Eye on Iran: Iran May Run Centrifuges at Fortified Site

Join UANI           Top Stories AP: "The United States is considering letting Tehran run hundreds of centrifuges at a once-secret, fortified underground bunker in exchange for limits on centrifuge work and research and development at other sites, officials have told The Associated Press. The trade-off would allow Iran to run several hundred of the devices at its Fordo facility, although the Iranians would not be allowed to do work that could lead to an atomic bomb and the site would be subject to international inspections, according to Western officials familiar with details of negotiations now underway. In return, Iran would be required to scale back the number of centrifuges it runs at its Natanz facility and accept other restrictions on nuclear-related work. Instead of uranium, which can be enriched to be the fissile core of a nuclear weapon, any centrifuges permitted at Fordo would be fed elements such as zinc, xenon or germanium for separating out isotopes used in medicine, industry or science, the officials said... One senior U.S. official declined to comment on the specific proposal but said the goal since the beginning of the talks has been 'to have Fordo converted so it's not being used to enrich uranium.' ... Experts say the compromise for Fordo could still be problematic. They note it would allow Iran to keep intact technology that could be quickly repurposed for uranium enrichment at a sensitive facility that the U.S. and its allies originally wanted stripped of all such machines - centrifuges that can spin uranium gas into uses ranging from reactor fuel to weapons-grade material." http://t.uani.com/1Gxb3ql Reuters: "Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused Iran on Thursday of trying to dominate the Middle East and said its efforts have begun annoying Ankara, as well as Saudi Arabia and Gulf Arab countries. Turkey earlier said it supports the Saudi-led military operation against Houthi rebels in Yemen and called on the militia group and its 'foreign supporters' to abandon acts which threaten peace and security in the region. 'Iran is trying to dominate the region,' said Erdogan, who is due to visit Tehran in early April. 'Could this be allowed? This has begun annoying us, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries. This is really not tolerable and Iran has to see this,' he added in a press conference... Erdogan said the conflict has evolved into a sectarian one and urged Iran to withdraw. 'Iran has to change its view. It has to withdraw any forces, whatever it has in Yemen, as well as Syria and Iraq and respect their territorial integrity.' ... In an interview with France 24, Erdogan also criticized Iran's role in the fight against Islamic State in Iraq, saying Tehran was aiming to drive out the Sunni insurgents only to replace them. 'Iran's attitude towards the matter is not sincere because they have a sectarian agenda. So they will want to fill the void that will be created by Daesh (Islamic State) themselves,' Erdogan said in comments dubbed to English." http://t.uani.com/1940wpk AFP: The US Senate voted unanimously supporting a non-binding measure to slap new economic sanctions on Iran should it violate terms of any nuclear deal it reaches with world powers. In a symbolic measure aimed at building pressure on Tehran amid crunch negotiations over its atomic program, lawmakers voted 100-0 on an amendment introduced by Senate Republican Mark Kirk as part of an ongoing budget debate. It does not carry the weight of law because budget resolutions are not binding legislation, but it signals senators' determination to act quickly should Iran fail to meet any requirements of the interim accord now in place, or a possible final agreement. With Thursday's vote, the first on the Senate floor since talks began early last year, the measure's author intends to hold his colleagues to account. 'If we find out that there's further development in the Iran nuclear program, it will allow me to remind 100 senators that they voted with me today,' Kirk told AFP. The chamber's entire Democratic caucus came on board after a modification of wording that recognized the role of the US president in making a 'determination' about Iran's compliance." http://t.uani.com/1F0R2pZ     Nuclear Program & Negotiations LAT: "Iranian President Hassan Rouhani wrote a letter Thursday to President Obama and leaders of the other five countries engaged in talks aimed at a nuclear deal, urging them to overcome differences so that an agreement can be reached by the end of the month. Rouhani, who didn't disclose the full contents of the letter, also raised the Saudi Arabian air attacks on Iranian-supported rebels in Yemen, an action Iran has strongly criticized. He said on Twitter that he had condemned the attacks, contending they are only 'exacerbating the crisis' in a country fighting a many-sided civil war... Rouhani also spoke by phone with French President Francois Hollande, British Prime Minister David Cameron and Russian President Vladimir Putin... Rouhani pressed Iran's top talking point, which is that it will only accept a deal if the six countries on the other side of the table -- the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China -- agree to quickly drop sanctions." http://t.uani.com/1CTXTT4 Reuters: 'While all sides agree they have been inching closer to a deal, there are major disagreements that have prevented a resolution. Tehran insists on the freedom to continue research on advanced centrifuges, machines that purify uranium for use in nuclear power plants or, if very highly enriched, in weapons, at an underground facility, and the immediate lifting of all U.N. sanctions and the most severe U.S. and European Union sanctions. 'There has been massive progress on all the issues,' a senior Iranian official told Reuters. 