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Top Stories
LAT:
"The interim nuclear deal between Iran and world powers will allow
Tehran to continue far more research and development on centrifuges to
enrich uranium than has been publicly recognized, according to a
veteran Washington nuclear analyst. In a new report, David Albright,
president of the nonpartisan Institute for Science and International
Security, said the deal may delay development of new centrifuges at the
Natanz uranium enrichment facility that haven't yet been fed with
uranium hexaflouride, a compound used to produce nuclear fuel. But the
accord, which went into effect Jan. 20, will allow Iran to continue
research over the next six months on several types of advanced
centrifuges already at Natanz. Iran also is likely to continue
centrifuge research and development at other sites, including
undisclosed locations, according to the report. As a result, the deal
is 'not expected to seriously affect Iran's centrifuge research and
development program,' the report says... Albright said he hopes to
persuade the six powers to push for much stricter limits on centrifuge
research and development when they negotiate the final agreement. The
issue 'has to be addressed much more aggressively,' said Albright, a
former United Nations nuclear inspector who has been frequently
consulted by U.S. administrations and Congress." http://t.uani.com/1ncSfSU
WSJ:
"Iran and global powers will begin negotiations on a comprehensive
agreement to end the decade long dispute over Tehran's nuclear program
in mid-February in New York, Western and Iranian officials said on
Monday. The meetings, whose dates aren't yet fixed, will mark a shift
from Geneva, where three rounds of talks were held beginning in
October... Iranian state media on Monday quoted Foreign Minister Javad
Zarif saying the date and location for the next round of talks were
agreed to during his meeting last week in Davos, Switzerland, with
Catherine Ashton, the European Union's foreign-policy chief. The State
Department confirmed New York as the site for the talks." http://t.uani.com/1f8NOCL
Sun Sentinel:
"United Against Nuclear Iran, a non-partisan, advocacy group that
seeks to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to obtain nuclear
weapons is working with local and national Jewish Federations on a
state and federal level to end Iran's nuclear quest. UANI and Jewish
Federations are urging Florida U.S. Senator Bill Nelson to co-sponsor,
with the majority of other senators, The Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act
of 2013. The bill is aimed to put forth sanctions if Iran does not
dismantle their nuclear capability... 'Obama has passed numerous pieces
of legislation including the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions Accountable
and Divestment Act in 2010, which allows state and local government to
also divest their state funds from Iran,' said Tara Laxer, UANI Florida
director. Over half a dozen pieces of state legislation was signed in
Florida from divesting state pension funds, overseeing state
contracting, divestment from state chartered banks to a rule change by
The State Board of Administration, Laxer noted, adding that as UANI
Florida director she will be working with State Senator Jeremy Ring (D)
Broward and State House Member Bill Hager (R) to push for additional
state conditioned sanctions as well in conjunction with federal law."
http://t.uani.com/1gmIn8t
Nuclear Program & Negotiations
AP:
"A majority of Americans support an agreement by the U.S. and five
other world powers to limit Iran's disputed nuclear program, but fewer
believe it will keep the Islamic republic from building a nuclear bomb.
