Eye on Iran: Hostage-Taking Past of Iran's UN Pick a Dilemma for Obama

Join UANI           Top Stories Bloomberg: "Iran has forced a foreign policy dilemma on the Obama administration by choosing as its next United Nations ambassador an official who belonged to the group that held 52 Americans hostage in Tehran for 444 days. Iran's government has applied for the U.S. visa required for Hamid Aboutalebi to take the UN post in New York, Bloomberg News reported March 29. Aboutalebi, Iran's former ambassador to Belgium and Italy, was a member of the group of radical students that seized the U.S. embassy on Nov. 4, 1979. The Iranian move poses a headache for President Barack Obama's administration as it tries to balance international negotiations aimed at curbing Iran's nuclear program against skepticism at home about whether the Islamic Republic has changed its ways, said Michael Singh, managing director of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy. 'Denying a visa to Iran's ambassador-designate could upset President Obama's still-delicate diplomatic re-engagement with Iran,' Singh, a former senior director for Middle East affairs at the U.S. National Security Council, said in an e-mailed statement. 'But granting the visa will prove controversial in the U.S. and will reinforce the impression among regional allies that Washington is willing to ignore Iranian misbehavior in our pursuit of a nuclear accord.' ... Michael Metrinko, a former diplomat and hostage who endured beatings and interrogations during his 444 days of captivity, said it was 'really stupid' and ironic for Iran to pick someone associated with taking diplomats hostage to become its top diplomat at the UN. 'The Iranian government officials have never understood that they did anything wrong,' Metrinko said of the hostage crisis. 'It was the most egregious violation of diplomatic norms and protocols.'" http://t.uani.com/PcAMNB Reuters: "Iran's top four crude oil buyers lifted their purchases 17.2 percent in February from a year ago, as the OPEC member continues to ship more oil than allowed under a deal that eases some of the sanctions aimed at its disputed nuclear programme. Under the interim agreement reached in November between Iran and six major powers and that took effect in January, the Islamic nation is supposed to hold its exports at an average of 1 million barrels per day (bpd) for the six months to July 20. But imports by its four biggest buyers, China, India, Japan and South Korea, as well as Turkey, have totalled more than that since at least November, and tanker tracking data indicates only a slight slowdown in Tehran's exports in March. 'Maybe the prices are too good to be refused. The Iranians have been known to offer pretty good deals,' said Victor Shum, vice-president of energy consultancy IHS Energy Insight... In February, Iran's four big Asian buyers imported an average of 1.37 million bpd of Iranian crude, up from 1.17 bpd a year ago, according to official government data and tanker arrival schedules given to Reuters. 'This is interesting because countries are supposed to limit their intake from Iran. But ... it's hard to draw any conclusions,' Shum said. Data for tanker loadings out of Iran for February and March indicates there might be only a slight drop in the elevated imports over the next couple of months." http://t.uani.com/1gggtVB Reuters: "President Barack Obama sought to reassure Saudi King Abdullah on Friday that he would support moderate Syrian rebels and reject a bad nuclear deal with Iran, during a visit designed to allay the kingdom's concerns that its decades-old U.S. alliance had frayed... Last year senior Saudi officials warned of a 'major shift' away from the United States after bitter disagreements over its response to the 'Arab spring' uprisings, efforts to negotiate with Iran, and Washington's decision not to intervene militarily in Syria, where Riyadh wants more American support for rebels. While the two leaders discussed 'tactical differences', they both agreed their strategic interests were aligned, a U.S. official told reporters after the meeting. 'I think it was important to have the chance to come look him (King Abdullah) in the eye and explain how determined the president is to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon,' the official said. The meeting was a chance to assure the king that 'we won't accept a bad deal and that the focus on the nuclear issue doesn't mean we are not concerned about, or very much focused on, Iran's other destabilizing activities in the region.'" http://t.uani.com/1hruWTd        Regional Destabilization AFP: "Iran and its 'destabilising actions' in the Middle East remain a source of concern for Washington despite progress in negotiations over Tehran's nuclear programme, a top US official said Friday. Deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes made the comments to reporters accompanying Barack Obama on his visit to Saudi Arabia, during which the US president will be seeking to assure Saudi officials that Washington has not changed its policy on Iran. 