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Top Stories
WSJ:
"Iran's chief nuclear negotiator said Iran wouldn't compromise on
its right to enrich uranium, casting doubts on whether the country could
reach a deal during talks with international powers in Moscow this month.
Saeed Jalili, the negotiator, updated lawmakers in Iran's parliament on
Wednesday over the status of the country's nuclear talks, in a speech
that was aired live on radio and published by official media. Mr.
Jalili's narrative of several rounds of nuclear talks dating to last year
suggested a hardening of Iran's position. The diplomat, who represents
the views of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, dismissed a
suspension of uranium enrichment, a central demand of the international
powers. The diplomat said Iran had recently threatened to pull out of the
talks if they only focus on the nuclear issue and don't address Iran's
other concerns such as human rights in Bahrain and piracy in the Persian
Gulf. He said Tehran only changed its mind after Catherine Ashton, the
European Union's Foreign Secretary, called him Monday to reassure him
Iran's concerns were on the table." http://t.uani.com/M5yJn6
JPost:
"A US-based pressure group accused a British company this week of
facilitating Iran's human rights abuses by providing broadcasting
services to the Islamic Republic's state media. United Against Nuclear
Iran (UANI) said it has ramped up its campaign to get UK communications
infrastructure company Arqiva to stop broadcasting and transmitting
networks operated by the state-controlled Islamic Republic of Iran
Broadcasting (IRIB)... 'By facilitating IRIB's broadcast of libelous
programs and hate speech against religious minorities, forced confessions
of peaceful dissidents and civil society activists, and show trials of
political prisoners, Arqiva is serving to further the Iranian regime's
campaign of persecution and repression against its own citizens,' [UANI
President Kristen] Silverberg wrote." http://t.uani.com/KDe9dD
Reuters:
"South Korea has imposed curbs on exports to Iran - mainly steel,
cars and electronics - to reduce its risk of payment defaults as western
sanctions disrupt Iranian oil exports, highlighting the growing risk of
doing business with the Islamic Republic. The move to limit the trade
exposure of Asia's fourth-largest economy, which sold $1.7 billion of
goods in Iran in the first quarter of this year, was announced by South
Korea's leading trade and business body and came into effect this week.
Fresh export deals to Iran will be approved only if their payment period
is within 180 days to reduce uncertainty in payment settlement, the Korea
International Trade Association (KITA) said in a statement on its web
site. 'This is temporary to prepare for the situation that Iranian crude
imports do not go smoothly, and it will be lifted if the trading
condition with Iran improves sharply,' KITA said... Export quotas could
be imposed on products including Samsung Electronics' mobile phones and
Hyundai Motor's vehicles, a source has told Reuters." http://t.uani.com/LMGOR3
 Nuclear Program
AP: "Proposals from both Iran and the
group of six world powers will be on the table for nuclear talks in
Moscow next week, not just the West's demand to halt Iran's highest level
uranium enrichment, Iran's top negotiator said Wednesday. Saeed Jalili said
the European Union's foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, has agreed
the negotiations will include Iranian proposals. The two days of talks
are scheduled to begin Monday, two weeks before the European Union is set
to impose a full embargo on Iranian oil imports." http://t.uani.com/K4QT6F
AFP:
"The United States called Wednesday for a united front with China
against Iran's nuclear program as it debates whether to slap sanctions on
the Asian power over oil purchases from the Islamic republic. The United
States has exempted 18 nations but not China from tough sanctions that
come into effect on June 28 on countries that buy oil from Iran, which
Israel and some Western officials accuse of building a nuclear weapon.
