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Top Stories
NYT:
"As Secretary of State John Kerry and foreign ministers from other
world powers sought to hammer out an interim agreement to constrain
Iran's nuclear program, the Iranian government's insistence on formal
recognition of its 'right' to enrich uranium emerged as a major obstacle,
diplomats said Sunday. In long hours of closed-door discussions, Western
and Iranian negotiators haggled over the language of a possible
agreement. Toward the end of a marathon session, some diplomats believed
that only a handful of words appeared to separate the two sides. But the
dispute over enrichment rights, among other differences, meant that the
talks ended not with the breakthrough that many had hoped for, but with
only a promise that lower-level negotiators would meet here in 10 days
for more discussions. Many reports have ascribed the failure of the talks
to France's insistence that any agreement put tight restriction on a
heavy-water plant that Iran is building, which can produce plutonium. But
while France took a harder line than its partners on some issues, a
senior American official said it was the Iranian delegation that balked
at completing an interim agreement, saying that it had to engage in
additional consultations in Tehran before proceeding further... Defending
his negotiating strategy, Mr. Kerry insisted Sunday that the agreement to
freeze Iran's nuclear program that he was seeking would be in Israel's
interest. 'We are not blind, and I don't think we are stupid,' Mr. Kerry
said on 'Meet the Press.'" http://t.uani.com/18ksl5I
AFP:
"US Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday defended moves to strike
a nuclear deal with Iran, saying it would protect Israel and America's
Gulf allies, while stressing Tehran had balked... 'Our hope is that in
the next months we can find an agreement that meets everyone's
standards,' Kerry told reporters in Abu Dhabi. 'The P5+1 was unified on
Saturday when we presented our proposal to the Iranians... But Iran
couldn't take it, at that particular moment they weren't able to accept,'
he said." http://t.uani.com/1gD5Cu3
AFP:
"President Hassan Rouhani said on Sunday that Iran will not abandon
its nuclear rights, including uranium enrichment, media reported a day
after a fresh round of talks with world powers. 'There are red lines that
must not be crossed,' Rouhani told the conservative-dominated parliament
in remarks quoted by the ISNA news agency. 'The rights of the Iranian
nation and our national interests are a red line. So are nuclear rights
under the framework of international regulations, which include
enrichment on Iranian soil,' he said... Rouhani said Iran would 'not bow
to threats from any power', while also insisting that the sanctions
targeting its ailing economy had not forced Tehran to the negotiating
table. 'We have practically and verbally told the negotiating sides that
threats, sanctions, humiliation and discrimination will never produce a
result,' he said." http://t.uani.com/1hywWe7
Reuters:
"Iran will grant U.N. inspectors 'managed access' to a uranium mine
and a heavy water plant within three months as part of a deal agreed on
Monday aimed at improving transparency in the Islamic state's disputed
nuclear programme. It was signed by U.N. nuclear agency chief Yukiya
Amano in Tehran after Iran and six world powers failed in broader
diplomatic talks in Geneva at the weekend to clinch an agreement to help
allay Western fears that Iran may be seeking a nuclear weapons
capability. Tehran denies the charge. Under the accord with the IAEA,
Iran will also provide information about planned new research reactors
and sites for future nuclear power plants, as well as clarify earlier
statements about additional uranium enrichment facilities. The IAEA and
Iran have agreed 'to strengthen their cooperation and dialogue aimed at
ensuring the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear programme,' a
joint statement distributed in Vienna said. 'It is foreseen that Iran's
cooperation will include providing the IAEA with timely information about
its nuclear facilities and in regard to the implementation of
transparency measures. Activities will proceed in a step-by-step manner,'
it said. An annex to the agreement listed six first steps to be
implemented by Iran over the next three months, including access to the
Gchine uranium mine and the Arak heavy water production plant, which the
IAEA has repeatedly asked for." http://t.uani.com/19W399C
 Nuclear
Negotiations
AFP: "Conservative
US leaders, fond of finger-pointing at France in recent years, lavished
praise on Paris Sunday for blocking an agreement between Western powers
and Iran over Tehran's nuclear program. 'Vive la France!' tweeted Senator
John McCain, an outspoken voice on national security issues. 'France had
the courage to prevent a bad nuclear agreement with Iran,' he said, after
the weekend announcement that no agreement had been reached between the
United States, China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany, known as the
P5+1. During three days of intense negotiations in Geneva, France
repeatedly voiced concerns over various points in a possible deal and its
