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VOA: "U.S. President Barack Obama says the world is united in its response to Iran, leaving the country 'more isolated than ever' and its leaders facing 'crippling' sanctions. The president said in an address to the nation Tuesday that he will not rule out any option for preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, but that the issue can be resolved peacefully. 'But a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible, and far better, and if Iran changes course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin the community of nations.' The president said the pressure on Iran will continue as long as it fails to live up to its responsibilities." http://t.uani.com/Aaod9K
NYT: "As the Obama administration and its European allies toughened economic sanctions against Iran on Monday - blocking its access to the world financial system and undermining its critical oil and gas industry - officials on both sides of the Atlantic acknowledge that their last-ditch effort has only a limited chance of persuading Tehran to abandon what the West fears is its pursuit of nuclear weapons. That leaves open this critical question: And then what? While the United States and Israel have not taken military options off the table, pursuing them is unpalatable, at least for now. Several American and European officials say privately that the most attainable outcome for the West could be for Iran to maintain the knowledge and technology necessary to build a nuclear weapon while stopping short of doing so. That would allow it to assert its sovereignty and save face after years of diplomatic tensions. While that might seem to be a big concession on the part of the United States, Iran would first have to make even bigger ones: demonstrate that it could be trusted and drop its veil of secrecy so that inspectors could verify that its nuclear work was peaceful, steps Iran has resisted." http://t.uani.com/yGo59o
AP: "Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has approved increasing bank interest rates to 21 percent, state media reported Wednesday, in a reversal of his earlier opposition to a move economists said was crucial to absorbing liquidity in the market and supporting the Iranian currency. The move came as the rial, under pressure after new U.S. sanctions targeting Iran's Central Bank, shed about 50 percent of its value relative to the dollar in the span of a month. The depreciation built on already mounting worries over the country's growing international isolation over its controversial nuclear program. The European Union earlier this week approved an oil embargo on Iranian crude. 'The president has fully approved' the increase in bank interest rates, Economy Minister Shamseddin Hosseini was quoted by the official IRNA news agency, adding that banks will be notified to change the rates starting Thursday." http://t.uani.com/wD7hcE
Nuclear Program & Sanctions WSJ: "South Africa's Sasol Ltd. is starting to diversify oil sources away from Iranian imports, it said Wednesday, as pressure from the U.S. and European Union mounts. South Africa, which relies on Iranian crude for roughly 25% of its oil imports, is currently debating how to approach increased sanctions being imposed on Iran by the U.S. and EU, aimed at choking off a key source of revenue from the regime. This week the EU enacted new sanctions on Iran, including a planned oil ban effective July 1 and banking and shipping sanctions. Sasol, the world's largest producer of motor fuels from coal, relies on Iranian oil imports for about 20% of its crude requirement, or 12,000 barrels a day, at its Natref refinery. 'In view of recent developments regarding trade restrictions and possible oil sanctions against Iran, Sasol Oil is diversifying its crude oil sourcing,' a company spokeswoman said, declining to give further details." http://t.uani.com/yLt0Ae
Reuters: "South Korea's imports of Iranian crude surged 20 percent in 2011, data showed on Wednesday, the latest indication of Korea's dependence on the oil even as it faces pressure from its ally the United States to cut back. The rise in Iranian crude imports was more than three times greater than the increase in Korea's overall oil purchases in 2011 and some refineries have indicated they will buy more, not less, from the OPEC producer this year. South Korea, the world's fifth-largest crude importer, will need to reduce its imports soon under U.S. sanctions to support Washington's push to halt Iran's nuclear programme. Crude imports from Iran rose to 238,860 barrels per day (bpd) in 2011 from 198,918 bpd in 2010, the state-run Korea National Oil Corp (KNOC) said on Wednesday." http://t.uani.com/wft2Oa
Korea Herald: "The Iranian government attempted to retaliate against Korea in connection with the U.S.-led sanctions of oil imports by demanding that Korean firms tear down their outdoor advertising billboards in Tehran earlier this month, news reports said. The Iranian government ordered Korean firms including Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics to demolish their outdoor ads, but withdrew its demand following protests from the Korean Embassy in Tehran, a government official was quoted by the Yonhap news agency as saying. Some outdoor advertisements were torn down in a few parts of Tehran, however, they were all back in place by Jan. 8, the official said... Iran is the top market for Korean goods in the Middle East and the trade activities between Korea and Iran hit a record of $18.5 billion last year, up 60 percent from the previous year." http://t.uani.com/w3wTaN
