Monday, January 21, 2013

Eye on Iran: Iran Could Begin Feeling a Further Squeeze on Its Oil Income Soon








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WashPost: "Ever since European seaports closed their gates to Iranian oil tankers last summer, Iran has looked to the East to keep its economy afloat. Countries such as China, India and South Korea - some of them critics of Western sanctions - have offered Iran a lifeline of reliable markets and much-needed dollars. But perhaps not for long. In just over two weeks, the Obama administration will begin enforcing a little-noticed statute that could dry up one of Iran's largest remaining sources of oil income, U.S. officials say. Beginning Feb. 6, Iran still will get paid for the oil it delivers to Asian markets, from Mumbai to Shanghai to Pusan - only not in cash. The law, part of a package of sanctions approved last year, requires that foreign governments keep any payments for Iranian oil locked up inside bank accounts in their own territory. Iran can use the money only to buy goods from the local economy, such as wheat or medicine or consumer goods. But it can't collect hard currency that could boost Iran's beleaguered economy back home, U.S. officials and analysts say. Administration officials have been quietly anticipating the impact of the new provisions, which could be the most significant since last summer's measures targeting Iran's oil and banking industry. A side benefit, officials say, is the potential impact on Iran's trading partners, which soon will have a compelling new economic interest in supporting tough sanctions against Iran. 'This is the next big shoe to drop,' said David S. Cohen, the Treasury Department's undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence. 'Most of these countries have large trade imbalances with Iran, and now Iran will have to find ways to spend all its oil earnings on their local economies.'" http://t.uani.com/VU9GLK

AP: "Iran has floated specific dates for reopening talks with the U.S. and other world powers about its nuclear program. At the same time, Tehran has left U.N. nuclear inspectors empty-handed when it comes to addressing Western suspicions that it's conducting tests related to nuclear weapons. Iran's split personality over creating space for possible nuclear concessions has complicated calculations by Washington and allies on whether to head back into negotiations more than six months after the last round ended in stalemate. But it also offers insight into Tehran's strategy as Western sanctions press harder on the economy, experts say. Iranian leaders know the only route to ease the economic pressures - and possibly undercut threats of military action by Israel - is through potential deal-making with six world powers - the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany. Making grand gestures to the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, would likely bring praise from the West, but it is unlikely to roll back sanctions, which have so far reduced Iran's critical oil exports by 45 percent. 'Tehran ... sees any cooperation with the IAEA as a potential bargaining chip that is better reserved for the talks that really matter,' said Suzanne Maloney, an Iranian affairs expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington. 'The Iranians want a payout and the IAEA cannot deliver that.'" http://t.uani.com/UJoH0w

NYT: "Although every year hundreds of convicts are hanged in Iran, a public hanging in a central park in Tehran is a rare event. Most hangings take place inside prisons, according to Iranian judicial officials and international human rights organizations. Sunday's execution in Park-e Honarmandan (Artists Park), near the crime scene, was part of a heavy-handed offensive by Iranian authorities, who say they are trying to prevent rising crime rates from getting out of hand by setting harsh examples. In recent weeks, public executions have been stepped up, and in several large cities the police have been rounding up what they call thugs and hooligans.  Police commanders and other officials blame government mismanagement of the economy - which they say has caused a rise in unemployment and inflation - for the increase in crime." http://t.uani.com/VifJHB
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Nuclear Program

Reuters: "Iran said it had made some progress in resolving its disputes with the U.N. atomic watchdog, state media reported, even though the two sides' latest talks failed to seal a deal on letting inspectors visit a military site. The Islamic state and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) met this week, but did not manage to revive an investigation into Iran's suspected nuclear arms research, the U.N. organization's officials said on Friday. Iran's ambassador to the body, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, later said some progress had been made in the talks, Press TV reported. 'We had two days of intensive talks and we were able to in fact bridge the gap to some extent,' Soltanieh was quoted as saying late on Friday... Soltanieh, however, stuck to Iran's stance that it would not stop uranium enrichment 'for a second.'" http://t.uani.com/Udcpi1

