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Reuters:
"Former U.S. embassy workers held hostage in Iran from 1979 to 1981
are outraged that Tehran has selected a new U.N. envoy who may have
played a role in the 444-day crisis and want him barred from U.S.
territory, lawyers for the ex-hostages said on Monday. The fact that
Hamid Abutalebi, a veteran diplomat who has held key European postings in
the past, has been selected by President Hassan Rouhani as Iran's new
ambassador to the United Nations has been well known among U.N.
delegations for months. But his potential role in the hostage crisis,
first reported by Bloomberg News over the weekend, has led some former
hostages to call on the administration of President Barack Obama to
reject his diplomatic visa application. 'It's a disgrace if the USG (U.S.
government) accepts Abutalebi's visa as Iranian Ambassador to the U.N.,'
former hostage Barry Rosen said in a statement provided to Reuters by
Alan Madison, spokesman for and member of the legal team representing the
former hostages in their compensation claims. 'It may be a precedent but
if the President and the Congress don't condemn this act by the Islamic
Republic, then our captivity and suffering for 444 days at the hands of
Iran was for nothing,' he said. 'He can never set foot on American
soil.'" http://t.uani.com/1dK9U30
Bloomberg:
"Families and victims of the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in
Kenya and Tanzania that killed more than 200 people were awarded $907
million in compensation by a U.S. judge. U.S. District Judge John D.
Bates in Washington awarded the damages March 28, based on formulas that
included $3 million for emotional injuries, $5 million for severe
physical injuries, and $7 million or more for those blinded and made
quadriplegics, according to court papers and a statement by plaintiffs' attorney
Thomas Fay. The governments of Iran and Sudan were sued by survivors
under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act and accused of helping
terrorists produce 'calculated mayhem' that killed hundreds and injured
thousands, Fay said today in the statement... In the August 1998 attacks,
embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, more than 224
people died, including 12 U.S. citizens. The judge cited Iran and Sudan
'for their roles in supporting, funding and otherwise carrying out these
unconscionable acts' in simultaneous suicide bombings." http://t.uani.com/1lkWees
NYDN:
"The Iranian companies that own a Midtown office tower worth more
than $500 million must forfeit the building to people who successfully
sued Iran for damages over terrorist attacks, including 9/11, a judge has
ruled. In a written opinion Friday, Manhattan Federal Judge Katherine
Forrest said the companies must hand over the building because they acted
as fronts for the Iranian government and therefore 'are' the government of
Iran under certain federal laws. In a separate but related decision in
September, Forrest said the feds have the right to seize the building,
650 Fifth Ave., partly due to money laundering acts. It's unclear how the
various claims to the property will be sorted out. The terrorism victims
are staking claim to the building because a different federal judge,
George Daniels, in 2012 ordered Iran, Hezbollah, Osama Bin Laden and
others to pay them more than $6 billion in damages. Daniels, in a default
judgment in 2011, found Iran and other parties liable for the 9/11
attacks." http://t.uani.com/1dKcaqV
Syria Conflict
NPR:
"But the U.S. isn't the only country that's faced difficult choices
over Syria. Iran and Syria have been close allies for decades. And in
Iran, discussions about Syria are surprisingly frank, complex and
demonstrate growing divisions over how to handle a costly war that has no
end in sight. At Tehran University, students of international relations
study the Syria-Iran alliance, one of the most enduring in the region.