'We will be making clear that even as we are pursuing the nuclear agreement with the Iranians, our concern about other Iranian behaviour in the region -- its support for (Syrian President Bashar al-) Assad, its support for (Lebanon's) Hezbollah, its destabilising actions in Yemen and the Gulf -- that those concerns remain constant,' said Rhodes... Rhodes said that the ongoing talks between Iran and the so-called P5+1 world powers were solely focused on Tehran's nuclear programme. 'The nuclear talks have the ability of resolving a threat to regional stability; at the same time, we're going to keep the pressure on all those other issues,' he said." http://t.uani.com/1pFSowI Reuters: "Yemen's president called on Iran to stop supporting separatists in the south and religious groups in the north of the Arabian peninsula country, which is trying to stabilise after more than two years of political upheaval. The comments by Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi published in pan-Arab daily Al Hayat newspaper will likely further strain relations with Iran, which has repeatedly denied interfering in Yemen. 'Unfortunately, Iranian interference still exists, whether through its support for the Hirak separatists or some religious groups in northern Yemen,' Hadi told Al Hayat, apparently referring to the Shi'ite Muslim Houthi rebels who are trying to capture more territory in the northern part of the country. 'We asked our Iranian brothers to revise their wrong policies towards Yemen, but our demands have not borne fruit. We have no desire to escalate (the situation) with Tehran but at the same time we hope it will lift its hand off Yemen,' he said." http://t.uani.com/PcA3fc Syria Conflict Reuters: "Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday called for domestic support for his militants after a year of growing sectarian violence in Lebanon following the Shi'ite militant group's intervention in the Syrian war. 'Some in Lebanon say the resistance (Hezbollah) has nothing to do with Syria,' Nasrallah told supporters via a television link from a secret location in South Lebanon. He justified sending his forces to a foreign war by saying that Sunni rebel groups would 'eliminate everyone in Lebanon' if they won in Syria. 'The problem in Lebanon is not that Hezbollah went to Syria, but that we were late in doing so,' he said. 'This resistance will remain solid, with its head hung high, protecting its people and its nation.'" http://t.uani.com/1fFZEE0 Human Rights NYT: "The Iran government's effort to portray a kinder and gentler image was frustrated on Friday by the United Nations Human Rights Council, which voted to extend the term of a monitor scorned by Tehran. The Council, concluding its annual meeting in Geneva, renewed the mandate of the monitor, Ahmed Shaheed, for another year in a 21-9 vote, with 16 abstentions. Surprising coalitions formed for and against the monitor, known as a special rapporteur. Brazil joined the United States and Britain in supporting the extension, while India, China, Pakistan and Russia opposed it... The vote on a resolution extending Mr. Shaheed's term elicited a harsh reaction from Iran's ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Mohsen Naziri Asl. 'In reality the claim by the main sponsors of this resolution on human rights advocacy has proved to be a myth, as they have on numerous occasions, put on display their fully politicized approach to human rights issues,' he said in a statement." http://t.uani.com/O8A2rR Domestic Politics Bloomberg: "Iran's inflation rate fell to a two-year low in February, fulfilling President Hassan Rouhani's vow to halt rampant increases in the cost of living.  Consumer prices rose 23 percent last month from a year ago, compared with 29 percent in January and as high as 45 percent in June, according to the central bank. Inflation rates fell in nine of the 10 sub-indexes tracked by the central bank, including clothing, food and transport... 'There's some degree of optimism in Iran, and people are easing out of panic economic practices such as hoarding,' Sam Wilkin, an analyst in Dubai at Control Risks Group, said by phone. 'Still, people are hesitant, and they're not fully confident the recent deal will lead to more comprehensive opening.'" http://t.uani.com/1i7TVbP Reuters: "Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei agreed on Monday to pardon or reduce the sentences of 920 people, the official IRNA news agency reported, in a customary gesture to mark the anniversary of the Islamic Republic. It was the second large-scale pardon this year after Iran's paramount clerical leader pardoned or eased the sentences of 878 people in honor of the Prophet Mohammad's birthday in January. IRNA did not say whether those pardoned on Monday included any of the nearly 900 people the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights says are currently in jail for political offences... 