Eye on Iran: Family of Former Marine Held in Iran Issues Plea for Obama Not to Forget Him

Join UANI           Top Stories NYT: "Relatives of a former Marine imprisoned in Iran for more than three years said Tuesday that he had begun a hunger strike, and they released an open letter he had written to President Obama urging him 'not to forget me' as the United States intensifies negotiations with the Iranians on their disputed nuclear program... The letter by the former Marine, Amir Hekmati, 31, of Flint, Mich., was his first to Mr. Obama, and reflected despondency over the paralysis of his case. 'I have dictated this letter to my family and asked them to bring my plight to your attention through an open letter,' it reads. 'It is my hope that after reading this letter you, or anyone who may see this, will help end the nightmare I have been living.'" http://t.uani.com/1GPMRfm NYT: "Six international human rights groups have petitioned the United Nations to freeze its counternarcotics aid to Iran until that country abolishes the death penalty for drug offenses. In a jointly signed Dec. 12 letter released Wednesday by the groups, they argue that the freeze is justified because of 'the widening gulf between Iran's rhetoric and the realities of the justice system.' Iran executes more prisoners than any other country except China, with 500 to 625 executed last year, according to United Nations estimates. At least half of the condemned were convicted of drug trafficking... Even though some senior Iranian officials have spoken out against capital punishment for drug crimes, there have been signs that the pace of executions has accelerated this year... The letter was signed by Human Rights Watch, Reprieve, Iran Human Rights, the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty, Harm Reduction International and the Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation, named after an Iranian lawyer who was assassinated in Paris in 1991." http://t.uani.com/1yYixLz Reuters: "The Syrian government took steps on Tuesday to ensure oil imports from major ally Iran will continue to meet its needs as winter approaches, sending a high-level delegation to Tehran for talks with Iranian officials including President Hassan Rouhani... Syrian Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi visited Tehran to discuss ways to ensure Iranian petroleum products reach the Syrian market smoothly and well as other bilateral issues, Syrian state news agency SANA said." http://t.uani.com/1GPMa5Q     Nuclear Program & Negotiations Trend: "A senior Iranian official has made statements that the country may import nuclear fuel from abroad instead of producing it inside the country, the country's YJC news agency reported Dec. 17. If Iran can buy its needed enriched uranium at a price lower than the fuel produced inside, the country will certainly do that, Behrouz Kamalvandi, the spokesman of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) said. It is while some Iranian experts claim that the country's nuclear program is not economically justified at all and the issue has become more of a political 'prestige'. While responding to a question about shipping uranium outside the country, and then receiving it as converted into fuel rods, the official said that 'no uranium will exit from Iran.'" http://t.uani.com/1sEVclj Sanctions Relief Reuters: "India imported about 38 percent more oil from Iran in the eleven months to November as an easing of Western sanctions earlier in the year over Tehran's disputed nuclear activities helped boost shipments, trade sources said... India, Iran's top client after China, imported 250,600 barrels per day (bpd) crude last month, tanker arrival data obtained from trade sources show, a growth of 14 percent from a year ago and a decline of 19 percent from October... Arrivals from Iran over the first 11 months of the year stood at 270,100 bpd, up 37.7 percent on year... In the first eight months of the current contract year beginning April, India shipped in 35 percent more oil from Iran from a year ago at about 174,000 bpd, the data showed... Iran's share of Indian oil imports was about 7.1 percent in the first eleven months of the year, compared with 5 percent last year, the data showed." http://t.uani.com/1qZLrNC Human Rights Amnesty: "The Iranian authorities' threat to expedite the execution of 10 men on death row in retaliation for going on hunger strike is deplorable, said Amnesty International as it called for the death sentences to be commuted immediately. One of the 10, Saman Naseem, was sentenced to death in 2013 for engaging in armed activities against the state after he allegedly participated in a gun battle while he was a child during which a member of the Iran's Revolutionary Guards was killed. The 10 men are among 24 prisoners from Iran's Kurdish minority who have been on hunger strike since 20 November 2014 in protest at the conditions of Ward 12 of Oroumieh Central Prison, West Azerbaijan Province, where political prisoners are held. 