Kurt Campbell, the top State Department official on East Asia, said that
the United States and China were 'right in the middle' of talks about
Iran and did not answer a question on whether Beijing would receive an
exemption." http://t.uani.com/LWvTAC
Daily Telegraph:
"North Korea may have used a launch-pad in Iran to test a new
missile capable of hitting American bases in the Pacific island of Guam,
according to reports from Japan and South Korea. The missile, named after
the Musudan testing range in North Korea, was recently shown off to the
public at a vast military parade in the capital, Pyongyang, according to
the reports. South Korean and American intelligence reports suggest that
the weapon may then have been tested in Iran, with which North Korea is
known to have military links. The Musudan missile had not been previously
recorded. North Korea has a known capacity to build short and
medium-range missiles, including the Taepodong-1 which it fired over
Japan in 1998 to the alarm of Tokyo and its allies in Washington." http://t.uani.com/LnN2m0
Sanctions
WSJ:
"Japan, looking to secure a steady energy supply, is pressing the
European Union to loosen pending sanctions that would prohibit European
firms from insuring its imports of Iranian oil, according to people
familiar with the effort. After significant reductions of purchases,
Japan still gets about 3% of its crude from Iran, and 90% of such tanker
voyages are reinsured by companies based in the EU. Those insurance
contracts come to a halt on July 1, when EU sanctions go into effect
prohibiting EU-based companies from insuring or reinsuring ships carrying
Iranian oil. The sanctions also include a ban on imports of Iranian oil
to Europe. Though the Japanese government has introduced legislation that
would allow it to cover tankers carrying Iranian crude in the case of an
accident, Japanese officials said such a law probably wouldn't be passed
in time to come into effect by July 1... Germany-based Munich Re, the
world's largest reinsurer, will stop reinsurance for ships carrying
Iranian oil exports on July 1, a spokeswoman said. 'Munich Re will of
course continue to monitor future international developments regarding
sanctions against Iran and comply with all applicable sanction
regulations,' she said." http://t.uani.com/OEEY3a
Reuters:
"It is no exaggeration to say the impact of the pending U.S. and
European sanctions against Iran are one of the most taboo subjects at an
OPEC meeting in years. A visitor from Mars could well walk away from the
day to day events in Vienna under the impression that the impending U.S.
and European sanctions regimes has nothing to do with Iranian oil
exports. Ministers and delegates are extremely reticent to discuss the
subject of the sanctions, set to take effect July 1, which may well force
Tehran, OPEC's No. 2 producer, to slash output. Already Iranian crude
shipments are down by an estimated 1 million barrels per day, according
to the International Energy Agency, as Tehran's customers in Europe and
Asia cut back purchases ahead of the sanctions... How can it be that oil prices
have fallen $30 a barrel at the same time as 1 million bpd of Iranian oil
exports have been knocked out of the market?, delegates ask." http://t.uani.com/M794um
Human Rights
Guardian:
"Amnesty International has warned against the imminent execution of
five members of Iran's Ahwazi Arab minority convicted of 'enmity against
God'. Abd al-Rahman Heidari, Taha Heidari, Jamshid Heidari along with
Mansour Heidari and Amir Muawi were sentenced to death in April 2011 on
charge of killing a law enforcement official. Three of the men are
brothers. Amnesty says the men, who come from Iran's southern province of
Khuzestan, were all tried 'unfairly' and moved to an unknown location at
the weekend, prompting fears that they may face imminent execution."
http://t.uani.com/KvhgZN
Foreign Affairs
NYT:
"Russia and Iran, Syria's staunchest allies, castigated the United
States on Wednesday for its support of opposition forces battling
President Bashar al-Assad and his military, and the Iranians accused the
Americans and their allies of sending weapons and troops into Syria.
