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WSJ:
"Nuclear talks between Iran and six world powers resumed Tuesday in
the Austrian capital, the start of a week of negotiations aimed at
reaching a final agreement by the deadline next Monday... Iranian Foreign
Minister Javad Zarif held a lunch meeting Tuesday with the chair of the
six-power group, former European Union foreign policy chief Catherine
Ashton, and there were bilateral talks between the U.S. and Iranian
teams. U.S. and European officials said on the eve of the talks that
there remain significant gaps on key issues, including how tight a cap
Tehran would accept on its future nuclear enrichment activities. Speaking
in London on Tuesday morning after meeting his U.K. counterpart, U.S.
Secretary of State John Kerry said it was impossible to say whether a
deal can be reached. 'We hope we can get there but we can't make any
predictions,' he said. 'It's imperative obviously, that Iran work with us
in all possible effort to prove to the world the [nuclear] program is
peaceful.'" http://t.uani.com/1zCZ05o
AFP:
"Iran and six world powers got down to business in Vienna Wednesday,
groping for the elusive magic formula to secure a milestone nuclear deal
that satisfies hardliners in Tehran and Washington. The clock was ticking
ever louder however on the second day of this final round of talks, with
just five more days for Iran and the five permanent members of the UN
Security Council plus Germany to get a deal. Foreign ministers were
expected in the Austrian capital later in the week, but the US State
Department made clear that Secretary of State John Kerry, currently in
London, would not arrive until Thursday afternoon at the earliest...
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, whose country is a crucial player
in the talks, will only come to Vienna if there is sufficient progress,
Moscow's lead negotiator Sergei Ryabkov told Russian media late
Tuesday." http://t.uani.com/1xPwFbG
Bloomberg:
"A United Nations committee voted for its strongest condemnation of
Iran's human-rights record less than a week before a deadline for world
powers and the Islamic Republic to reach a deal on curbing its nuclear
program. The UN General Assembly's main committee handling human rights
yesterday adopted Canada's version of a resolution criticizing Iran's
'alarming high frequency and increase in the death penalty,' widespread
restrictions on basic freedoms and worsening discrimination and
persecution of women and minorities... The stronger language in this
year's non-binding resolution follows an independent UN investigator's
report that found Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has failed to deliver
on his campaign pledge to improve human rights. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN
special rapporteur on Iran, reported a surge in public executions and the
deteriorating status of women's rights in Iran... Canada's proposed
revised text of the annual resolution was adopted with 78 votes in favor
and 35 'no' votes cast by countries including Russia, China, Syria and
North Korea. There were 69 abstentions." http://t.uani.com/1F0679j
Nuclear
Program & Negotiations
AFP:
"US Secretary of State John Kerry has pushed back his trip to Vienna
where international negotiators are in final talks on Iran's nuclear
programme, his department said. Kerry, who has been in London since
Monday evening, was due to arrive mid-week in the Austrian capital to
complete negotiations with the '5+1' group (United States, Russia, China,
France, Britain and Germany) and Tehran... But Kerry will now travel to
Vienna 'later in the week', state department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki
indicated, adding that the exact day had not yet been set. 'Secretary
Kerry will stay in London tomorrow where he will continue consulting with
both the negotiating team in Vienna and his interagency counterparts in
Washington,' she said late Tuesday. 'He will travel to Paris on Thursday
morning where he will have separate meetings with Saudi Foreign Minister
Saud and French foreign Minister Fabius on the Iran nuclear
negotiations.'" http://t.uani.com/1uJ3W92
Sanctions
Relief
Reuters:
"India will soon pay a third tranche of $400 million to Iran ahead
of a Nov. 24 deadline to an interim deal with six world powers that
allows Tehran to recover part of its overseas frozen oil revenues,
industry sources said in Wednesday. Indian oil refiners are preparing to
release the payments this week, the sources said, adding Mangalore
Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd and Essar Oil will make the bulk of the
payment. The other refiners that will also make payments are Indian Oil
Corp and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. India has already paid $900 million in