Sanctions

Reuters: "Iran's parliament voted 171 to 36 to investigate the country's central bank over its response to last year's currency crisis, parliamentary news agency Icana reported. Iranian media also reported on Sunday that Mahmoud Bahmani, Iran's central bank governor, had asked to leave his post, but there was no confirmation or denial from the central bank. The value of the Iranian rial against the U.S. dollar has plummeted in the last year following sanctions on the central bank and a European Union embargo on Iranian oil, believed to have curtailed Tehran's hard currency earnings. Critical legislators have accused the central bank of economic mismanagement for its handling of the currency's decline, including accusations that it did not provide the market with enough dollars to meet demand, helping to drive down the rial." http://t.uani.com/10eG8Xf

AP: "Iran's Intelligence Ministry says the West has launched a 'currency war' against Tehran to destabilize the Islamic Republic.The director of the ministry's economy department, who was unnamed in the Monday report from the semiofficial Fars agency, says that expanding domestic production can help counter Western sanctions imposed on Iran over its nuclear program." http://t.uani.com/VJWurz

Bloomberg: "China's imports of crude from Iran rebounded to the highest level in six months in December after the U.S. renewed an exemption from penalties on banks that process payments for the Persian Gulf nation's oil. China, the world's second-biggest crude consumer, bought 2.52 million metric tons of oil from Iran last month, according to figures from the General Administration of Customs today. That's up 43 percent from November, when purchases slipped 9.3 percent. Shipments averaged 596,000 barrels a day, the most since June, and advanced 3.6 percent from December 2011, the data showed." http://t.uani.com/WlE92C

WSJ: "A fleeing ship went back on the U.S. blacklist on Friday, proving the difficulty in enforcing some U.S. sanctions. The MV Amina, an Iranian-flagged cargo ship, was detained by Sri Lanka in December after Germany's DVB Bank SE obtained a court order to hold the vessel after the owners defaulted on a payment, according to a Reuters report. Following its detention, the U.S. Treasury Department, which blacklisted the ship in 2008, issued a general license in early January that authorized certain transactions 'related to the arrest, detention, and judicial sale' of the MV Amina... But the Reuters report said the ship fled, even after the Sri Lankan navy fired warning shots, and that it wasn't possible to immediately confirm the vessel's exact location. The report said it was unclear what cargo the vessel carried. On Friday, the U.S. Treasury Department revoked the license to conduct the transactions. 'We revoked the license because we learned that the Amina had escaped arrest in Sri Lanka,' said John Sullivan, a Treasury spokesman, in an email." http://t.uani.com/10ghxRW

Syrian Uprising

Reuters: "A senior aide to Iran's supreme leader warned against the overthrow of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad, saying his fate was a 'red line', in one of the Islamic state's strongest messages of support for the Damascus government. Iran has steadfastly backed Assad's rule since an uprising against his rule began almost two years ago and regards him as an important part of the axis of opposition against arch-foe Israel. 'If the Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is toppled, the line of resistance in the face of Israel will be broken,' Ali Akbar Velayati, who is seen as a potential contender in Iran's June presidential election, said in an interview broadcast on Sunday." http://t.uani.com/VU9a01

Human Rights

Fox News: "As her husband's trial and possible death sentence looms, the wife of an American Christian pastor imprisoned in Iran for evangelizing clings to hope and prays for a miracle. Naghmeh Abedini has been told by attorneys for her husband, Saeed, to expect the worst at Monday's trial, where the 32-year-old husband and father faces the capital charge of compromising national security. Supporters believe the charges are directly related to Abedini's work nearly a decade ago starting a house church movement in Iran, and the judge he'll face, Abbas Pir-Abassi, is infamous for sending defendants to the gallows. 'There is a lot going through my mind. I can never clear my head. I only sleep two hours a night,' Naghmeh Abedini told Foxnews.com by phone from her family's home near Boise. 'Unfortunately, he has been set up for failure and a harsh sentence because of his beliefs. His attorney says that the court has gathered a large amount of evidence against him.'" http://t.uani.com/WQqlLN