'There are still disputes over two issues -- R&D (research and development) and U.N. sanctions.' A Western official close to the talks confirmed that from his side, centrifuge research and enrichment in general remained the most difficult unresolved issue: 'The essential element for us is R&D, and enrichment.'" http://t.uani.com/1942rdi  Iraq Crisis WSJ: "U.S. airstrikes pounded Islamic State strongholds in Tikrit on Thursday as thousands of Iranian-backed Shiite fighters were sidelined in the stalled offensive so that American forces could take a central role in the fight. Iraqi security forces prepared to capitalize on the intensifying airstrikes after ceding to a U.S. demand that the Shiite militias backed by Tehran be barred from the fight ahead, American officials said Thursday. Iraq's request for American help in Tikrit sparked outrage from the Shiite forces that make up the bulk of the fighters around the city, where militia leaders backed by Iran withdrew their support for the operation. A senior leader in the Shiite militias said on Thursday his forces weren't taking part in the Iraqi army's advance into the city in protest of the U.S. strikes. The militias would maintain their strategic positions around the city, he said, but not advance... American officials on Thursday trumpeted Iraq's shift in strategy as a sign that Iran's military mastermind, Major-Gen. Qasem Soleimani, had failed to deliver the swift victory against Islamic State that the Shiite militias initially promised." http://t.uani.com/1HRvVtY Yemen Crisis AFP: "Arab coalition warplanes bombed rebel camps in Yemen on Friday in a second straight day of strikes led by Saudi Arabia, which accused Iran of 'aggression' across the region. A months-long rebellion by Shiite fighters has escalated into a regional conflict that threatens to tear apart the impoverished state at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia has vowed to do 'whatever it takes' to prevent the fall of its ally President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, accusing Shiite Iran of backing the Huthi rebels' power grab... The White House voiced concern about 'reports of Iranian flow of arms into Yemen', while Riyadh lashed out at Tehran. 'The Iranians are the ones who are meddling in the affairs of the Arab countries whether it's in Lebanon, in Syria, in Iraq... in Yemen,' the kingdom's ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir, told Fox News. 'We have to deal with Iran's aggression in the region. We're dealing with their support of the Huthis and the Huthis' attempt to take over in Yemen,' he added." http://t.uani.com/1Nlxn6k Reuters: Conflict in Yemen risks spilling out into the busy sea lanes that pass it and potentially disrupt the narrow Bab el-Mandeb passage through which nearly 4 million barrels of oil are shipped daily to Europe, the United States and Asia... 'The collapse of Yemen as a political reality and the power of the Houthis will enable Iran to expand its presence on both sides of the Bab el-Mandeb, in the Gulf of Aden and in the Red Sea. Already discrete numbers of Iranian naval vessels regularly sail these waters,' J. Peter Pham of U.S. think tank the Atlantic Council said. Analysts say Houthi forces do not themselves have the maritime capabilities or the interest to target the Bab el-Mandeb, while warning of Iranian influence. 'If the Iranians were to gain access to a de facto base in some port or another controlled by the Houthis whom they have aided in the latter's fight, the balance of power in the sub-region would shift significantly,' said Pham, who also advises U.S., European and African governments." http://t.uani.com/1CTWKLp Human Rights RFE/RL: "An Iranian journalist who campaigned for President Hassan Rohani and who had traveled to Lausanne with Iranian negotiators to cover talks on Tehran's nuclear program is seeking political asylum in Switzerland. Amir Hossein Motaqi, editor of Iran's ISKA news agency, told RFE/RL he decided to seek asylum after being hampered in his journalistic work by Iranian officials. 'Officials from the Foreign Ministry demanded that we cover the news they wanted -- news that was not true -- or not to cover news that they didn't want to be published,' Motaqi told RFE/RL in a telephone interview from Lausanne. He said pressure also came from 'one or two' members of news agencies affiliated with the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). Motaqi, 31, said such 'clear interference' forced him to end his work with domestic media 'to tell the truth and defend freedom of expression.'" http://t.uani.com/1HW8cW4 ICHRI: The United Nations Human Rights Council voted today to renew the mandate of Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, signaling the international community's continued concern over the state of human rights in Iran. The resolution to renew the mandate received 20 votes in favor, 11 against, and 16 abstentions. 'The vote's message is loud and clear: four years after the establishment of the mandate, Dr. Shaheed's work is not done,' said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. 'The most basic rights and freedoms continue to be routinely violated in Iran.'" http://t.uani.com/1BPSBCv Opinion & Analysis WSJ Editorial: "With less than a week to go until the deadline for the Iran nuclear talks, the list of skeptical governments and experts is growing. The latest addition is the International Atomic Energy Agency, and its misgivings are a reality check on Iran's willingness to honor its promises. 