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AFP: "Iran will never coordinate
with the United States in Syria and other regional conflicts, supreme
leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in remarks published on his website
Sunday. 'We don't want such a coordination as their main objective is
to stop Iran's presence in the region,' Khamenei said in a transcript
from a speech to university students... Khamenei repeated demands for
the US to stop interfering in the region and said Washington was still
acting aggressively despite last year's nuclear accord with world
powers to end Iran's isolation. 'Americans are still engaged in
hostility against the nation of Iran, be it the Congress or the US
administration,' he said... 'Those who believe in looking to the West
for the progress of the country have lost their minds because wisdom
tells us to learn from experience,' Khamenei said." http://t.uani.com/29jInaq
Reuters:
"Iran's
officials are reviving the idea of developing oil fields using buy-back
deals that international oil companies dislike, suggesting renewed
tensions between hardliners and reformists over the future of the
industry. Iran needs money to boost output from its oil reserves, the
world's fourth largest, because production has been crippled by years
of Western sanctions. Some of these were removed in January. Iran has
promised new Iran Petroleum Contracts (IPCs), offering more flexible
terms and ending a system known as buy-back contracts that foreign
companies say give them a limited return on investment while denying
them any rights to the oil, with the Iranian government taking the bulk
of the profits. But on Monday, the newly-appointed managing director of
state-run National Iranian Oil Company, Ali Kardor, said oil fields
could be developed either through buy-backs or Engineering,
Procurement, Construction and Financing Contracts (EPCF). Joint fields
will be offered using the new type of contracts, while Iranian companies
will be entrusted with developing a number of fields, Kardor said,
according to Shana, the Iran's oil ministry agency. Foreign oil
companies and Iranian reformists are likely to regard Kardor's comments
as a setback." http://t.uani.com/29nn7B2
AFP: "The entire management of
Iran's development fund was forced to resign on Saturday as part of a
mounting scandal over lavish executive salaries, the ISNA news agency
reported. Iran has been gripped by the scandal ever since the payslips
of executives at several public companies were leaked two months ago,
showing salaries more than 100 times that of their average workers. It
has provided ammunition for hardline opponents of moderate President
Hassan Rouhani less than a year before he faces re-election. Seyed
Safdar Hosseini, a former reformist minister who was hand picked by
Rouhani to head the development fund, had been particularly targeted by
Iran's conservative media. His leaked payslip showed he was paid 580
million rials ($17,000) per month. Hosseini resigned along with the
rest of the development fund's management, which oversees investment in
infrastucture. Media reports said he had agreed to repay some $140,000
to the state... The news came just two days after Economy Minister Ali
Tayebnia sacked the directors of four banks 'for receiving
unconventional salaries and loans.'" http://t.uani.com/29vrTLV
U.S.-Iran
Relations
Reuters: "Just before last year's
nuclear deal with Iran, five U.S. universities visited the country to
explore renewing educational ties that flourished before the Islamic
Revolution. The group, which included representatives from Rutgers and
the University of Southern California (USC), found a desire on both
sides for more exchanges and concluded that U.S. students and scholars
would be warmly welcomed in Iran. But there was a hitch -- the head of
the delegation, Allan Goodman, was a former U.S. intelligence analyst.
In March this year he was attacked in hardline Iranian media reports
which have painted the June 2015 visit as a U.S. attempt to build an
espionage network and undermine the Iranian state. U.S. officials and
Goodman's employer, the Institute of International Education (IIE), say
that's not the case and that there was no U.S. government involvement
in the trip. Nevertheless, the negative press reports have cooled
efforts to rebuild educational ties in the wake of the landmark nuclear
deal, two U.S. officials said. They said the U.S. government is now
cautioning American universities against moving too fast and that the
schools themselves are treading warily." http://t.uani.com/29tvvAY
FP: "In Tehran, buildings and
overpasses have long served as a canvas for hard-line government
officials to voice their hatred of the United States. One famous
example? The massive mural of an American flag running the vertical
length of a concrete high-rise, its stripes replaced by falling bombs
and its stars by human skulls. This week, the Tehran municipal
government was at it again, installing billboards intended to shame the
United States. 'For every 110 U.S. citizens, there is one in jail,'
says one of the signs, which spans the entirety of a highway overpass.