lack of guarantees, a position that had Iran calling it a negotiations
spoiled sport. 'Thank God for France and thank God for push back,' said
hawkish Senator Lindsey Graham on CNN's 'State of the Union' show. 'The
French are becoming very good leaders in the Mideast,' Graham said, also
suggesting he would be in favor of more sanctions against Iran." http://t.uani.com/1iY67LZ
Reuters:
"A Twitter account Iran experts believe is run by the office of
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterated criticism of France on
Sunday after Paris expressed reservations about a proposed deal to end a
dispute over Tehran's nuclear program. A message posted in English on the
account @khamenei_ir said: 'French officials have been openly hostile
towards the Iranian nation over the past few years; this is an imprudent
and inept move.' A second tweet said: 'A wise man, particularly a wise
politician, should never have the motivation to turn a neutral entity
into an enemy.'" http://t.uani.com/1fv4ENm
Reuters:
"U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday Washington was
not engaged in a race to complete talks with Iran on its nuclear program
and vowed to defend Washington's regional allies against any threats.
Speaking at a news conference with United Arab Emirates (UAE) Foreign
Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahayan in Abu Dhabi, Kerry also
praised the Syrian opposition's decision to participate in a proposed
peace conference as 'a big step forward'. 'This is not a race to complete
just any agreement,' Kerry said, adding: 'Through diplomacy we have an
absolute responsibility to pursue an agreement.'" http://t.uani.com/1cf8szH
Reuters:
"Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took his case against a
nuclear accord with Iran directly to the U.S. public on Sunday,
denouncing 'a very bad deal' that he feared the Obama administration was
pursuing... On CBS television's Face the Nation on Sunday, Netanyahu said
the proposed interim agreement, as 'described to us by American sources',
would have allowed Iran to maintain its capability to enrich material for
nuclear bombs... In Jerusalem, Netanyahu urged hundreds of supporters
attending an assembly of the quasi-governmental Jewish Agency, many of
them from the United States, to help him avert what he called a 'bad and
dangerous deal' emerging with Iran... 'There are many Arab leaders in the
region who are saying this is a very bad deal for the region and for the
world,' Netanyahu said on Sunday on CBS. 'And you know when you have the
Arabs and the Israelis speaking in one voice, it doesn't happen very
often, I think it's worth paying attention to it.'" http://t.uani.com/1iY9y5m
Sanctions
Reuters:
"U.S. lawmakers said on Sunday they aimed to tighten sanctions on
Iran to prevent Washington giving away too much in a deal on Tehran's
nuclear program that diplomats said was still possible despite the
failure of high-level weekend talks. Their comments reflected widespread
Congressional skepticism about a rapprochement between Iran and world
powers and coincided with renewed lobbying from Israel against a proposal
it sees as leaving open a danger Iran could build a nuclear bomb. Tehran
denies harboring any such ambition... The Senate Foreign Relations
Committee will move ahead with additional sanctions this week to keep the
pressure on Iran as talks continue, said Democratic Senator Bob Menendez,
the committee's Democratic chairman. 'My concern here is that we seem to
want the deal almost more than the Iranians,' Menendez said on ABC's
'This Week.'" http://t.uani.com/1bjqAXs
Reuters:
"Iran's fuel oil exports will plunge to as little as a third of
previous levels over the next few months as winter demand forces the
country to divert the product to its own power plants, according to a
National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) source. The fall means additional
revenue lost to the OPEC member, which is already down billions of
petrodollars a month due to tough Western sanctions that have halved its
crude exports and crippled its economy by choking Tehran's biggest money
stream... Sanctions have made it difficult to track Iranian fuel oil
flows. The country typically exports about 600,000 tonnes of fuel oil a
month, about 130,000 barrels per day, most of which heads to China and
the rest of Asia, trade sources said. Exports of the heavy fuel have
reached as much as 1 million tonnes in some months. But the lower volumes
that started at end-September and are expected to last until early
January will drop monthly shipments to about 200,000-300,000 tonnes, the
NIOC source said. Iran's low density, low sulphur fuel oil is suitable
both as a feedstock for the smaller, independent refineries in China, often
called teapots, and for blending with heavier grades." http://t.uani.com/19duz6p
Domestic
Politics
Reuters:
"An unidentified attacker shot dead an Iranian deputy minister of
industry in Tehran on Sunday, the state news agency IRNA reported, in
what appeared the first reported killing of a senior central government
official in years. Safdar Rahmat Abadi was shot in the head and chest as
he got into his car in the east of the capital, IRNA said, quoting
witnesses as saying the attack occurred at about 7:50 p.m. (1620 GMT).
