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Top Stories
Reuters:
"Six world powers see a chance that Iran's relatively moderate new
president, beset by sanctions and worried about unrest in the region
trickling home, may be more amenable to compromise in a long-standing
nuclear dispute, a senior Western diplomat said. The powers - Russia,
China, France, Britain, Germany and the United States - are hoping years
of economic pressure will finally force Iran to scale back its nuclear
work, which they suspect aims at allowing Tehran to make bombs.
President-elect Hassan Rouhani won the June 14 election largely on a
promise of repairing the economy, and will be under pressure in the
coming months to deliver, the diplomat said. He would be mindful that
without progress and at least some relief from sanctions, which would
require the scaling back of Iran's nuclear work, his public support could
quickly wane. 'Rouhani's election could provide an opportunity and we are
expecting to see a change in tone,' the diplomat said, who spoke on
condition of anonymity but has close knowledge of the issue." http://t.uani.com/1bDEQz7
The Citizen
(Tanzania): "Tanzania could find itself in an
awkward diplomatic position again following revelations that Iran is now
using the country's national identity to evade sanctions imposed on its
oil tankers. Shipping intelligence data indicate that Iranian vessels and
other ships blacklisted by the US are using signals assigned to Tanzania.
Under this cover, the tankers no longer fly the Tanzanian flag. But the
ploy has been exposed by their continued use of the signal that
identifies Tanzania in international shipping traffic... On Thursday, a
New York-based watchdog organisation which played a key role in exposing
links between Tanzania's flag and Iran's tankers said the new scheme also
involves Very Large Crude Carriers. United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI)
officials said in an email to this paper that data they had seen
indicated that 32 NITC tankers currently signalling Tanzanian flags
delivered over the past few months. 'We are particularly concerned with
the role that a US-based company, Philtex, seems to be playing in this
flagging. As the agent of the Tanzania Zanzibar ship registry, it seems
that Philtex is continuously granting Tanzanian flagging rights to the
NITC's newest and most capable super tankers, in violation of US sanctions,'
UANI official Nathan Carleton told The Citizen on Sunday." http://t.uani.com/135LJAX
CNN:
"The European Union forged a political agreement Monday to list the
military wing of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, a European
diplomat told CNN. The Iranian-backed Lebanese Shiite group, which is a
strong force in Lebanese politics, already is regarded as a terrorist
organization by the United States and Israel. There had been political
pressure to put the entire group on the terror list amid developments in
Bulgaria and Cyprus. The designation would put asset freezes on Hezbollah
entities. The Bulgarians cited evidence that Hezbollah's military wing
was involved in a terror attack last year killing five Israeli tourists
and a Bulgarian bus driver. In Cyprus earlier this year, a court found a
Hezbollah member guilty of assisting in the planning of an attack on
Israel. Lately, its fighters have sided with Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad in that country's civil war." http://t.uani.com/1bWrpsH
Nuclear Program
AP:
"Iran's top leader said Sunday he has not prohibited talks with the
U.S. but urged caution with any possible dialogue, describing the
American government as untrustworthy... 'I said earlier this year that
I'm not optimistic about talks with the U.S.,' said Supreme Leader
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 'although I didn't prohibit dialogue on specific
issues such as Iraq in the past years.' He told outgoing President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other top government officials in Tehran,
'Americans are untrustworthy and illogical. They are not honest in their
dealings.' ... 'The art in interaction with the world is to continue your
path without the other party being able to stop you. If interaction with
the world causes retreat from the path, it is a loss,' he said." http://t.uani.com/1bV0ttn
RFE/RL:
"More than 120 members of the U.S. Congress have signed a
letter calling on President Barack Obama to reengage Iran diplomatically
over its nuclear program following the election of the Islamic republic's
next president. The letter's authors -- a bipartisan pair of lawmakers,
Charles Dent (Republican-Pennsylvania) and David Price (Democrat-North
Carolina) -- plan to send it to the White House on July 19... Suzanne
Maloney, a former State Department expert on Iran at the Brookings
Institution, says the letter is an important gesture. But she says it
doesn't represent 'a tsunami' in favor of a dramatic new overture to
Tehran. 'I think there has always been at least a minority of support for
diplomacy with Iran,' she says. 'But there is likely to remain a very
strong majority supportive of increasing pressure on Iran so long as
there is no agreement on the nuclear issue.' Maloney says any U.S.