'It is truly deplorable that the Iranian authorities are playing games with the lives of these men in such a manner. Resorting to death threats and other punitive measures to quell prisoners' hunger strikes only serves to underscore how rotten Iran's criminal justice system is,' said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty International's Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa." http://t.uani.com/1J2B0P1 AFP: "Three Christian clerics sentenced to six years' jail in Iran on 'national security' charges have been acquitted on appeal, a Christian rights association said Tuesday. Christian Solidary Worldwide said Pastor Matthias Haghnejad and Deacon Silas Rabbani had been released but Pastor Behnam Irani remained in Karaj jail, west of Tehran, for a separate conviction. The three Iranians were arrested in 2011 in Karaj, where they had set up underground churches. They were found guilty in October on charges of 'action against national security' and of 'creating a network to overthrow the system'. An appeals court in the Islamic republic dropped the charges in a hearing on December 9, said the Britain-based association." http://t.uani.com/1wKTmh8 Domestic Politics RFE/RL: "Mohammad Ali Jafari, the commander of Iran's powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), says President Hassan Rohani and the IRGC enjoy 'very good relations,' based on mutual trust... Jafari said Rohani has full trust in the IRGC. 'The enemies of the establishment and revolution, especially the foreign-based counterrevolutionaries, cannot harm this relationship, which was established since the imposed war [with Iraq],' he said." http://t.uani.com/1wKSSrj Opinion & Analysis David Axe in Reuters: "By 2014, the old Syrian army was a spent force. In May, a rebel sniper killed Iranian General Abdullah Eskandari in battle near Damascus. Opposition fighters seized Eskandari's notebook and published its contents online, including a frank description of the Syrian army's 'dissipation and disintegration' in Hama province in west-central Syria. It's safe to assume the army was in a similarly poor state in other provinces. But that didn't matter. Because by then the Iranians had essentially replaced the Syrian army with a militia called the National Defense Force, which draws many of its volunteers from the Alawite religious group - the regime's main supporters - and also requires minimal training and support to function. What the volunteers lack in expertise and experience, they make up in patriotic fervor. This fall, an Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps fighter named Sayyed Hassan Entezari gave a shockingly candid interview to a corps-funded website, in which he detailed the creation of the National Defense Force by Iranian agents. 'The Syrian army couldn't handle this three-year crisis because any army would be fatigued [after that long],' said Entezari, paralyzed after being badly wounded while fighting in Syria. 'Iran came and said why don't you form popular support for yourself and ask your people for help.' Tehran's agents helped build support for the volunteer National Defense Force. 'Our boys went to one of the biggest Alawite regions,' Entezari recalled. 'They told the head of one of the major tribes to call upon his youth to take up arms and help the regime.' Entezari explained that National Defense Force volunteers serve 45 days at a time on the front line before returning home. 'Of course,' he pointed out, 'some of them get martyred.' At any given time there are an estimated 50,000 National Defense Force fighters under arms in Syria, in at least 37 brigades of slightly more than 1,000 men apiece. Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps officers lead the volunteer units. Indeed, several high-ranking Revolutionary Guard Corps generals, in addition to Eskandari, have died commanding Syrian volunteers. Damascus equips volunteers with weapons from the disintegrating army, including many of the surviving tanks. Spreading the heavy weaponry across widely scattered militia units bolsters the volunteers' local firepower but also prevents Damascus from concentrating force for a decisive attack into rebel-held territory. This lack of decisive force worried Eskandari. In his notebook, he brainstormed ideas for punching through rebel lines. One was bringing in specialized 'line-breaker' troops from Iran. But not long after Eskandari died, Iran diverted some troops in Syria to Iraq to help battle Islamic State. It seems unlikely Tehran will be able to significantly boost its contingent in Syria. More than 24,000 National Defense Force volunteers have died in combat, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. But there are three million Alawites in Syria, more than enough to sustain the National Defense Force for years to come, barring an unlikely collapse in Alawite support for the regime. That means Damascus can keep fighting through 2015. But it can't win - and neither can the rebels or the militants. The rebels still struggle to obtain heavy weaponry for their two-front war. For their part, Islamic State militants have picked simultaneous fights with the Syrian regime, the Free Syrian Army, Iran, Iraq and a growing U.S.-led coalition. I predict that a year from now not much will have changed in Syria. Except for increases in the death toll and the roster of the displaced." http://t.uani.com/13xVCPh      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.