Yet there are now more questions about Iran's recent role in the Syrian
bloodshed... Iran is reportedly spending billions to prop up Syrian
President Bashar Assad. Saudi Arabia backs the rebels... Iranian student
activists and a Facebook page in Farsi and English last month to promote
news from Syria for Iranians. 'The Iranian regime is supporting a
dictator hated by most Syrians,' reads the founding statement on the
site, 'and is wasting economic resources desperately needed by Iranians
at home.'" http://t.uani.com/1iVLJgU
Human Rights
Reuters:
"Human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh has been summoned by Iran's
Intelligence Ministry for questioning, her husband's Facebook page said,
days after a video of her voicing support for what she called prisoners of
conscience was posted online. Reza Khandan, Sotoudeh's husband, said his
wife had ignored the summons, made in a telephone call on Sunday, because
she considered it 'illegal'. Sotoudeh was freed from several years in
prison in September shortly before President Hassan Rouhani's visited the
United Nations, in what was seen at the time as a sign that his election
would usher in a new era of political freedom. In March, however, the
United Nations said his administration had only taken small steps to
improve human rights. The U.N special rapporteur for human rights said
almost 900 political prisoners were being held. In a Facebook posting on
Monday, Khandan wrote that the Intelligence Ministry had called Sotoudeh
while they were on a family trip in the province of Khuzestan. 'Since the
phone call was illegal, they ignored the summons and went horseback
riding instead,' Khandan said, referring to Sotoudeh and their host, who
he did not identify." http://t.uani.com/1mvx8d1
AFP:
"An Iranian film director is to held a private screening of his
latest movie on Saturday to raise funds to save the life of a 26-year-old
on death row. Mostafa Kiaei, director of 'Special Line', said he had
learnt by accident of the young man's case and wanted to help raise the
'blood money' to be paid to the family of a murder victim. 'I didn't know
the convict before and I learned about the case through a contact in the
judiciary,' Kiaei told AFP. According to Mehr news agency, the unnamed
convict and two of his friends were involved in a street fight which led
to the murder, but he did not kill the victim. The case became more
complicated after his accomplices died in a car accident, leaving him the
only person accountable for paying the blood money. The convict has been
in jail for the past seven years." http://t.uani.com/1dKaldy
Commerce
Trend:
"Iran, Afghanistan and India are set to sign a memorandum of
understanding which will give Kabul access to India via Iran's southern
Chabahar Port, a senior Afghan official said. Afghan foreign ministry
spokesman Shakib Mostaghni said Afghanistan will connect to India via
Iran in the near future, Iranian IRNA news agency reported on March 31.
He went on to say that the memorandum's text has been submitted to Indian
officials to be studied... India's ambassador to Iran, Shri D.P.
Srivstava, who was present in the meeting, said that an Indian private
company is ready to establish a direct shipping link between Chabahar and
the Indian ports in order to bypass Dubai, where Indian container ships
have to cross to reach Iran." http://t.uani.com/1gkKTWu
Domestic
Politics
Trend:
"The Statistics Center of Iran on March 30 reported that the
country's point-to-point inflation in the 12th calendar month of the
previous year (February 20 - March 20) decreased by 2.4 percent compared
to its previous month, Iran's Fars News Agency reported... Iranian
President Hassan Rouhani said on March 29 that the country's inflation
rate is projected to drop to 25 percent by the end of the current Iranian
calendar year (March 20, 2015), Iran's Arsh news website reported.
'Improving relations with foreign countries may even cause the figure to
fall below 25 percent,' he explained... The Statistics Center of Iran on
March 1 put the 12-month and the point-to-point inflation rates for the
eleventh Iranian calendar month of Bahman (January 21 - February 19) at
33.7 percent and 22 percent, respectively, Iran's Mehr News Agency
reported." http://t.uani.com/1gXPhRj
Opinion &
Analysis
Eric Shawn in Fox
News: "Former American hostage Barry Rosen, held by
student extremists at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran for more than a year,
said Monday it would be an 'outrage' and 'disgrace' if Washington gave a
visa to one of the militants recently named by Iran as its new U.N.
ambassador. 'It may be a precedent but if the president and the Congress
don't condemn this act by the Islamic Republic, then our captivity and
suffering for 444 days at the hands of Iran was for nothing,' Rosen said.
'He can never set foot on American soil.' Iran wants to send Hamid
Aboutalebi to New York as its new U.N. ambassador. He may be a
56-year-old veteran diplomat, but it turns out that Aboutalebi was
apparently a member of the hard-line Muslim student group that in 1979
took over the U.S. embassy in Tehran for 444 days and held American
diplomats hostage. 'It's a disgrace if the United States government
accepts Aboutalebi's visa as Iranian Ambassador to the U.N.,' Rosen said.
