Eye on Iran: US: Forfeiture Deal over Iran Assets Sets Record

Join UANI           Top Stories AP: "A federal judge has approved plans to sell a 36-story Manhattan office building and other properties owned by Iran nationwide in what will be the largest terrorism-related forfeiture ever, a prosecutor said Thursday. U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said Judge Katherine Forrest approved the deal between the U.S. government and 19 holders of more than $5 billion in terrorism-related judgments against the government of Iran, including claims brought by the estates of victims killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The deal calls for the Manhattan building and other forfeited assets to be sold by the U.S. Marshals Service, with the U.S. government receiving reimbursement for litigation expenses and any costs of the sales before the rest is distributed to victims of terrorist attacks. The agreement stems from a 2008 lawsuit by the government against the building's owners. Bharara said the settlement is an important step toward 'completing what will be the largest ever terrorism-related forfeiture and providing a substantial recovery for victims of terrorism.' 'From the very beginning of this case,' Bharara said in a release, 'this office sought to dismantle Iran's slice of Manhattan - an office tower on Fifth Avenue - both to end Iran's illegal sanctions-violation and money-laundering schemes and to provide a means of compensating victims of Iranian-sponsored terrorism.' Besides Sept. 11 victims, the settling creditors include families and estates of victims of the 1983 terrorist bombings of U.S. Marine Barracks in Beirut, the 1996 terrorist bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia and terrorist attacks in Israel and elsewhere. The government said buildings also will be sold in Queens and in Houston, Carmichael, Calif., Catharpin, Va., and Rockville, Md." http://t.uani.com/1iwyDHN Reuters: "Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said the Islamic Republic had the might to deter any attacks as its military displayed a range of drones and missiles at an annual parade in Tehran, state television reported on Friday. Chanting 'God is Greatest', troops paraded missiles carriers, some bearing banners saying 'Death to America' and 'Death to Israel', armored personnel carriers and unmanned surveillance aircraft as well as small submarines with men wearing aqua-lungs alongside... 'We told the world during the (nuclear) talks and we repeat that we don't support any aggression ... We support dialogue,' Rouhani said in the live broadcast. 'We don't attack any country and don't want war but we will firmly confront any aggression against Iran,' he said, as helicopters and fighter jets flew overhead and parachutists landed in the parade area in the south of the capital near the shrine of revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini." http://t.uani.com/1jQtN7T AFP: "Iran's crude oil exports have hit 1.2 million barrels per day, almost doubling from eight months ago when the country elected a new president, a top government official said Friday. Mansour Moazami, who holds the planning brief among the Islamic republic's five deputy oil ministers, said the numbers were 20 percent above forecasts and they would rise further. 'When the government took office, exports were around 700,000 barrels per day,' Moazimi was cited as saying by Mehr, a semi-official government news agency. He said the updated figure of 1.2 million was supplemented by 200,000 barrels per day of derivative gas products from crude. 'Our oil exports are now 20 percent higher than in the budget numbers and we believe that in the current Iranian year they will increase further,' Moazimi added." http://t.uani.com/1eHm2ls        Nuclear Program & Negotiations Press TV (Iran): "A senior Iranian cleric says the Islamic Republic will never shut down its nuclear facilities including a heavy-water reactor in central Iran. Addressing worshippers at weekly Friday Prayers in Tehran, Kazem Seddiqi said Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has clearly noted that neither Arak heavy water facility, nor other nuclear sites will be shut down... The Iranian cleric added that if the arrogant powers managed to stop Iran's nuclear fuel cycle, it would also bring production in other sectors to a halt and the country's economy would be further disrupted. Seddiqi also echoed recent calls by Ayatollah Khamenei that Iran's nuclear activities are unstoppable, adding that as put by the Leader, '...we will not give up any of achievements made by our scientists in peaceful nuclear energy at any price.'" http://t.uani.com/1kIh2xb Bloomberg: "Iran may be less likely to halt its nuclear weaponry program after the U.S. and Europe failed to stop Russia from annexing part of Ukraine, which 20 years ago gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees, said former U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen. In the case of Ukraine 'having given up its nuclear weapons in a deal that was supposed to guarantee their independence, we now see their independence being rolled back by Russia,' Cohen said in an interview on Bloomberg Television's 'Political Capital with Al Hunt' airing this weekend. 