Iran's foreign minister Ali Akbar Salehi, and his Russian counterpart,
Sergey V. Lavrov, spoke about Syria at a news conference in Tehran, where
Mr. Lavrov was consulting with senior Iranian officials. Both denied
Western accusations that Russia and Iran were seeking to destabilize
Syria. The Russian foreign minister reiterated Russia's longstanding
denial of American accusations that his country is sending helicopter
gunships to Syria, which will help government troops to fight the
opposition. Mr. Lavrov said that Russia was 'honoring military contracts'
with the Syrian government, but only sending 'antiaircraft
weapons.'" http://t.uani.com/KDbT6b
Reuters:
"Iran's clerical leadership never misses a chance to parade on the
international stage and it has been buoyed by suggestions the
oil-producing nation of 75 million might join a group of global powers
intended to revive peace efforts in Syria. The reality however is a
little different. The Islamic Republic appears to be running out of
options if it is to maintain its influence in Syria and by extension its
ability to manipulate events across the Middle East. Wedded to President
Bashar al-Assad's bloody crackdown against Syrian rebels, distrusted by opposition
groups and sanctioned by Western nations over its controversial nuclear
program, Iran's top authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has little room to
maneuver, say diplomats and analysts. The only real tool left in Iran's
locker would seem to be raising the fear - and arguably an implied threat
- of protracted and bloody civil conflict in Syria." http://t.uani.com/LER6li
AP:
"Iran once saw the Arab Spring uprisings as a prime opportunity,
hoping it would open the door for it to spread its influence in countries
whose autocratic leaders long shunned Tehran's ruling clerics. But it is
finding the new order no more welcoming. Egypt is a prime example. Egypt
has sporadically looked more friendly toward Iran since the ouster of
Hosni Mubarak 16 months ago, and the rise of the Islamists here fueled
the expectations of Tehran's clerical regime that it could make inroads.
Instead, it has been met with the deep mistrust felt by many in mainly
Sunni Muslim Egypt toward non-Arab, Shiite-dominated Iran - as well as
Cairo's reluctance to sacrifice good relations with Iran's rivals, the
United States and the oil-rich Arab nations of the Gulf." http://t.uani.com/LnJznw
Reuters:
"British foreign minister William Hague met his Iranian counterpart
on Thursday, ISNA news agency reported, the highest level diplomatic
contact between the two nations since the storming of the British embassy
in Tehran late last year. Iranian protesters broke into two British
diplomatic compounds in Tehran in November, ransacking offices and
burning British flags in protest against new sanctions imposed by Britain
on Iran. The incident sparked a major row between the two countries, with
Britain shutting its embassy in Tehran before Hague expelled all Iranian
diplomats from London saying there had been 'some degree of regime
consent' in the attack." http://t.uani.com/M79fDT
Opinion &
Analysis
Nicholas Kristof
in NYT: "My 1,700-mile road trip across Iran began
with a giddy paean to America, reinforcing my view that at the
grass-roots level, this may be the most pro-American nation in the Middle
East. 'We love America!' gushed a former military commando, now a
clothing seller, my first evening in the spiritual center of Mashhad. He
was so carried away that I thought he might hug me, and although he
acknowledged that his business was suffering greatly from Western
sanctions, he said he blamed his own leaders. 'I can't blame America,' he
said. 'I love America too much.' That was far from a universal view. I
encountered many Iranians - especially in the countryside - who strongly
support the Iranian authorities and resent what they see as American
government bullying. But while Iranians are far from monolithic, one
feature was ubiquitous: the warmth of Iranians when they discovered I was
American. We passed occasional 'Death to America' signs, but our trip was
slowed by hospitality, for Iranians kept giving us presents or inviting
us into their homes. And in the security line to board a flight from
Tehran to Mashhad, a Revolutionary Guard said genially, 'We're not
supposed to let batteries through, but we'll make an exception for you
since you're a foreigner.' The Iranian government gave me a very rare
journalist visa, along with permission to drive unescorted across the
country on a government-approved route from Mashhad in the east to Tabriz
in the west, and back to Tehran. I interviewed people at random along the
way, and as far as I could tell I was not tailed. Compared with my last
visit, in 2004, people seem more discontented - mainly because of
economic difficulties caused in part by Western sanctions. Those
sanctions are causing bitter pain, yet a surprising number of Iranians
seem to largely blame their own leaders for the woes. Another difference
from my last visit: People are more scared now. Iranians feel fairly free
to gripe about their leaders, even within earshot of others, yet since
the 2009 crackdown there has been a red line: anything approaching
activism, including public criticism. One blogger is serving a 15-year
prison sentence, and Iranians have been jailed just for giving interviews
to foreign journalists. As a result, Iranians are more wary now of being
quoted or shown in videos... To me, Iran feels like other authoritarian
countries I covered before they toppled. My guess is that the demise of
the system is a matter of time - unless there's a war between Iran and
the West, perhaps ignited by Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear sites.
