Eye on Iran: UN Nuclear Watchdog Sets Up "Iran Task Force"

For continuing coverage follow us on Twitter and join our Facebook group.    Top Stories Reuters: "The United Nations' nuclear watchdog has set up an Iran Task Force to handle inspections and other issues related to the Islamic state's disputed atomic activities, an internal IAEA document showed on Wednesday. The brief announcement by the International Atomic Energy Agency, addressed to agency staff, appeared to be an attempt to focus and streamline the IAEA's handling of the sensitive Iran file by concentrating experts and other resources in one unit. The Vienna-based U.N. agency, which regularly inspects Iran's nuclear sites, has voiced growing concern over the last year of possible military dimensions to the country's nuclear program. Tehran says its nuclear work is entirely peaceful." http://t.uani.com/PNRoIy AFP: "UN leader Ban Ki-moon will stress to Iranian leaders this week that they must take 'urgent' action on the country's nuclear drive and human rights, a UN spokesman said. The warning was given as Ban headed for Tehran to take part in the Non-Aligned Movement summit starting Wednesday. The United States and Israel said that Ban should not go to Iran. The UN secretary general will raise the 'clear concerns and expectations of the international community on the issues for which cooperation and progress are urgent for both regional stability and the Iranian people,' a UN spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters. 'These include Iran's nuclear program, terrorism, human rights and the crisis in Syria,' the spokesman added." http://t.uani.com/O2MqVm AP: "A news agency reports that Iran's top military commander is suing the U.S. for putting his name on its sanctions list. The semiofficial Fars news agency quoted Iran's chief of staff, Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi, as saying the U.S. opposes 'security and independence' for Iran. He said he has spent his life serving Iran and humanity, and the U.S. should be made to pay for the 'unwise' decision to list him... The U.S. put Firouzabadi's name on the sanctions list in 2011, charging he was involved in human rights abuses." http://t.uani.com/RYcXt5   Nuclear Program & Sanctions  Reuters: "The scope of a cyber espionage campaign targeting Iran and other parts of the Middle East has widened, even after security experts blew the operation's cover last month, according to the research firm that discovered the Mahdi Trojan. Israeli security company Seculert said that it has identified about 150 new Mahdi victims over the past six weeks as the developers of the virus have changed the code to evade detection from anti-virus programs. That has brought the total number of infections found so far to nearly 1,000, the bulk of them in Iran. 'These guys continue to work,' Seculert Chief Technology Officer Aviv Raff said via telephone from the company's headquarters in Israel." http://t.uani.com/QxuztY Bloomberg: "Tupras Petrol Rafinerileri AS (TUPRS), Turkey's sole refiner, said net income plunged 47 percent in the second quarter, missing estimates, as Iran oil sanctions shrank its refining margins. Net income fell to 135.7 million liras ($75.4 million) from 258.1 million liras in the second quarter of last year, the oil refiner, owned by Koc Holding AS (KCHOL), said today in a filing to the Istanbul Stock Exchange. That missed the average estimate of 142.4 million liras from 17 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Tupras cut oil purchases from Iran in the second quarter as the U.S. and Europe planned sanctions against the Persian Gulf country." http://t.uani.com/OwTlZC BBC: "US trade sanctions have led game maker Blizzard to cut off access to World of Warcraft (Wow) in Iran. Blizzard posted a statement to its player-forum site after hundreds of Iranian players said they had lost access to the game. Access was lost recently, it said, because it had 'tightened up its procedures' to comply with sanctions... Although the block on Wow has been imposed by Blizzard, other reports suggest a wider government ban might have been imposed. Players of Wow and other games, including Guild Wars, said when they had tried to log in they had been redirected to a page saying the connection had been blocked because the games promoted 'superstition and mythology.'" http://t.uani.com/NwKpFj Human Rights Guardian: "Iran's opposition has urged the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, to visit political prisoners and press the regime over its human rights record during a controversial trip to Tehran for a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement this week... Not far from the summit venue in north Tehran, a number of Iranian activists are behind bars in Tehran's notorious Evin prison. The opposition hopes to use the high-profile visits to highlight the plight of political prisoners, especially the regime's treatment of opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, who have been under house arrest for more than 18 months." http://t.uani.com/PsTnDq WSJ: "The Islamic Republic of Iran and its various opposition group are competing to capitalize on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's first visit to Iran on Wednesday. Mr. Ban is scheduled to be in Tehran until Friday to participate in this year's conference of the Non-Aligned Movement, which Iran is chairing and hosting. He is expected to meet with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other top Iranian officials... For Iran's opposition groups, from the pro-democracy Green Movement to reformers and royalists, Mr. Ban's visit put the regime under the international spotlight-one they hope to steal in part to raise allegations of Iran's human-rights violations." http://t.uani.com/UaYyXM Opinion & Analysis Thomas Friedman in NYT: "I find it very disturbing that one of the first trips by Egypt's newly elected president, Mohamed Morsi, will be to attend the Nonaligned Movement's summit meeting in Tehran this week. Excuse me, President Morsi, but there is only one reason the Iranian regime wants to hold the meeting in Tehran and have heads of state like you attend, and that is to signal to Iran's people that the world approves of their country's clerical leadership and therefore they should never, ever, ever again think about launching a democracy movement - the exact same kind of democracy movement that brought you, Mr. Morsi, to power in Egypt. In 2009, this Iranian regime literally killed the Green Revolution. It gunned down hundreds and jailed thousands of Iranians who wanted the one thing that Egyptians got: to have their votes counted honestly and the results respected. Morsi, who was brought to power by a courageous democracy revolution that neither he nor his Muslim Brotherhood party started - but who benefited from the free and fair election that followed - is lending his legitimacy to an Iranian regime that brutally crushed just such a movement in Tehran. This does not augur well for Morsi's presidency. In fact, he should be ashamed of himself. 'The Iranian regime has offered Morsi a sanitized tour of its nuclear facilities' noted Karim Sadjadpour, the Iran expert at the Carnegie Endowment. 'As a former political prisoner in Mubarak's Egypt, Morsi should also request a visit to Tehran's notorious Evin prison. It will remind him of his own past, and offer him a glimpse of Iran's future.' Egyptian officials say Morsi is only stopping in Tehran for a few hours to hand over the presidency of the Nonaligned Movement to Iran from Egypt. Really? He could have done that by mail. It would have sent a powerful democratic message. By the way, what is the Nonaligned Movement anymore? ... Is Morsi nonaligned in that choice? Is he nonaligned when it comes to choosing between democracies and dictatorships - especially the Iranian one that is so complicit in crushing the Syrian rebellion as well? And by the way, why is Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, lending his hand to this Iranian whitewashing festival? What a betrayal of Iranian democrats." http://t.uani.com/OqpuQN   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.