'Investigations show that two shots were fired from inside the vehicle,'
the agency quoted a police official as saying. 'That two shells were
found inside the car shows a strong likelihood that the assailant was
inside the car and in conversation with Mr Abadi. There was no sign of
struggle at the scene of the killing.'" http://t.uani.com/1hytcJD
AFP:
"Iran's Defence Minister Hossein Dehqan on Saturday inaugurated the
production line of an anti-missile system dubbed the Sayyad-2 (Hunter 2),
media reported. 'In order to counter aerial attack, we have put the
production of the Sayyad-2 missile system on the agenda,' Dehqan said on
state television during the inauguration ceremony. 'This solid-fuel
missile system is able to destroy different kinds of cruise missiles,
bombers, drones and helicopters,' he added... In September, the military
paraded missiles with a nominal range of 2,000 kilometres (1,250 miles)
that could theoretically hit Israeli and US military targets in the
region." http://t.uani.com/19cot6f
AFP:
"Air pollution has forced Iranian authorities to close elementary
schools and kindergartens in Tehran province for three days from Sunday,
the state broadcaster said. Schools had already been closed due to
pollution on Sunday, while government agencies were to shorten working
hours on Monday and Tuesday as pollution has reached alarming levels.
Sunday's decision to extend the school closure for more two days was made
by a crisis committee on air pollution, the broadcaster said... With four
of its cities among the world's 10 most polluted, other parts of the
country also struggle with pollution. In 2012, air pollution contributed
to nearly 4,500 premature deaths in Tehran alone and nearly 80,000 across
the country, according to figures by the health ministry. Dozens of
people were hospitalised last week in the southwestern city of Ahvaz, and
thousands rushed to get medical assistance as pollution levels reached
dangerous levels." http://t.uani.com/HP7t0p
Foreign Affairs
Reuters:
"Britain said on Monday it had revived diplomatic relations with
Iran and appointed a non-resident charge d'affaires, two years after an
angry mob ransacked the British embassy in Tehran... Britain's Foreign
Office said Ajay Sharma, currently the head of the ministry's Iran
department, would take up the post immediately and hoped to visit Tehran
this month. 'I am very much looking forward to renewing direct UK contact
with the Iranian government and society,' Sharma said in a statement.
'This is very much in the interests of both our countries.' Iran's Mehr
news agency said Tehran had appointed Mohammad Hassan Habibollah as
charge d'affaires to Britain." http://t.uani.com/17OWtMc
Opinion
& Analysis
WSJ Editorial: "We never thought
we'd say this, but thank heaven for French foreign-policy exceptionalism.
At least for the time being, François Hollande's Socialist government has
saved the West from a deal that would all but guarantee that Iran becomes
a nuclear power. While the negotiating details still aren't fully known,
the French made clear Saturday that they objected to a nuclear agreement
that British Prime Minister David Cameron and President Barack Obama were
all too eager to sign. These two leaders remind no one, least of all the
Iranians, of Tony Blair, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan or George W.