Amnesty International: "The execution in Iran this week of a 21-year-old man for a crime he allegedly committed while apparently still a juvenile shows a deplorable disregard for international law, Amnesty International said. According to state-run media agency Mehr, Ali (Kianoush) Naderi was executed in Raja'i Shahr Prison in Karaj, north-west of Tehran on Wednesday. He had been sentenced to death for his alleged role in the murder more than four years ago - when he was apparently still only 17 years old - of an elderly woman during the course of a burglary. Those under the age of 18 at the time of their alleged offence are considered to be children under international law and their execution is strictly prohibited." http://t.uani.com/WgWU6j

Foreign Affairs

AP: "A spokesman for Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard has criticized the 2011 storming of the British Embassy in Tehran, saying students and activists should 'avoid actions driven by emotion.' Gen. Ramezan Sharif says the Islamic Republic's enemies are plotting against the country, and that Iranians in turn must deal with their enemies 'more intelligently' and 'avoid shallow and emotional actions' that damage Iran's image abroad... Hard-line Iranian protesters stormed the British diplomatic compounds in November 2011." http://t.uani.com/UJo3jC

Guardian: "Depictions of foreign politicians are almost unknown, but last week an Iranian website showcased photographs of a dramatic new anti-Obama mural near the city's busy Valiasr Square. The image is of Barack Obama standing next to Shemr, a villain in Shia Islam, with a BBC-style caption at the bottom attributing to both men, in the years 2013 and 680 respectively, the loaded phrase: 'Be with us, be safe.' ... In the mural, Shemr extends a similar letter to the viewer, as he and Obama utter the words Ba ma bash - 'be with us' - playing on the president's name, and insinuating that anyone who still likes Obama in the wake of tightening sanctions - or who advocates meeting American, EU, or International Atomic Energy Agency demands over Iran's nuclear programme to avoid conflict - is a traitor to the faith. Obama, the state insists, is a 'Hussein' unworthy of loyalty." http://t.uani.com/SqkmRr

Opinion & Analysis

Ahmed Hashemi in The Times of Israel: "Iran's top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili recently said his country has agreed to resume talks on its nuclear program later this month. At the same time, the IAEA and the international community, particularly the European countries, have stepped up efforts to revitalize the futile negotiating process. During my four and a half years as an employee of the Iranian foreign ministry, I learned beyond doubt, that my country's participation in talks is purely a stalling tactic. Having fled to Turkey to seek political asylum, I know that I'm far from the first Iranian to try and warn the world of Tehran's determination to obtain weapons of mass destruction. It was almost a decade ago that the People's Mujahedin, Iran's leftist opposition in exile, first revealed the clandestine nuclear activities carried out by the regime, providing the exact addresses of some of the facilities, and letting the world know about the Islamic theocracy's true ambitions for acquiring nuclear bombs. Since then, Iran has attended dozens of negotiating rounds merely to convince naïve politicians and dewy-eyed peaceniks that it is telling the truth. Within this context, Tehran maintains that it is trying to use diplomatic means to prove that Iran is merely working to harness nuclear energy for peaceful purposes in order to meet increasing domestic energy demand as it runs out of fuel. Iran likewise exploits the matter at home, whipping up populist nationalism with leftist-style demagoguery that depicts its nuclear program as a cardinal matter of national pride. But a lie remains a lie, whether it is repeated ceaselessly in international forums or broadcast all day to the Iranian masses. While at the Iranian foreign ministry, I served as interpreter for visiting dignitaries, diplomats and officials. I paid close attention to public proclamations and official statements. And I was present at inner-circle conversations in which a number of high-profile Iranian officials made no secret of their intention to go atomic. I personally witnessed the following examples." http://t.uani.com/VfPCoC

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.

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