'Progress has been very limited' on Iran's promise to come clean about its earlier efforts to develop a nuclear weapon, IAEA head Yukiya Amano said this week. Mr. Amano added that 'no more new issues' had been resolved, particularly on Iran's effort to develop explosives for a nuke. Supporters of the talks hailed last year's Iranian-IAEA statement, in which Tehran pledged to fess up to its weaponization work. That statement followed a 2013 agreement setting out a 12-step plan for disclosing the possible military dimensions of a nuclear program Tehran still claims is for civilian use. Tehran would clean the slate about the past, the thinking went, and trust would grow. Now Mr. Amano says Tehran has completed only one of the 12 steps... Without Iranian disclosure of past illicit activities, including nuclear enrichment and weaponization research, it's hard to see how the Obama Administration can honor its core pledge to strike a deal that would give the West a one-year warning if Iran decides to build a bomb. As Olli Heinonen, the former Deputy Director-General for Safeguards at the IAEA, told us, 'you need to have that baseline. You want to understand what they were doing.' An Iran that has the know-how to rapidly weaponize highly enriched uranium or plutonium may need only months to assemble a bomb. The Obama Administration is nonetheless plowing ahead and, the Journal reports, is prepared to accept a 'scaled-back version' of the 2013 agreement. The U.S. may also accept a verification plan that would grant the IAEA access to 'some' of the sites that Iran has so far closed to the IAEA. But any verification program that doesn't give inspectors unfettered and immediate access to any place they want to see does little more than create the illusion of inspections while giving Iran the opportunity to cheat. The Administration's red lines on Iran have been as erasable as they were on Syria. But Iran's inspection stonewall ought to be a deal-breaker, and cause for a sense of the Senate vote as early as next week on the President's failing diplomacy." http://t.uani.com/1H5tL6D UANI VP of Operations Simone Dinah Hartmann in Algemeiner: "Do you remember how ABC's 'Nightline with Ted Koppel' began? Its first broadcast was on November 8, 1979. Four days earlier, a group of Iranian students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and took 66 Americans hostage, just months after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini took over Iran. ABC started Nightline as a special nighttime program to update Americans on the fate of the hostages. Each day for the next 440 days, Americans followed the unfolding events of the hostage crisis and its trigger, Iran's Islamic Revolution. The takeover was not a random act by radical students but a demonstration of the extremist nature of the Islamic Republic and its hatred of America - a hatred that hasn't vanished, even as the regime is on the verge of signing a nuclear deal with the United States. The deal between the P5+1 and Iran would likely leave thousands of Iranian centrifuges running and enriching uranium - the fissile material that could eventually be used for nuclear weapons. The deal would also permit Iran to maintain a plutonium path to a bomb and continue to develop long-range ballistic missiles, which would be delivery vehicles for a nuclear bomb. These realities raise some serious questions: Can we trust the Iranian regime with an intact nuclear infrastructure that leaves Tehran within a year of building a nuclear weapon? Can we trust a regime that spreads havoc in the Middle East and threatens American lives? On day 26 of the Iranian hostage crisis, Koppel reported that President Jimmy Carter's mother, Lillian, had vented, 'If I had a million dollars, I'd look for someone to kill the Ayatollah Khomeini.' When she spoke those words, it was not yet even known how brutally Iranian revolutionaries had been treating their American prisoners. As some hostages later recounted, beatings, mock executions, and cruel episodes of Russian roulette were part of their ordeal." http://t.uani.com/1xkbPVt Claudia Rosett in WSJ: American negotiators and their cohorts are trying to close a deal that would let Iran keep its nuclear program, subject to intricate conditions of monitoring and enforcement. Yet how is a deal like that supposed to be verified? The Obama administration can't even keep up with the Iran-linked oil tankers on the U.S. blacklist. Currently, there are at least 55 of these tankers the Treasury Department says are under U.S. sanctions. These are large ships, major links in the oil chain that sustains the Tehran regime, many of them calling at ports from Turkey to China. They are easier to spot and track than, say, smuggled nuclear parts (which, in a pinch, they could potentially squeeze on board). But Iran has engaged for years in what Treasury called 'deceptive practices' to dodge sanctions. These include trying to mask the identities, and sometimes the smuggling activities, of its blacklisted ships by renaming them, reflagging them to other countries, veiling their ownership behind front companies, presenting false documents, and engaging in illicit ship-to-ship oil transfers. The result, according to information on Treasury's publicly available blacklist, is that the U.S. government cannot establish under what flag at least 31 of these tankers are doing business. They can be identified by their unique seven-digit hull numbers, or IMO numbers, issued for the life of each ship. But a ship's flag also is a vital identifier, one under which it signals its position, carries cargo and presents credentials to visit ports, buy insurance and pay fees. On Treasury's Specially Designated Nationals list, which helps ensure global compliance with U.S. sanctions, in the category of 'flag' for these 31 tankers Treasury states: 'none identified.' ... Under the emerging Iran nuclear deal, especially if sanctions are lifted, how exactly do the U.S. and its partners propose to keep a tighter leash on Iran's nuclear program than they are now keeping on its shipping traffic?" http://t.uani.com/1xkc0QP          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.