled that Iran's state-run Press TV is responsible for a serious breach of UK broadcasting rules and could face a fine for airing an interview with Maziar Bahari, the Newsweek journalist arrested covering the Iranian presidential election in 2009, that was obtained by force while he was held in a Tehran jail. In July 2009 Press TV, which has a bureau in west London, aired what it said was an interview with Bahari following his arrest in the previous month, days after he had filed a report to Channel 4 News and Newsweek about an attack in Tehran during a post-election demonstration. The UK media regulator has been investigating the complaint by Bahari, who spent 118 days in jail, since last summer. In its ruling on the complaint published on Monday, Ofcom said it regards the breaches to be of a 'serious nature' and is now considering if the case 'warrants the imposition of a sanction.'" http://t.uani.com/kJLuzN
Foreign Affairs
WSJ: "Iraq signed an initial agreement to buy natural gas from former foe Iran to fuel power plants, a spokesman for the Iraqi electricity ministry said Monday, as the government seeks to ease the electricity shortages that last year provoked a wave of nationwide protests. Iraq's electricity ministry and Iran's oil ministry signed the five-year agreement for 25 million cubic meters a day, Iraqi electricity ministry spokesman Mussab al-Mudaris said. The gas will be used to feed two power stations in Baghdad's northern suburbs Sadr City and Al-Quds, but could also be fed into the grid to supply other power plants to combat the country's chronic power shortages. The gas, which will be supplied under international prices for five years, will be fed via pipeline through the Diyala province that borders Iraq and will take 18 months to construct, Mr. Mudaris said. Last year, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki sacked Electricity Minister Wahid Kareen following a wave of demonstrations in Baghdad and other southern regions over the power shortages." http://t.uani.com/iimsCH
Opinion & Analysis
Ilan Berman in WSJ: "With the drama of the Arab Spring and the death of Osama bin Laden dominating the headlines, you might have missed the most important development in months surrounding Iran's nuclear program: Zimbabwe's emergence as a key enabler of the Islamic Republic's march toward the atomic bomb. In recent days, officials in Harare have confirmed that the government of Robert Mugabe is finalizing a massive resources deal with Tehran, in defiance of United Nations sanctions aimed at derailing Iran's nuclear push. That agreement, in the works ever since Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited the African state in April 2010, would provide the Iranian regime with preferential access to the country's estimated 455,000 tons of raw uranium over the next five years. The deal sheds light on what amounts to a major chink in the Islamic Republic's nuclear armor. For all of its atomic bluster, the Iranian regime lacks enough of the critical raw material necessary to independently acquire a nuclear capability. Indeed, according to nonproliferation experts, Iran's known uranium ore reserves are 'limited and mostly of poor quality.' As a result, it desperately needs steady supplies of uranium ore from abroad. Without them, the Islamic Republic's nuclear plans would, quite simply, grind to a halt. This vulnerability is deepening, moreover. Iran's aging uranium stockpile, which the Islamic Republic acquired from South Africa in the 1970s, is mostly depleted. As a result, Tehran in recent months has been feverishly courting a motley crew of foreign partners in search of new and stable sources of uranium to fuel its nuclear habit. According to a confidential intelligence summary from an unnamed International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) member state this past February, the Islamic Republic has focused on Africa, home to a number of key uranium producers including Zimbabwe, Senegal, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo... In its ongoing bid to derail Iran's nuclear drive, Capitol Hill is now said to be contemplating new sanctions aimed at further tightening the international noose around Tehran. Iran's flirtation with Zimbabwe strongly suggests that lawmakers would do well to focus less on trying to stop Iran's centrifuges from spinning and more on making sure that Iran's nuclear machinery is running on empty." http://t.uani.com/k6zfmy
Karen Leigh in The Atlantic: "Cindy Hickey and Laura Fattal didn't eat on Thursday or Friday. Their sons, UC Berkeley graduates Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, have been held in Tehran's Evin Prison for the past 21 months, accused of spying for the United States. The charges, denied by their families as well as President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, are largely seen as a means of embarrassing the U.S. Shane and Josh, not to mention their distraught families, are incidental casualties. When the Iranian government cancelled the two hikers' latest court appearance last Thursday, both mothers suspected the boys were hunger striking. They began their own solidarity fast on May 19. Their mothers' intuition was correct -- the men had been fasting. On Monday, after 17 agonizing days without food, Shane and Josh were each allowed one short phone call to America. Hickey had long worried something might happen to her son. Shane, now 28, is a freelance journalist whose work in the Middle East had placed him in the scrum in Baghdad just six weeks before his July 31, 2009 arrest. But her phone rang while he was hiking in Kurdistan, a peaceful, tourist-friendly area, with girlfriend Sarah Shourd, 31, and their friend Josh, also 28. 'I worry when he's on assignment,' Hickey told me. 'I wasn't concerned about this trip. Even I would have gone on this trip.' Officials from the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad told her Shane had been arrested by Iranian authorities, accused of spying. Nearly two years later, he is still held in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison. Shourd was released on $500,000 bail in September over concern for her declining health. Prominent peace activists, including Nobel Peace Prize winners Desmond Tutu and Iranian Shirin Ebadi, are speaking out on the hikers' behalf. 'If we assume that the judge presiding would be a fair judge, and observes the rule, they should get their acquittal,' Ebadi told me at a recent conference in Oslo. 'The prosecutor has charged them with espionage, but bear in mind that they were arrested the moment they entered Iran. Which means that even if we assume it was their intention to spy, they didn't have time to get around to it. They are innocent and must be released.' On Friday, Hickey received a visit of support from one of her senators, Minnesota's Amy Klobuchar, who has been working closely on the case. But the nightmare continues. For the now 19 months after the arrest, she couldn't go near the study in her home in Pine City, Minnesota, the room where she got the call. When the news first broke, 'I figured this wasn't going to be a 24-hour thing,' she recalled. 'But I thought the maximum time was four months. And the last few months I just wake up thinking, How can we do this?' Until Monday, Hickey had not had contact with her son since a five-minute phone call on Thanksgiving. She has seen him only once in 21 months, in May of last year, when the hikers' mothers were granted 48-hour visas to Iran and allowed to visit briefly with their children at a luxury hotel near Evin." http://t.uani.com/izf3RN
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