Reuters: "Australia will follow the European Union's lead in banning oil imports and imposing a range of other sanctions on Iran, Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd said on Tuesday. Rudd said later that Australian imports of Iranian oil were already 'negligible'. 'On the question of Iran, let me be absolutely clear (regarding) the actions taken in Brussels yesterday on sanctions by the European Union -- we in Australia will undertake precisely the same parallel action for Australia,' he told reporters during a visit to London." http://t.uani.com/xCjR14
Human Rights
DW: "An Iranian woman who won a 2005 blogging prize from Deutsche Welle was arrested earlier this month in Iran, as part of a recent crackdown against journalists and online activists. Dokouhaki became known for being one of Iran's earliest female bloggers, and her site, Zan-Nevesht (Woman Writer), often took on women's issues, although she has not worked as a journalist in recent years. Iran's supreme court has also confirmed last year's death sentence of Saeed Malekpour, an Iranian-Canadian web developer, who has been held since 2008. Mohammad Solimaninya, who founded a professional social networking site for Iranians, was also recently arrested at his home in Karaj, north of Tehran, on January 20. Marzieh Rasouli, a culture journalist who worked for some of the country's top reformist newspapers, was also taken into custody two days after Dokouhaki, on January 17. According to Reporters Without Borders, three other online journalists and writers were arrested on January 7." http://t.uani.com/zgLg6U
Foreign Affairs
Toronto Star: "Iran's Green Revolution geeks are taking their struggle to cyberspace, but the clerical regime's censors are already there - and gunning for them. 'There is an arms race in cyberspace and it's caught up with Iran,' says Ron Deibert, who heads University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, which monitors the digital media's intersection with human rights. 'It's not the only government to increase Internet surveillance and censorship, but it has ambitions to engage in more sophisticated surveillance of network traffic. We can see that the Iranians are developing fine-grained techniques.' Iran has also stepped up a ground war against its suspected enemies: GTA web designer Saeed Malekpour, along with Internet professionals Vahid Asghari and Ahmad Reza Hasempour, were sentenced to death this month in Iran, as part of a crackdown on people who use cyberspace to spread messages the regime considers subversive." http://t.uani.com/xtCwD1
Opinion & Analysis
Ronen Bergman in NYT: "As the Sabbath evening approached on Jan. 13, Ehud Barak paced the wide living-room floor of his home high above a street in north Tel Aviv, its walls lined with thousands of books on subjects ranging from philosophy and poetry to military strategy. Barak, the Israeli defense minister, is the most decorated soldier in the country's history and one of its most experienced and controversial politicians. He has served as chief of the general staff for the Israel Defense Forces, interior minister, foreign minister and prime minister. He now faces, along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and 12 other members of Iraeli's inner security cabinet, the most important decision of his life - whether to launch a pre-emptive attack against Iran. We met in the late afternoon, and our conversation - the first of several over the next week - lasted for two and a half hours, long past nightfall. 'This is not about some abstract concept,' Barak said as he gazed out at the lights of Tel Aviv, 'but a genuine concern. The Iranians are, after all, a nation whose leaders have set themselves a strategic goal of wiping Israel off the map.' When I mentioned to Barak the opinion voiced by the former Mossad chief Meir Dagan and the former chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi - that the Iranian threat was not as imminent as he and Netanyahu have suggested and that a military strike would be catastrophic (and that they, Barak and Netanyahu, were cynically looking to score populist points at the expense of national security), Barak reacted with uncharacteristic anger. He and Netanyahu, he said, are responsible 'in a very direct and concrete way for the existence of the State of Israel - indeed, for the future of the Jewish people.' As for the top-ranking military personnel with whom I've spoken who argued that an attack on Iran was either unnecessary or would be ineffective at this stage, Barak said: 'It's good to have diversity in thinking and for people to voice their opinions. But at the end of the day, when the military command looks up, it sees us - the minister of defense and the prime minister. When we look up, we see nothing but the sky above us.' Netanyahu and Barak have both repeatedly stressed that a decision has not yet been made and that a deadline for making one has not been set. As we spoke, however, Barak laid out three categories of questions, which he characterized as 'Israel's ability to act,' 'international legitimacy' and 'necessity,' all of which require affirmative responses before a decision is made to attack: 1. Does Israel have the ability to cause severe damage to Iran's nuclear sites and bring about a major delay in the Iranian nuclear project? And can the military and the Israeli people withstand the inevitable counterattack? 