A new Associated Press-GfK poll gave President Barack Obama lower marks
for his dealings with Iran... The poll indicated that 60 percent of
American adults approve of the six-month agreement. But fewer than half
- 47 percent - believe it might work. 'From a diplomatic standpoint, it
would be great to be able to negotiate and come up with a solution that
would eliminate the chance for nuclear weapons for Iran,' respondent
Lance Hughey, 40, a lawyer from LaCrosse, Wis., said Monday. However,
'Iran is a difficult country to trust,' said Hughey, who identified
himself as an independent voter with slightly Republican leanings. 'And
the leadership that we see out of D.C., the way things have been
conducted with Syria ... I don't believe (the president) has the leadership
skills to deal with Iran.' The poll concluded that overall, 42 percent
approve of how Obama handles Iran - about the same as 44 percent in
December. Fewer strongly approve of his performance, 25 percent now
compared with 30 percent in December." http://t.uani.com/1ncMR24
Reuters:
"Iran's first nuclear power plant at Bushehr is expected to shut
down in the next few days for an annual refueling outage, the IRNA news
agency reported on Tuesday. Built near the Gulf coast city of Bushehr,
the plant had been scheduled to shut in mid January. But the outage was
delayed because cold weather meant there was not enough gas available
for other power plants to compensate for the loss of nuclear output, a
spokesman for Iran's Atomic Energy Organization told the state news
agency IRNA. The spokesman said that the refueling process usually
takes about one month." http://t.uani.com/1iGCNxW
Sanctions
Relief
Bloomberg:
"Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will travel to Tehran
today as both countries seek to bolster trade and energy ties while the
U.S. cautioned businesses to delay deals with Iran. Erdogan will be
accompanied by the foreign, economy and energy ministers as Turkey
signs five cooperation agreements, Star newspaper said today, without
citing anyone. Erdogan will also meet Iranian President Hassan Rouhani,
who has pledged to end his country's political and economic isolation,
it said... Turkey and Iran agreed to increase annual trade volume to
$30 billion from $22 billion in 2012, as Iran seeks a bigger share in
Turkey's energy market and the two countries work toward preferential
trade agreements, according to officials from both countries." http://t.uani.com/1ljMd4l
Sanctions
Enforcement
WSJ:
"The Bank of Moscow agreed to remit $9.5 million to the U.S. over
allegations it handled money transfers with a bank under U.S.
sanctions. The U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets
Control said in an enforcement notice that the Bank of Moscow, which is
formally known as the Joint-Stock Commercial Bank, sent 69 transfers
totaling more than $41 million through the U.S. between January 2008
and July 2009 on behalf of Bank Melli Iran ZAO, which was placed under
U.S. sanctions in October 2007. None of the payment messages Bank of
Moscow sent included references to the bank under U.S. sanctions;
instead, it identified the bank in abbreviations, the notice said. U.S.
financial institutions processed the transactions without intervening,
Treasury said." http://t.uani.com/1f7qoPN
Congressional
Sanctions Debate
Reuters:
"An attempt to impose new sanctions on Iran over its nuclear
program has stalled in the U.S. Congress and lawmakers are discussing
whether to introduce a much weaker measure, congressional aides said on
Monday. Members of the Senate and House of Representatives are
considering a non-binding resolution that expresses concern about
Iran's nuclear ambitions and calls for negotiators to set strict
conditions in talks between Tehran and world powers. That would fall
short of tightening sanctions on Iran, as envisioned in a bill that
senators have been discussing for months. 'We don't think it is going
to come to a vote,' said a Senate aide who requested anonymity because
that person was not authorized to speak to the media. 'There are
discussions about a resolution.'" http://t.uani.com/1f7k1vQ
Human Rights
IHR:
"One prisoner was hanged in public in the city of Qazvin (west of
Tehran) today Tuesday January 28, reported the official Iranian media.