concessions on the nuclear issue will depend on Tehran's moves. 'Of
course Iranians want to see something dramatic on our side, but the
likelihood of either the administration or certainly the Congress
supporting preemptive concessions or dramatic sanctions relaxation prior
to any moves on the Iranian side is just, I think, worrisomely
unrealistic,' she explains." http://t.uani.com/1325J6w
Sanctions
Reuters:
"Iran denied on Sunday it had failed to make payments on its loans
to the World Bank for the last six months, blaming Western sanctions for
preventing an intermediary from forwarding funds to the global lender,
Iran's IRNA state news agency said. The World Bank said on Thursday it
was placing Iran's loans in non-performing status as Tehran had not paid
back any of the money it owed for more than six months. The designation
from the World Bank, often a lender of last resort to cash-strapped
governments, means Iran will be ineligible for any new World Bank funds
and may find it even harder to get money from commercial creditors. Iran
owed the bank $697 million on June 30, of which $79 million was
overdue." http://t.uani.com/16TvMz1
Bloomberg:
"The Iranian rial appreciated 6 percent in the past week, on hopes
the U.S. may delay further sanctions on Iran following the election of
its new president, Hassan Rohani, the Shargh newspaper reported. Since
Rohani's June 14 election, Iranians have been selling dollars they bought
over the past year while the domestic currency was tumbling amid
sanctions, the Tehran-based newspaper said. The rial reached 30,500
yesterday after more than 120 members of the U.S. Congress signed a
letter last week calling on President Barack Obama to engage Iran
diplomatically, according to the daily." http://t.uani.com/1bV14Lm
WSJ:
"Iraq has signed a deal with its former Gulf War foe Iran to import
Iranian natural gas to feed its power plants near Baghdad in a step aimed
at easing the country's electricity shortages, an Iraqi government
spokesman said Monday. Under the four-year deal signed in Baghdad Sunday
night, Baghdad will buy some 850 million cubic feet a day of Iranian
natural gas at international prices to feed two power plants in a
northeastern suburb of Baghdad to generate 2,500 megawatts, said Mussab
al-Mudaris, a spokesman for the Iraqi ministry of electricity." http://t.uani.com/18v4bYd
Azer News:
"First American cars which have been imported by El Khodro Aras
Company arrived in Tehran's Imam Khomaini International Airport, Mehr
news agency reported. Imported cars (Convertible 2LT RS Package 2013
Camaro which is manufactured by General Motors) were transported from
State of Miami to Paris and then to Tehran by Qatar Airways, the report
said. Iran's Aras Free Trade - Industrial Zone (AFZ) is shown as the
final destination of cargos in the documents submitted to the U.S.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP), because CBP does not allow new car
exports in order to protect regional products (South Korea's GM)." http://t.uani.com/1aDU9Vu
Syrian Civil War
Reuters:
"The civil war in Syria is widening a rift between top Shi'ite
Muslim clergy in Iraq and Iran who have taken opposing stands on whether
or not to send followers into combat on President Bashar al-Assad's side.
Competition for leadership of the Shi'ite community has intensified since
the U.S.-led invasion of 2003 toppled Saddam Hussein, empowering majority
Shi'ites through the ballot box and restoring the Iraqi holy city of
Najaf to prominence. In Iran's holy city of Qom, senior Shi'ite clerics,
or Marjiiya, have issued fatwas (edicts) enjoining their followers to
fight in Syria, where mainly Sunni rebels are fighting to overthrow Assad,
whose Alawite sect derives from Shi'ite Islam... The Syrian war has
polarized Sunnis and Shi'ites across the Middle East - but has also
spotlighted divisions within each of Islam's two main denominations,
putting Qom and Najaf at odds and complicating intra-Shi'ite relations in
Iraq. In Najaf, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who commands unswerving
loyalty from most Iraqi Shi'ites and many more worldwide, has refused to
sanction fighting in a war he views as political rather than religious.