Bush. That left the French to protect against a historic security
blunder, with Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius declaring in an interview
with French radio that while France still hopes for an agreement with
Tehran, it won't accept a 'sucker's deal.' And that's exactly what seems
to have been on the table as part of a 'first-step agreement' good for
six months as the parties negotiated a final deal. Tehran would be
allowed to continue enriching uranium, continue manufacturing
centrifuges, and continue building a plutonium reactor near the city of
Arak. Iran would also get immediate sanctions relief and the unfreezing
of as much as $50 billion in oil revenues-no small deliverance for a
regime whose annual oil revenues barely topped $95 billion in 2011. In
return the West would get Iranian promises. There is a promise not to
activate the Arak reactor, a promise not to use its most advanced
centrifuges to enrich uranium or to install new ones, a promise to stop enriching
uranium to 20%, which is near-weapons' grade, and to convert its existing
stockpile into uranium oxide (a process that is reversible). What Iran
has not promised to do is abide by the Additional Protocol of the Nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), which imposes additional reporting
requirements on Iran and allows U.N. inspectors to conduct short-notice
inspections of nuclear facilities. The International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA) has complained for years that Iran has refused to answer its questions
fully or provide inspectors with access to all of its facilities. IAEA
inspectors have been barred from visiting Arak since August 2011.
In other words, the deal gives Iran immediate, if incomplete, sanctions
relief and allows it to keep its nuclear infrastructure intact and keep
expanding it at a slightly slower pace. And the deal contains no
meaningful mechanisms for verifying compliance... The negotiators plan to
resume talks on November 20, and France will be under enormous pressure
to go along with a deal. We hope Messrs. Hollande and Fabius hold firm,
and the U.S. Congress could help by strengthening sanctions and passing a
resolution insisting that any agreement with Iran must include no uranium
enrichment, the dismantling of the Arak plutonium project and all
centrifuges, and intrusive, on-demand inspections. Anything less means
that Iran is merely looking to con the West into easing sanctions even as
it can restart its program whenever it likes." http://t.uani.com/17NB9qn
Reuters Special
Report: "A Reuters investigation details a key to
the supreme leader's power: a little-known organization created to help
the poor that morphed into a business juggernaut worth tens of billions
of dollars. The 82-year-old Iranian woman keeps the documents that upended
her life in an old suitcase near her bed. She removes them carefully and
peers at the tiny Persian script. There's the court order authorizing the
takeover of her children's three Tehran apartments in a multi-story
building the family had owned for years. There's the letter announcing
the sale of one of the units. And there's the notice demanding she pay
rent on her own apartment on the top floor. Pari Vahdat-e-Hagh ultimately
lost her property. It was taken by an organization that is controlled by the
most powerful man in Iran: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. She now
lives alone in a cramped, three-room apartment in Europe, thousands of
miles from Tehran. The Persian name of the organization that hounded her
for years is 'Setad Ejraiye Farmane Hazrate Emam' - Headquarters for
Executing the Order of the Imam. The name refers to an edict signed by
the Islamic Republic's first leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, shortly
before his death in 1989. His order spawned a new entity to manage and
sell properties abandoned in the chaotic years after the 1979 Islamic
Revolution. Setad has become one of the most powerful organizations in
Iran, though many Iranians, and the wider world, know very little about
it. In the past six years, it has morphed into a business juggernaut that
now holds stakes in nearly every sector of Iranian industry, including
finance, oil, telecommunications, the production of birth-control pills
and even ostrich farming. The organization's total worth is difficult to
pinpoint because of the secrecy of its accounts. But Setad's holdings of
real estate, corporate stakes and other assets total about $95 billion,
Reuters has calculated. That estimate is based on an analysis of
statements by Setad officials, data from the Tehran Stock Exchange and
company websites, and information from the U.S. Treasury Department. Just
one person controls that economic empire - Khamenei. As Iran's top
cleric, he has the final say on all governmental matters. His purview
includes his nation's controversial nuclear program, which was the