two installments under the interim deal that allowed Iran to recover $2.8
billion of its funds held in foreign banks, in addition to $4.2 billion
paid between January and July. 'Payment could be made as early as
tomorrow,' said a second source. The sources declined to be named due to
the sensitivity of the matter." http://t.uani.com/1vpeMmt
Sanctions
Enforcement & Impact
NYT:
"More than a year after paying a steep penalty for doing business
with Iran, one of the world's biggest banks is back in regulators' cross
hairs. New York State's chief banking regulator on Tuesday announced a
$315 million settlement with the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, accusing
the bank of 'misleading regulators' about its business with Iran and
other countries blacklisted by the United States. The latest action is an
outgrowth of a separate settlement, reached in June of last year, that
took aim at the Japanese bank for routing transactions with Iran through
New York. The initial settlement drew a $250 million penalty, a sum that
was based in part on a report that assessed the extent of the bank's
wrongdoing. The report, conducted by the consulting firm
PricewaterhouseCoopers, was supposed to be objective." http://t.uani.com/1yoiytn
Terrorism
Algemeiner:
"The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP,) the
Palestinian terrorist group widely believed to have carried out today's
terrorist attack on a synagogue in Jerusalem's Har Nof neighborhood in
which four people were killed, has seen its star fade since its heyday
during the 196os and 70s, when the organization was notorious for airline
hijackings and other atrocities. But signs are emerging that Iran is
reviving the group's flagging fortunes... Last year, however, the PFLP
apparently found a new sponsor in the form of Iran. According to Middle
East website Al Monitor, the Islamist regime in Tehran 'has resumed its
financial and military support' of the Marxist PFLP 'in order to
strengthen its alliance with the 'Palestinian resistance forces' and not
limit itself to only supporting Islamist movements such as Hamas and
Islamic Jihad." According to Al Monitor, a source who spoke on the
condition of anonymity said that 'several meetings were held between the
PFLP leadership abroad and Iranian officials in Beirut, Damascus and
Tehran under the auspices of Lebanese Hezbollah terrorist organization.
Those meetings resulted in reviving direct support to the PFLP.'
'Following the resumption of Iranian support, there will soon be a
dramatic increase in the strength of the PFLP's military wing, the Abu
Ali Mustafa Brigades, after the internal reorganization of the group is
completed,' the source told Al Monitor." http://t.uani.com/11Caz1F
Human Rights
ICHRI:
"The Rouhani administration should use all its authority to end the
government's initiatives to restrict Iranians' access to the Internet,
immediately cease state efforts to monitor users' online accounts, and
end the prosecution of individuals for their peaceful online activities,
the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said today. In a
49-page report released today, Internet in Chains: The Front Line of
State Repression in Iran, the Campaign reveals the technological
initiatives, policies, and practices underway in Iran that will
profoundly violate Iranians' right to access information, freedom of
speech, and right to privacy. It includes a detailed description of
ongoing efforts to implement a National Internet." http://t.uani.com/1vph3xY
Foreign Affairs
RFE/RL:
"The commander of Iran's Basij paramilitary force has accused the
U.S. Embassy in Baghdad of being the 'Islamic State command center,'
saying the United States wants to bring IS to Iran's borders in order to
pressure Tehran. Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Naghdi's comments,
reported by Iran's Fars News (close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards
Corps, or IRGC), echoed accusations by Iran's supreme leader and other
Iranian military and political leaders that IS is a creation of the
United States and the West. Naghdi also said that Iraq has its own 'Iraqi
Basij' volunteer paramilitary fighters." http://t.uani.com/1xUCSUQ
Times of Israel:
"In a sermon carried on state TV, an Iranian cleric threatened that
his country will 'raze Tel Aviv and Haifa to the ground' and target US
bases. Ayatollah Ali Movahedi-Kermani, whose Friday sermon was translated
on Sunday by MEMRI, a US-based media watchdog group, spoke extensively
about Iran's ballistic missile capabilities. Movahedi-Kermani claimed
that Tehran would use Iranian-made Sejjil missiles against Israel as a
defensive deterrent if Jerusalem ever decided to attack the Islamic
Republic. 'If such a mistaken idea of attacking Iran occurs to Israel one