Rosen was the embassy's press attaché, who was blindfolded and held at
gunpoint, along with 51 fellow Americans taken hostage. In a statement to
Fox News, Rosen demanded that the Obama administration deny a visa to
Aboutalebi to prevent him from taking up Tehran's U.N. post. U.S. State
Department spokesperson Marie Harf did not indicate if the administration
intends to bar Aboutalebi from the country by refusing to issue him a
visa. 'The visa procedure is obviously confidential, we don't discuss
individual visa cases. People are free to apply for one and their visas
are adjudicated under the normal procedures that we adjudicate peoples',
and we don't make a prediction about what the outcome of that process
might look like,' she said. 'This is a thumb in the eye of the United
States,' charged former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John
Bolton. 'This is really Iran's ambassador in America since they have no
direct diplomatic ties, and I think that it is intended to show that this
regime, despite some of the p.r. moves we've heard about it, is still the
same fundamentally anti-American regime it's been since 1979.' Under
existing U.N. agreements, it appears that the White House may have its
hands tied in trying to stop Aboutalebi from representing the Islamic
Republic of Iran. The U.N.-U.S. host country agreement generally only
allows the U.S. government to reject a diplomat's visa if the subject
presents a national security risk to the United States. Sources say
officials are exploring their options on whether it could be legal to bar
Aboutalebi. 'Personally I think Iran should either be expelled or
suspended under the U.N. charter because it is not a peace loving state,'
Bolton said. 'I have no hesitation at all in saying we should deny a visa
to this individual. There is no chance the Obama administration will do
that because they'll fear its consequences for the nuclear negotiations.'
Iranian officials have not responded to Fox News' request for comment on
their selection. Aboutalebi has told the Iranian news media that while he
was not a part of the initial violent takeover of the embassy, he admitted
serving as an interpreter during a news conference for some of the freed
hostages. He also said that he was a translator. He was 22 years old at
the time. Since then, he has served extensively in the foreign service in
a variety of high-profile posts. He was Iran's Ambassador to Australia,
Belgium, Italy, and the European Union. He has also been the political
director general of the Foreign Ministry. 'For the past 15 years, I have
been an ambassador to many Western countries that are very close to the U.S.,
from Europe to Australia, and have always been dealing with the West,'
Aboutalebi told the website Khabar Online. 'Even in 1994 when I traveled
to the US as a member of our country's delegation at the U.N. General
Assembly for a while, no questions [about my past] ever come up.'" http://t.uani.com/1gXRrjV
Olivier Guitta in
the National Post: "While the international
community has been focusing on a potential Israeli strike against Iranian
nuclear facilities, another much larger issue looms, and should be
tackled very urgently. But interestingly, except for a few concerned
neighbours in the Gulf, nobody is really looking at the possible
implications of a potential earthquake in Bushehr, where Iran's oldest
and main nuclear plant is located. Bushehr, a city of over a million
people in southeast Iran, sits in one of the most active seismic regions
in the world, at the intersection of three tectonic plates. Building a
nuclear plant in this area should have been a no-no, but construction
started in 1975 with the help of Germany. It was stopped in 1979, right
before the Revolution that unseated the Shah. It was resumed in 1996 with
Russian assistance. The project took over 15 years to complete because of
the very difficult technical issues of merging German and Russian
technology. After Russia provided necessary nuclear fuel, the plant went
operational in July 2013. The safety issues concerning the plant are
numerous: It is built with a 40-year-old design that has shown its
limitations; the emergency coolant system is also 30 years old; it is
running on two different technologies; according to the International
Atomic Energy Agency, the staff is not properly trained to face any kind
of accident. In February, 2011, a broken water pump caused small metallic
pieces to infiltrate the reactor cooling system, forcing the unloading of
the fuel rods. When you couple all this with the fact that Iran is the
only nuclear-operating country that has not signed any of the major
international safety conventions, one should be very worried about a
possible Fukushima-style accident. Indeed, in May, 2011, Iranian
scientists themselves concluded this, in a report that was subsequently
leaked. The design of the plant, and the competence of its staff, are not
the only issues. It is situated in a zone that has experienced several
deadly and very intense earthquakes - including as recently as April of
last year. A 6.3 magnitude earthquake hit Bushehr; luckily the plant was
not online at the time." http://t.uani.com/1heMk9f
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Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against
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email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com
United Against Nuclear
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