'For all we know there may be no political prisoners among them (released on Monday) or there may be. There is simply not enough information available yet,' Hadi Ghaemi, Executive Director of the New York- based International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, said in an e-mail to Reuters." http://t.uani.com/1dHByO3 Opinion & Analysis Laura Rozen in Al-Monitor: "Iran and six world powers can reach a comprehensive nuclear deal by agreeing on Iran's practical needs for enrichment, which are limited in the near term; as well as on technical modifications that could be made to the Arak reactor and turning the Fordo enrichment site into a research and development facility, former U.S. nuclear negotiator Robert Einhorn writes in a paper to be released by the Brookings Institution Monday. 'I think of the big issues, Arak is the easiest,' Einhorn told Al-Monitor in an interview last week. 'Fordo is hard. But the hardest single issue is enrichment capacity.' Einhorn, in his Brookings paper, 'Preventing a Nuclear Armed-Iran: Requirements for a Comprehensive Iran Nuclear Deal,' released to Al-Monitor in advance, proposes that Iran and the P5+1 define the practical needs for Iran's civil nuclear program. 'Indeed, Iran's actual need to produce enriched uranium for fueling reactors is quite limited, at least in the near and middle terms,' he writes. 'Proposed modifications to Arak [would make it] better for producing medical isotopes,' he said. Since reaching a breakthrough interim nuclear deal last November, Iran and six world powers have held two rounds of talks to try to negotiate a comprehensive nuclear deal by the July 20th expiration of the six month Joint Plan of Action. 'For the U.S. side,...to get sufficient support domestically and abroad, the U.S. position [on the size of Iran's enrichment program] will be pretty demanding,' Einhorn, who served as the top State Department Iran non-proliferation advisor until last summer and is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said.  'If Iran wants to find a way out, I propose the practical needs issue, [which] gives them a narrative that it could explain that it won on enrichment.' On enrichment, extending Iran's potential 'breakout' time to between six and twelve months in a final deal 'could be achieved by limiting centrifuges to between 2000 and 6000 first-generation IR-1 Iranian centrifuges (or significantly lower numbers if more advanced IR-2m centrifuges are included) and reducing enriched uranium stocks, especially at the near-20 percent level,' Einhorn writes in the Brookings 'requirements' paper. 'Whatever numbers and combinations [of centrifuges and uranium stocks] are chosen, lengthening the breakout timeline to between six and twelve months would require substantial reductions in current Iranian centrifuge and stockpile levels,' he writes. On the Arak IR-40, Einhorn proposes that, at a minimum, 'changes should be made in the reactor's design to greatly reduce its production of plutonium, especially to fuel it with enriched uranium and reduce its power level,' he writes. 'The best solution would be to convert it to a light water-moderated research reactor, but other options requiring less extensive modification of the reactor are being explored.' However, 'if you can't get the Iranians to switch [Arak] to a light water reactor, you could limit the power of the Arak reactor' from 40 MW to 10 MW, and instead of natural fuel, feed low enriched fuel into it, George Perkovich, a non-proliferation expert who serves as vice president and director of non-proliferation studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told Al-Monitor. 'Then [you could] control how long it stays in the reactor, which actually makes better medical isotopes...If you do all these things, it dramatically reduces the amount of plutonium in spent fuel,' to about 6kg a year, Perkovich said. 'That's a serious impediment to a breakout,' Perkovich said. 'That would be less than a bomb's worth of plutonium produced [a year].' In addition, Perkovich said, 'Any proposed agreement says 'no reprocessing.' So the reduced plutonium concentration in spent fuel in a safeguarded reactor is a barrier added to the more fundamental barrier that Iran agrees to fore-go reprocessing and not have a facility for it.' Can the parties reach a deal by July 20th? Or will they need an extension? 'I think both parties really do have a strong incentive to get it done in six months,' Einhorn said. 'I don't think either party has an incentive to extend it.' However, he said, while 'both sides genuinely want to reach agreement and want to create the perception that agreement is possible...[to] generate momentum, the reality is the substantive positions' are still far apart." http://t.uani.com/1rXLy9Q 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.