subject of intense negotiations between Iranian and international
diplomats in Geneva that ended Sunday without an agreement. It is
Khamenei who will set Iran's course in the nuclear talks and other recent
efforts by the new president, Hassan Rouhani, to improve relations with
Washington. The supreme leader's acolytes praise his spartan lifestyle,
and point to his modest wardrobe and a threadbare carpet in his Tehran
home. Reuters found no evidence that Khamenei is tapping Setad to enrich
himself. But Setad has empowered him. Through Setad, Khamenei has at his
disposal financial resources whose value rivals the holdings of the shah,
the Western-backed monarch who was overthrown in 1979. How Setad came
into those assets also mirrors how the deposed monarchy obtained much of
its fortune - by confiscating real estate. A six-month Reuters
investigation has found that Setad built its empire on the systematic
seizure of thousands of properties belonging to ordinary Iranians: members
of religious minorities like Vahdat-e-Hagh, who is Baha'i, as well as
Shi'ite Muslims, business people and Iranians living abroad. Setad has
amassed a giant portfolio of real estate by claiming in Iranian courts,
sometimes falsely, that the properties are abandoned. The organization
now holds a court-ordered monopoly on taking property in the name of the
supreme leader, and regularly sells the seized properties at auction or
seeks to extract payments from the original owners. The supreme leader
also oversaw the creation of a body of legal rulings and executive orders
that enabled and safeguarded Setad's asset acquisitions. 'No supervisory
organization can question its property,' said Naghi Mahmoudi, an Iranian
lawyer who left Iran in 2010 and now lives in Germany. Khamenei's grip on
Iran's politics and its military forces has been apparent for years. The
investigation into Setad shows that there is a third dimension to his
power: economic might. The revenue stream generated by Setad helps
explain why Khamenei has not only held on for 24 years but also in some
ways has more control than even his revered predecessor. Setad gives him
the financial means to operate independently of parliament and the
national budget, insulating him from Iran's messy factional infighting.
Washington has acknowledged Setad's importance. In June, the Treasury
Department imposed sanctions on Setad and some of its corporate holdings,
calling the organization 'a massive network of front companies hiding
assets on behalf of ... Iran's leadership.' The companies generate
billions of dollars in revenue a year, the department stated, but it did
not offer a detailed accounting." http://t.uani.com/1i16CqZ
UANI Advisory
Board Member Irwin Cotler in JPost: "However, while
negotiations will clearly focus on Iran's nuclear program - and on
economic sanctions that may be relaxed in exchange for Iranian
concessions on the nuclear front - the United States and its allies must
ensure that nuclear negotiations do not overshadow - let alone sanitize -
the massive domestic repression in Iran. Indeed, when the US negotiated
an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union in 1975, it did not turn
a blind eye to the USSR's human rights abuses; instead, the Helsinki
Final Act linked the security, economics, and human rights 'baskets,'
with human rights emerging as the most transformative of the three.
Negotiations with Iran should replicate this approach. What follows is an
inventory of serious human rights abuses in Iran, and a corresponding set
of queries that will serve as a litmus test for the authenticity of
Rouhani's commitment to justice and human rights for the Iranian
people." http://t.uani.com/1aNHwdF
UANI Sanctions
Legislation & Media Advisor David Peyman interviewed in the LA Jewish
Journal: "With the recent talks between Iran and six
of the world's major powers on the Iranian regime's pursuit on nuclear
weapons, countless Jewish and non-Jewish groups in the U.S. are calling
for local and state officials to turn up the pressure on the Iranian regime
by enforcing tough federal sanctions. Specifically, the New York-based
'United Against Nuclear Iran' (UANI) has worked with the American Jewish
Committee (AJC) and other Southern California groups to call on L.A.
mayor Eric Garcetti to ban ships that have docked in Iranian ports from
docking in the Port of Los Angeles. With this move activists believe the
Iranian regime will be squeezed economically even further to stop their
nuclear weapons pursuit...I recently had a chance to chat with David
Peyman, an Iranian Jewish activist and senior advisor to UANI about the
calls for Iran sanctions to be imposed on the Port of Los Angeles. The
following is a portion of our conversation." http://t.uani.com/1iYeaID
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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
nuclear weapons.
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