Despite Sistani's stance, some of Iraq's most influential Shi'ite
political parties and militia, who swear allegiance to Iranian Supreme
Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have answered his call to arms and sent
their disciples into battle in Syria." http://t.uani.com/135M0nf
Terrorism
Politico:
"The U.S. made a serious mistake by not responding more assertively
to an alleged Iranian plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United
States in a bomb attack on a popular Washington restaurant, just-retired
CENTCOM commander James Mattis said Saturday... 'When we finally caught
them in the act of trying to kill Adel, we had a beleaguered attorney
general, a fine man but beleaguered politically, stand up and give a
legal argument that frankly I couldn't understand,' Mattis said at the
Aspen Security Forum. 'We caught them in the act and yet we let them walk
free.' Without being specific, Mattis suggested Iran should have suffered
some more serious consequence for being behind the alleged plot." http://t.uani.com/18ymwai
Human Rights
Iran Human Rights:
"One prisoner was hanged in the prison of Khoramabad (western Iran)
yesterday morning July 20, reported the Iranian state media. The prisoner
who was not identified by name was convicted of possession and
trafficking of 1122 kilograms of opium, said the report. This is the
first execution reported by the official Iranian sources in the holy
month of Ramadan." http://t.uani.com/1dODIVV
Domestic
Politics
FT:
"Hassan Rohani, the moderate cleric and president-elect, faces an
economy in crisis thanks to sanctions over the country's nuclear
programme and mismanagement by Mr Ahmadi-Nejad, and an international
community pushing for compromise on the nuclear issue, with Israel
threatening military action if there is no progress. Yet his biggest
challenge may be ensuring he has the full backing of the supreme leader,
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Not only does the ayatollah have the last say in
all state affairs but he is the only figure who can control the country's
radical forces, notably the elite Revolutionary Guards, whose political
and economic interests could be undermined by the new government. That
support is crucial. Five weeks after Mr Rohani's surprise victory, many
Iranians - they assume that the regime, rather than the ballot box,
controlled the result - are still speculating about why the supreme
leader allowed the moderate figure to win the crucial election whose
results could affect nuclear policies... Analysts say the ayatollah
realised that the popular uprisings convulsing the region and Iranians'
growing frustration at the impact of sanctions on their daily lives could
put his regime's survival at risk, leaving him with no choice but to be
flexible." http://t.uani.com/1dPGQB2
AP:
"An influential Iranian ex-president is calling for deep changes in
the country's foreign policy, saying Iran can no longer remain 'angry
with the world.' The statement by Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is an
unusually pointed criticism of the combative style of outgoing President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose critics say has internationally isolated Iran.
Rafsanjani made the remarks during a meeting with university teachers in
Tehran that was posted on his website, hashemirafsanjani.ir, on
Monday." http://t.uani.com/15b6FK2
Foreign Affairs
AP:
"Iran's foreign ministry says the Islamic Republic has sent
invitations to all the world's leaders to attend the Aug. 4 inauguration
of its new president. Spokesman Abbas Araghchi was quoted by the
semiofficial ISNA news agency as saying Sunday that American and European
leaders and officials were among those invited to the swearing-in of
Hasan Rouhani. Rouhani has pledged to follow a 'path of moderation' and
promised greater openness over the country's nuclear program, which has
placed it at odds with the West." http://t.uani.com/17wz51a
AFP:
"Iran on Sunday voiced opposition to a US-mediated resumption of
peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, predicting the Jewish
state would never agree to withdraw from occupied Arab lands. Tehran
'along with Palestinian groups expresses its opposition to the proposed
plan and it's certain that the occupying Zionist regime will utterly not
agree to withdraw from the occupied lands,' foreign ministry spokesman
Abbas Araqchi said, quoted by Iranian media. 'Past experience shows that
the occupying Zionist regime is basically not ready to pay the price for
peace since war mongering and occupation lie at its very core,' he
added." http://t.uani.com/1bV1v8v
Opinion &
Analysis
John Hannah &
Nouriel Roubini in Reuters: "The domestic benefits
of the U.S. oil production boom are well documented - everything from the
creation of high-paying jobs to sending less money to foreign oil
producers. Less well appreciated are the geopolitical benefits. U.S. oil
production has already paid foreign policy dividends in at least one
vital area: It has paved the way for stronger sanctions on Iran by
helping to keep the global oil market well-supplied and minimizing oil
price volatility. This development is timely and instructive. By the
first half of 2014, according to credible estimates, Iran is likely to be
able to covertly produce enough highly enriched uranium for one nuclear
device in as little as seven to 10 days - before it could be detected by
the international community. While it remains unclear how close Iran is
to nuclear weapons capability, the consensus is that the window for
preventing it from happening is closing. The most effective way to
inflict economic pressure on Tehran, most analysts say, is to target the
Iranian petroleum industry. Crude oil exports account for between 60
percent and 70 percent of government revenue, more than $600 billion over
the past decade. Yet for much of the history of the Iran sanctions
program, simple steps that could have constricted or even eliminated this
cash flow were not taken. Across the globe, oil demand had been growing
quickly, spare production capacity was low, and new supplies were harder
to find. So the world market needed Iranian oil, and petroleum-dependent
economies across the globe - including the United States - were afraid of
the devastating price shocks that could have accompanied any effort to
remove barrels from the market. This dynamic began changing dramatically
in 2012. Most important, oil production surged in nations outside the
Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries - particularly in the
United States and Canada, where combined oil output grew by nearly 1.3
million barrels per day and outpaced global demand growth. Other factors
were also key, notably Saudi Arabia's decision not to cut crude production
as Libyan output returned to the market following the fall of the Muammar
Gaddafi regime in 2011. At the same time, global oil demand growth had
slowed substantially, with much of the euro zone facing an economic
crisis and stagnant growth in the United States. By mid-2012, the market
was facing the surprising prospect of a sizeable glut in oil supplies.