'I think that sends a signal to the Iranians, certainly to the North Koreans and others, that maybe we've got to hold on to what we have or try to get what we don't have.'" http://t.uani.com/1mcU3wy Sanctions Relief NYT: "President Obama has warned that Iran is not open for business, even as the United States has loosened some of its punishing economic sanctions as part of an interim nuclear pact. Yet, on Tuesday morning, Iran had an unlikely visitor: a plane, owned by the Bank of Utah, a community bank in Ogden that has 13 branches throughout the state. Bearing a small American flag on its tail, the aircraft was parked in a highly visible section of Mehrabad Airport in Tehran. But from there, the story surrounding the plane, and why it was in Iran - where all but a few United States and European business activities are prohibited - grows more mysterious. While federal aviation records show the plane is held in a trust by the Bank of Utah, Brett King, one of its executives in Salt Lake City, said, 'We have no idea why that plane was at that airport.' He said that the Bank of Utah acted as a trustee for investors who have a financial stake in the plane and that the bank was investigating further. The Federal Aviation Administration said it had no information about the investors in the aircraft or who was operating it. Officials waiting at the gangway at Mehrabad Airport said only that the aircraft was 'V.I.P.' The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, the federal government's primary enforcer of sanctions against Iran, declined to comment on the plane's presence there." http://t.uani.com/1hSN0q9 Reuters: "Iran's crude oil exports fell for the first time in five months in March, and are slated to drop further in April, moving closer to the levels stipulated by November's temporary nuclear deal that eased some sanctions on Tehran. Under the agreement reached in Geneva, Iran's oil exports were to remain at an average 1 million barrels per day (bpd) for the six months to July 20, but since the signing last year, shipments to Asia alone had topped that mark until this month. The drop in crude exports to just over 1 million bpd in March and to 953,000 bpd for April, according to ship loading data seen by Reuters, reduces pressure on Tehran ahead of talks next month to finalise an end to the decade-old nuclear dispute. The drops have come mainly because Japan did not take any cargoes in March and South Korea is not scheduled to take any shipments in April, according to the tanker data. 'When the Iranian exports increased, the market noticed so I'm not surprised that they might try to cut back some in the upcoming period,' IHS oil consultant Victor Shum said... Iran's biggest customer China will increase loadings this month to 552,000 bpd, about a third higher than a year ago, after a decline in March to 458,000 bpd. Chinese buyers will account for almost 60 percent of oil shipped by tanker from Iran in April... India is scheduled to load in April about 145,000 bpd of Iranian crude, down from imports of 412,000 bpd in January. It's not immediately clear if the reductions in Japan, India and South Korea are a response to pressure to hold to the terms of the temporary nuclear agreement, or if they are related to a seasonal drop in imports because of refinery maintenance." http://t.uani.com/1mjzDj4 Reuters: "Essar Oil, Iran's top Indian client, imported 18.6 percent more oil from Tehran in 2013/14 after a jump in shipment volumes in the final quarter to end-March, according to tanker arrival data obtained from trade sources and assessed by Thomson Reuters Oil Analytics. The private refiner shipped in about 231,100 barrels per day (bpd) of Iranian crude in March, its highest monthly shipment since at least January 2011, reflecting a growth of about 90 percent from February and six times more than the volume in March 2013, the data showed. The higher volumes in the quarter were probably triggered by an interim deal agreement Tehran and six world powers in November for a loosening of trade sanctions in exchange for curbs on Iran's disputed nuclear programme. Essar shipped in about 105,700 bpd from Iran in the year to March 31, the data showed, benefiting from discounts offered by Tehran. On the basis of actual loading from Iran, Essar lifted about 31 percent more oil than the contracted 80,000 bpd in the last fiscal year, a government source told Reuters." http://t.uani.com/1lfNTI1 Human Rights IHR: "Four prisoners were hanged in the prison of Bandar Abbas (Southern Iran) yesterday April 17. According to the group 'Human Rights and Democracy activists in Iran' (HRDAI) five prisoners were transferred to solitary confinement on Wednesday April 17, for implementation of their death sentences. Four of the prisoners were executed on Thursday morning. These prisoners were identified as:  Zargham Jahangiri (27) been 5 years in prison; and three Juvenile offenders: Ahmad Rahimi (21) been in the prison since he was 17 year old (Juvenile offender); Ali Fouladi (22) been in the prison since he was 16 year old and Ali Sharifi (29) been in the prison since he was 14 year old. Execution of a fifth prisoner was interrupted two minutes after being hanged and his execution was postponed." http://t.uani.com/1h9x4dW IHR: "A Kurdish political prisoner identified as Samko Khorshidi was hanged in the Dizelabad prison of Kermanshah, reported the 'Kurdistan Human Rights Organization' today. The prisoner was arrested in 2011 near Tehran, and sentenced to death charged with 'Moharebeh' (waging war against the God) and 'Corruption on earth', for membership in a Kurdish opposition group... At least three Kurdish political prisoners were executed by the Iranian authorities in 2013. All the executions were carried out secretly." http://t.uani.com/1hTjbGQ RFE/RL: "Dozens of Iranian security forces have stormed a section of Tehran's Evin prison where political prisoners are held, injuring a number of the detainees. Some 30 prisoners were transferred to solitary confinement following the raid on April 17. The reports by opposition websites have been confirmed by some of the families of the prisoners. The daughter of jailed human rights lawyer Abdolfatan Soltani told RFE/RL's Radio Farda that her father was among the prisoners who were beaten up and isolated. 'About 100 guards, members of antiriot forces, entered the prison. Under the excuse of inspecting Section 350, they brutally attacked the prisoners and beat them up,' Maedeh Soltani said in telephone interview from Tehran. She said she received the information from 'reliable' sources inside the prison. The website Kalame, which broke the news, says the 'unprecedented' raid is the most violent action against political prisoners in the past 20 years. 'The raid took place after prisoners protested and resisted against a brutal inspection plan. It lasted for five hours. The guards took pictures and filmed their operation,' the website said in its report." http://t.uani.com/1gPFX0y 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.