day, we will, as our supreme leader said, raze Tel Aviv and Haifa to the
ground,' the cleric warned. The sermon, which was carried by Iran's
Channel One, a government-owned station, also threatened US bases in the
region, declaring that neither the United States nor Israel was safe from
Iran's ballistic missile capabilities. 'The Sejjil ballistic missile can hit
and raze to the ground any place in Israel, as well as any American base
in the region,' the ayatollah claimed, adding that all of 'Israel's
atomic or missile centers... are within range of the powerful, fast, and
awe-inspiring missiles of Iran.'" http://t.uani.com/14Lu7Su
Opinion &
Analysis
Faisal Al Yafai in
The National: "Surely, then, with agreement so close
and with the issue so great, it is churlish of the Gulf states to
continue their displeasure at the prospect of rapprochement with Iran? After
all, if the possibility of Iran acquiring nuclear weapons recedes, then
Iran can no longer be a threat to the Gulf states? This reading of the
situation is, however, profoundly mistaken. Despite the conciliatory tone
struck by Oman's foreign minister in an interview last week - where he
said that an agreement between Iran and the west would be more in the
Gulf's interests than in Iran's - the mood behind the scenes in the Gulf
is far from genial. That is because Iran won't become a threat to the
Gulf by acquiring nuclear weapons. It is already a threat now. This is
not hyperbole. Over the past decade, Iran has steadily expanded its
influence across the Middle East - recently with tacit US support. The
'big bang' came at the start of the century, when the United States,
helpfully, destroyed two of Iran's enemies. Subsequent reporting -
particularly from The New Yorker's Dexter Filkins - has exposed exactly
how deep the relationship between the two countries was in the war
against the Taliban. This was not a nod and a wink, this was open
collaboration. The same happened in Iraq, although both sides played
dirty. The Iranians both supported the Americans against Saddam Hussein
and, later, his loyalists, and sought to undermine them. The murkiness of
that war and the back room deals that carved out a wide sphere of
influence for Iran inside Iraq has poisoned the relationship between
Sunnis and Shia, perhaps for a generation. When the Arab Spring exploded,
the Iranians were swift to move in, particularly in Syria and Yemen. In
the latter, although initially the Gulf-brokered agreement seemed to
marginalise the Houthi rebels, consistent action by Iran has paid off:
the Houthis, though small in number, have essentially gained veto power
over Yemen's government. The GCC, occupied as it has been with events
within its borders and the raging wars to its north, has neglected the
government in Sanaa, with the result that Iran now wields incredible
influence on the government of one of the largest countries on the Arabian
Peninsula. All of that is without even discussing Syria, where Iran's
support for the murderous Assad regime has destabilised the entire region
and made millions homeless. All of which is essential background to
understand the view of the Gulf states. A future time when a
nuclear-armed Iran poses a threat across the Strait of Hormuz need never
materialise: Iran is a threat now, gradually pursuing policies that
reduce the security and stability of the Gulf. It is for that reason that
the Gulf states view a nuclear deal with such trepidation. In its rush to
get a foreign policy victory for Barack Obama's time in office, the US
administration has ridden roughshod over decades of links. The Gulf looks
to the US to guarantee security in the region: what message does it send
when the Americans go behind the backs of their allies and seek a deal
with Tehran? As Hussein Ibish wrote on these pages yesterday, there is a
feeling in the Gulf that the US is tacitly accepting a sphere of
influence for Iran - a sphere that encircles the traditional allies of
the Gulf. If there is an agreement with Iran next week, many in the West
will congratulate themselves on the power of that diplomacy and the
effective use of sanctions. But the mood in the Gulf will be less
celebratory. There has never been an issue with the people of Iran, nor
with its position as a majority Shia country. The problem is all
politics. When the diplomats and politicians of the West have finished
their gladhanding, they will leave the Middle East - but for the Gulf
Arabs, the problems with the government in Tehran will continue." http://t.uani.com/1HkW96m
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Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against
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email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com
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