These developments were critical in allowing the United States to
implement new, tougher sanctions in early 2012 that drove year-over-year
Iranian crude exports down by nearly 15 percent in the first quarter
alone. A complete European embargo, effective July 1, 2012, had a more
dramatic effect - cutting Iranian crude exports by nearly 60 percent in
the third quarter. All told, Iranian crude production in 2012 fell to its
lowest level since 1989. For the first time, Western sanctions began to
inflict real pain on Iran's economy... Analysts disagree about how long
oil markets can withstand the loss of Iranian oil supplies. Markets will
inevitably tighten, perhaps as soon as mid-2014. Yet, time is running out
on peaceful options to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
Favorable oil market conditions, led by the surge in U.S. production,
have opened a unique window to strengthen sanctions and maximize pressure
on Tehran to abandon nuclear ambitions. Policymakers, who rightly seek to
avoid being forced to choose between living with a nuclear Iran or going
to war, should be prepared to seize this opportunity before it is too
late." http://t.uani.com/1bWsvER
Khaled Yacoub
Oweis in Reuters: "Military support from Iran and
its Shi'ite ally Hezbollah has given Syrian President Bashar al-Assad new
impetus in his fight against the insurgents intent on ousting him, but at
a price. Assad now risks losing much of his autonomy to Tehran and
becoming a pawn in a wider sectarian war between Sunni Muslims and
Shi'ites that may not end even if he is forced to step down, military
experts and diplomats in the region say. Having lost thousands of troops
and militiamen from his Alawite sect as the war grinds through its third
year, and anxious to preserve his elite loyalist units, Assad is now
relying on Hezbollah from Lebanon and other Shi'ite militias allied with
Iran to turn the tide of battle. Alawite army units with their vast
arsenal of artillery and missiles have been taking a back seat in combat,
using these weapons supported by the air force to obliterate rebellious
neighborhoods and blow holes in rebel lines for Iranian-and
Hezbollah-trained local militias. In some cases men from Hezbollah, an
Iranian-backed group that is one of Lebanon's most powerful military and
political forces, have been doing the street fighting, according to rebel
commanders and other opposition sources. Under this new arrangement,
Hezbollah and Iran have become directly involved in the command
structures of Assad's forces, eroding his authority and the Alawite power
base that has underpinned four decades of family rule by him and his
father. The Alawites, to which Assad belongs, are an offshoot of Islam
that has controlled Syria since the 1960s. Unlike the Shi'ites in Iraq,
Iran and Lebanon, Syria's Alawites tend to be secular and lack the
religious zeal that has helped motivate thousands of Shi'ite militia to
come to Syria. Security sources in the region estimate there are about
15,000 Shi'ite fighters from Lebanon and Iraq in Syria, and they have
helped produce success on the battlefield, reversing gains made by rebels
in two years of fighting. When rebel fighters have held confined areas,
such as the border town of Qusair, which was overrun by Hezbollah and
Assad loyalists two months ago, they have put themselves at a serious
disadvantage, the sources said. Rebellious Sunni districts in Homs to the
south are being hit hard and Damascus suburbs, a main concentration of
the Arab- and Western-backed Free Syrian Army, are under siege as the
war's death toll climbs above 90,000. But Assad's newfound military
advantage may prove short lived, despite the increasing pressure on the
rebels, military experts and diplomats believe. The fall of Qusair, and
Hezbollah's triumphant rhetoric, spurred regional heavyweight Saudi
Arabia into action. The kingdom, diplomats say, has assumed the main role
in backing the opposition in coordination with the United States." http://t.uani.com/15YwITz
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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
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commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a
regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons. UANI is an
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