That, I sense, would provoke a nationalist backlash and rescue the
ayatollahs." http://t.uani.com/OEzFAZ
Thomas Joscelyn in
The Weekly Standard: "Putting that debate to the
side, there are interesting nuggets in Rodriguez's recent book, Hard
Measures, concerning top al Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah's ties to
Iran... Rodriguez's revelations about Zubaydah's ties to Iran, including
his putative plan to move there, are not surprising. Zubaydah helped
other top al Qaeda operatives and associates relocate to Iran after the
9/11 attacks. A one-page biography of Zubaydah prepared by the U.S.
government reads: 'In November 2001, Abu Zubaydah helped smuggle
now-deceased al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al Zarqawi and some 70
Arab fighters out of Kandahar, Afghanistan, into Iran.' Zarqawi will
always be remembered for his vehement hatred of Shiites. The Iranians did
not imprison him, however, but instead allowed him to make his way onto
Iraq, bringing mayhem and chaos with him. There is evidence that Zarqawi
coordinated his network's activities from Iranian soil for a time. Ali
Saleh Husain, an al Qaeda operative who worked with Zubaydah, also helped
relocate al Qaeda operatives and their family members to Iran in late
2001... Iran clearly provided a hospitable operating environment for
Zubaydah and his colleagues. It is no wonder that Zubaydah himself, per
Rodriguez's testimony, may have planned to move there. Some of have
seized on the tensions between Iran and al Qaeda that arose later, after
the Iranians did not release some al Qaeda members from house arrest in a
timely manner. Those tensions, reflected in a narrow set of Osama bin
Laden's documents released to the public, were very real, but they do not
define the entire relationship. Iran and al Qaeda cooperated both before
and since. Nearly all of the materials in the U.S. government's
possession pertaining to Iran's ties to al Qaeda, including Zubaydah's
videos, should be declassified and released to the public." http://t.uani.com/LWAjYk
Jeffrey Goldberg
in The Atlantic: "Gen. Benny Gantz, the chief of
staff of the Israel Defense Forces, spoke out last week against
ex-military and intelligence officials who are expressing doubts about
the efficacy of a preemptive Israeli military strike on Iran's nuclear
project. Gantz, testifying in the Knesset, said, 'There is a lot of
chatter and conversation regarding Iran. Very few people know what is
real and what is not, or what can be and what cannot be.' Gantz named no
names, but his targets were quite obviously three men: his predecessor as
chief of staff, Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi; the former head of the Shabak, Israel's
internal security service, Yuval Diskin; and Meir Dagan, the recently
retired chief of the Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence service. It is
Dagan who has taken the lead in criticizing his former boss, the prime
minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the defense minister, Ehud Barak, for
contemplating a preemptive aerial strike. Dagan came out of the gate
early and strong, stating, in early 2011, shortly after his retirement (a
retirement that was forced by Netanyahu), that attacking Iran is a
'stupid idea.' He has not let up since. For those of us who have asked,
on occasion, whether Netanyahu and Barak are actually preparing to strike
Iran or are simply trying to bluff the international community, Dagan's
harsh, and repeated, statements about the plans of the current government
need to be taken seriously: Dagan believes firmly that Bibi and Barak are
not bluffing. Which is why he is so agitated. Earlier this month, I
accompanied David Bradley, the chairman and owner of the Atlantic Media
Company, on a visit to Dagan's Tel Aviv apartment in order to discuss the
Iran issue... In our hour-long conversation, Dagan outlined his many
objections to the idea of an Israeli strike, but he began by disavowing
the notion that he is anything like a dove. He does not believe that
Israel could easily survive in a Middle East dominated by a nuclear Iran,
and he believes that the Iranian regime might not be entirely rational,
that elements of the Islamic Republic's leadership might be motivated by
extreme eschatalogical beliefs to contemplate committing unthinkable
acts. In other words, Dagan is someone who takes seriously the genocidal
threats of Iranian leaders, and their nuclear intentions - 'Iran has come
to the conclusion that it needs a bomb' -- and it is for this reason that
he made himself the principal architect of Israel's program of
anti-Iranian sabotage, subterfuge and cyberwarfare (the last one being
run jointly with the United States, as David Sanger has recently shown.)