2. Does Israel have overt or tacit support, particularly from America, for carrying out an attack? 3. Have all other possibilities for the containment of Iran's nuclear threat been exhausted, bringing Israel to the point of last resort? If so, is this the last opportunity for an attack? For the first time since the Iranian nuclear threat emerged in the mid-1990s, at least some of Israel's most powerful leaders believe that the response to all of these questions is yes." http://t.uani.com/wPsEbc
Mark Heller in IHT: "This week, the European Union went to war against Iran. There was no formal declaration, of course, nor even any undeclared use of military force. But the E.U. decision to place an embargo on Iranian oil imports, ban new contracts, and freeze Iranian Central Bank assets is effectively an act of war and may very well result in the military hostilities that sanctions are meant to forestall. Oil exports account for over 50 percent of Iranian government revenue and about 80 percent of its hard currency earnings. And the E.U., as a bloc, is Iran's second-largest customer, taking about a quarter of Iranian exports. Consequently, unless other customers neutralize E.U. actions by stepping up their own purchases from Iran - and indications from China, Japan and South Korea suggest that this is unlikely to be the case - the E.U. decision, coupled with existing American measures, will come close to imposing the 'crippling sanctions' that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton threatened but could not deliver without European cooperation. If that turns out to be the case, then the Iranian regime, already coping with high inflation and a rapidly depreciating currency, will feel constrained to react. One possibility is that it will capitulate and essentially dismantle its nuclear weapons program. That is obviously the outcome that Europeans and others hope sanctions (or even the credible threat of sanctions) will bring about. But it is at least as likely that Iran, feeling trapped, will lash out in a desperate attempt to frighten the Europeans into backing down or at least introduce so much hysteria into the oil market that price spikes will allow it to earn the same revenue from a reduced volume of exports. One form this might take would be an attempt to close the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has already threatened to do. But that is probably beyond Iran's capacity for very long and would in any case also shut down Iran's own ability to export to whatever markets it manages to retain. Far less complicated would be sabotage or rocket attacks on refineries, pipelines and other facilities in places like Abqaiq and Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia. These might be carried out as 'false flag' operations by local Shiite insurgents concentrated in Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province, but nobody would be fooled and the risks of escalation to large-scale conflict with Iran would be significant." http://t.uani.com/xotsMf
Toronto Star Editorial Board: "Shaken by the Arab Spring's drive for reform, rattled by mass protests in major cities and pummeled by sanctions over their nuclear program, Iran's clerical leaders are lashing out at those they blame for defying the regime. Lawyers, rights activists, journalists, students, bloggers and other critics have been hauled before the courts and jailed as Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's hardliners try to crush opposition voices, Human Rights Watch reports. And in what Amnesty International calls a 'killing spree of staggering proportions,' the regime has paraded its toughness by executing more than 600 people including children in the past year for offences that range from drug trafficking, to terrorism, spying and sodomy. Now a Canadian resident has been ordered to pay with his life for running afoul of the mullahs as they seek to suppress the Internet as well, the Star's Olivia Ward reports. Saeed Malekpour, an engineer and website designer who makes his home in the Greater Toronto Area, faces the death penalty for the catch-all crime of 'insulting Islam.' His offence? Developing image-uploading software that was used - by others, he says - to post pornographic images. He was charged on a trip to Iran in 2008, and the country's high court has just reconfirmed his death sentence. During his time in prison he says he was stripped by interrogators, beaten, flogged and threatened with rape. Canadians who remember photojournalist Zahra Kazemi, who was beaten to death in 2003 in a Tehran prison after covering a student protest, will not find Malekpour's plight hard to believe. And he's not the only Canadian on death row. So is Toronto resident Hamid Ghassemi-Shall, on spy charges. The authorities may well be making an example of Malekpour to warn others - including political activists - away from using the Internet for unauthorized purposes." http://t.uani.com/xmGuJU |
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