Based on the official and unofficial reports Iran Human Rights (IHR)
has collected, in the first 4 weeks of 2014 at least 61 people have
been executed in Iran. Mahmodo Amiry-Moghaddam, the Spokesperson of IHR
condemned today's public execution in Qazvin and urged the
international community to react to the wave of executions in Iran. The
man who was hanged publicly today was according to the prosecutor of
Qazvin identified as 'H. Lotfi' (44 year old) and was
sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Court, convicted of smuggling 8
kilograms of heroin." http://t.uani.com/1edDtYd
Opinion &
Analysis
Ali Alfoneh
& Reuel Marc Gerecht in TNR:
Ali Alfoneh & Reuel Marc Gerecht in TNR: "Zarif has a small
legion of American admirers in New York and Washington-journalists and
think tank experts especially-whom he assiduously cultivated while at
Turtle Bay. Perhaps even as much as Rouhani, he is the Iranian
'pragmatist' in whom the White House now has put its atomic hopes. So
is Zarif a good bet? Is he actually a realist in the Kissingerian
tradition? We may now answer these questions more precisely, since
Zarif's memoir Aqa-ye Safir: Goftegou ba Mohammad-Javad Zarif, Safir-e
Pishin-e Iran dar Sazeman-e Melal-e Mottahed, or Mr. Ambassador: A
Conversation with Mohammad-Javad Zarif, Iran's Former Ambassador to the
United Nations, has just been published in Tehran. The answer is not
entirely edifying. To the extent that his book accurately reflects
Zarif's worldview and fundamental beliefs, the affable foreign minister
turns out to be every bit as religiously ideological as the radicalized
student activist he was in the late 1970s. A certain circumspection is,
of course, required: when Zarif commissioned this book, he was
obviously interested in returning to the good graces of the Supreme
Leader. Ahmadinejad, a lower-class firebrand who exemplified many of
Khamenei's passions until he started to question the necessity of the
clergy as intermediaries between man and God, loathed the revolutionary
upper crust that revolved around Ali-Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the
rapaciously corrupt clerical majordomo who was the right-hand man of
Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the obsidian-eyed mullah who
established Iran's theocracy. Zarif may have felt compelled in this
book to alter his religious views and his possible political
differences with Khamenei and others who wield the power within the
regime. He is without his own power base; his network of friends is
largely derivative of those he has served. Still, extended
conversations-this memoir is a very long chat with the writer
Muhammad-Mehdi Raji-inevitably reveal a lot of truth. And this makes
Zarif's book depressing to read-particularly for those who want to
believe that Zarif's savoir vivre and wit reflect the Islamic
Republic's transformation from a revolutionary state into a more
run-of-the-mill, unthreatening if internally unpleasant Middle Eastern
authoritarianism. Such hope is difficult to sustain after reading
Zarif's book. The memoir also serves as a bad omen for the Islamic
Republic's interim nuclear agreement in Geneva-let alone the felicitous
aspirations of those in Washington who want to end the cold war between
the Islamic Republic and the West through a 'grand bargain,' or just a
lot of little ones... 'We have a fundamental problem with the West and
especially with America,' Zarif declares. 'This is because we are
claimants of a mission, which has a global dimension. It has nothing to
do with the level of our strength, and is related to the source of our
raison d'être. How come Malaysia [an overwhelmingly Muslim country]
doesn't have similar problems? Because Malaysia is not trying to change
the international order. It may seek independence and strength, but its
definition of strength is the advancement of its national welfare.'
While Zarif considers national welfare one of the goals of the Islamic
Republic, he stresses that 'we have also defined a global vocation,
both in the Constitution and in the ultimate objectives of the Islamic
revolution.' He adds: 'I believe that we do not exist without our
revolutionary goals.' Zarif does not take the trouble to explain the
global vocation of the Islamic Republic, but his reference to the
Constitution is doubtlessly to Article 154: '[the Islamic Republic]
supports the just struggle of the mustazafun [the oppressed] against
the mustakbirun [the arrogant] in every corner of the globe.' This is
the 'export-of-the-revolution' clause, which the late Grand Ayatollah
Ali Montazeri, Khomeini's 'defrocked' onetime successor, who was
perhaps the most Trotskyite of clerical revolutionaries, gingerly moved
away from before he died under what was effectively house arrest. Very
few others have even gone that far." http://t.uani.com/1edFDXT
MEMRI:
"In a September 29, 2013 interview with ABC's George
Stephanopoulos, in which Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif
was questioned about Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's statements
that the Holocaust is a 'myth,' Zarif claimed that Khamenei is not a
Holocaust denier and that the statements - which can be found in
English on his official English-language website - were a 'bad
translation' and 'out of context.' Khamenei had made the statements in
a February 2006 speech to Iranian Air Force officers. However, a MEMRI
investigation reveals that FM Zarif's claim is false; in Khamenei's
original statements, which can be accessed on Khamenei's official
Persian-language website, Khamenei did indeed call the Holocaust a
'myth.' Furthermore, in mid-December 2013, Khamenei's office
re-released Khamenei's 1998 statements of praise for the work of the
late convicted French Holocaust denier Roger Garaudy, on the occasion
of the anniversary of Garaudy's 1998 trial in France." http://t.uani.com/1f8Oxnw
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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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