... All this is to say that Meir Dagan is not a pacifist. He told David
and me explicitly that the threat of military action should be held out
as an absolute last resort, but he is angry that Israeli leaders have
turned what should be understood as a problem for the entire world into a
specifically Israeli issue. 'We made a huge mistake by making this our
problem,' he said... Dagan believes that sanctions may still yet work,
especially the sort of sanctions, combined with sabotage programs, that
threaten the stability of the regime. If the Iranian economy is squeezed
in a way that causes average citizens to rise up against their
government's policies, Dagan believes that the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah
Khamenei, might be forced to shelve his nuclear ambitions. And Dagan
believes the tempo of sabotage should, if anything, be increased. 'Covert
operations have a better impact on proliferation than an attack.,' he
said." http://t.uani.com/LWBzus
Ilan Berman in The
Diplomat: "So much for Chinese cooperation on Iran,
it would seem. Just a few months ago, the Chinese government seemed to be
on track for a very public divorce from its third largest energy
supplier. But now, China appears to be reverting to type. In April,
China's imports of Iranian crude nearly doubled, surging some 48 percent
to reach 1.6 metric tons. That spike effectively reverses the trend seen
since this winter, in which China - leery of mounting Western economic
pressure against Iran and attendant penalties on its energy clients - had
begun to trim its energy commerce with the Islamic Republic. Nor does it
seem to be an anomaly; experts predict that Iran's oil exports to China
will return to regular levels in coming months, striking a significant
blow to U.S. and European efforts to isolate Iran in the process. Crude
purchases aren't the only way Beijing is helping Tehran to weather
Western sanctions. In recent weeks, as U.S. and European sanctions on
Iran have begun to bite in earnest, China's government has stepped into
the void left by fleeing foreign partners. China's shippers, for example,
have capitalized on the lack of market competition to do a thriving
business carrying Iranian oil. Chinese insurers, meanwhile, increasingly
have supplanted skittish Western underwriters and guaranteed Iran's
foreign crude export shipments. What accounts for Beijing's backsliding?
Economic considerations certainly play a role. Iran has long served as a
key supplier of energy to China, and its output remains crucial to
China's economy. Despite some success in diversifying its energy sources
over the past two years, Iran is still estimated to provide China with
nearly 12 percent of its total annual foreign crude. That makes Iran
roughly as significant for China, in energy terms, as Saudi Arabia is for
the United States. It's also why Chinese officials have been quick to
declare that, notwithstanding a looming European ban on Iranian oil (now
slated to take effect July 1) and U.S. threats of economic penalties,
'the volume of our shipments will not drop.' But politics are also bound
to figure prominently in China's calculus. China is a member of the
'P5+1' group, and as such has watched firsthand the frenzied diplomatic
efforts of the United States and its European allies for a negotiated
settlement with Tehran over its nuclear ambitions. As of this writing,
recent talks (first in Istanbul and most recently in Baghdad) have set up
a protracted negotiating track that has, however temporarily, slowed
Western efforts to apply economic pressure to Iran. In the process, it
has provided the Iranian regime with much-needed breathing room to
continue its nuclear effort." http://t.uani.com/MIUM28
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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
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