'In America, two out of every five newborns are born out of wedlock,'
says another. In one corner, a cartoon baby's umbilical cord snakes its
way into a question mark. 'Every 9 seconds an American woman is
beaten,' says a third. The banners bore the official seal of the Tehran
municipal office, along with a satirical title: 'American Human
Rights.' Foreign Policy verified all of the claims on the billboards as
true, although the last one may be outdated: It last appeared on a 1999
Georgia Department of Human Resources studies. On social media,
Iranians speculated that Tehran's conservative mayor and perennial
presidential candidate, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, was behind the
posters, which came ahead of the release of an annual report on U.S.
civil rights abuses. Iranian officials announced on Wednesday that they
had finished writing this year's 130-page report. On the social media
app Telegram, Iranians expressed dismay that the capital city invested
its resources in highlighting America's problems rather than tackling
Iran's own pressing domestic ones." http://t.uani.com/29qYJir
Tasnim
(Iran): "Iran
has compiled the 2015 edition of a book on the human rights violations
in the United States, an Iranian official announced. Speaking at a
round-table discussion on the terrible record of US violation of human
rights, held in Iran's northern city of Gorgan, deputy head of the
Iranian Judiciary's Human Rights Council, Kazem Gharibabadi, said the
130-page book has been compiled and is going to be released.
Enumerating the cases of Washington's violation of human rights, both
inside the US and at the international level, the official underscored
that the US lacks the competence to comment on the issue of human
rights and accuse Iran, itself a victim of US hostile measures, of
violating human rights. Iran's International Human Rights Center
releases annual reports on human rights violations in the US." http://t.uani.com/29mvFqn
Business
Risk
Reuters: "Concerns raised by Germany's
Bundesbank led India to suspend trade in euros through the Asian
Clearing Union, a regional trade settlement system, Reserve Bank of
India official H.R. Khan said... Last week's RBI move signals the
apprehensions of some European banks in dealing with Iran, which cannot
trade in dollars as the United States has not yet lifted all sanctions
on Tehran. India now settles payments to Iran in euros outside the ACU
system. India has been keen to bring Iran transactions into the ACU
after a gap of five years, as the government seeks to promote trade
ties following the lifting of international sanctions." http://t.uani.com/29fuQ5r
The
Hill: "A top
foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump says in a new interview that the
billionaire would not scrap the Iran nuclear dear if his presidential
bid is successful. 'No, he's not going to get rid of an agreement that
has the institutional signature of the United States,' Walid Phares
told The Daily Caller. 'He is a man of institutions. But he's going to
look back at it in the institutional way. So he is not going to
implement it as is, he is going to revise it after negotiating one on
one with Iran or with a series of allies.' Phares said Trump dislikes
the current diplomatic agreement, but believes it can improve with
input from lawmakers. 'He's said so far that he doesn't like this deal
and that it was poorly negotiated,' he said. 'Once elected, he's
going to renegotiate it after talking through it with his advisers. One
of the clear possibilities is he will send it back to Congress,' Phares
added. 'The reaction of the Iranian leadership will be the next
phase.'" http://t.uani.com/29thz9K
Sanctions
Relief
Reuters: "Shipping Corporation of
India (SCI) will resume sailing to Iran this month after a four-year
gap, transporting an oil cargo for a state-run refiner, the chairman of
India's biggest shipping company said on Tuesday... SCI stopped sailing
to Iran in 2012 when sanctions targeting Iran's nuclear programme
prevented the company obtaining insurance cover for oil and other
shipments... SCI will this month use one of its Suezmax-sized tankers
to ship an oil cargo for state-refiner Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd
(HPCL) from Iran. 'It is not yet decided ... which SCI-owned vessel is
going to Iran,' Sinha said... HPCL will resume Iranian oil imports from
July after three years because insurance was now available for plants
processing Iranian oil, its head of refineries B.K. Namdeo said.
Similarly, BPCL's head of refineries, B.K. Datta, confirmed it also
planned to import an oil cargo from Iran this month, although it would
use the Panama-flagged tanker 'Vito'. India's Iranian oil imports are
set to hit a seven-year high in the year from April 1, with refiners
buying at least 400,000 barrels per day." http://t.uani.com/29kmzNc
Tasnim
(Iran): "A
150-strong delegation of business people from Italy's Marche region
will visit Iran next week to hold talks with Iranian officials and
private sector representatives and weigh plans for investment. The
delegation will include 120 representatives of Italian companies and 30
officials from the Marche region. Led by Marche Region Governor Luca
Ceriscioli, the delegation will hold meetings in the capital Tehran and
in the northern city of Sari to get acquainted with investment
opportunities in Iran." http://t.uani.com/29mxV0X
Tehran
Times: "A
senior official in Trade Promotion Organization of Iran (TPO) announced
that to fasten trade ties with the American continent in post sanction
era, an Iranian trade delegation will embark for Mexico and Ecuador
next month. As ISNA reported on Sunday, Abolfazl Koudei said that the
delegation, led by the head of TPO and a number of prominent private
companies, will pay a visit to the two American countries to
investigate improvement of commercial exchanges with them. 'Following
the face-to-face negotiations with their economic entities and
activists, a number of MOUs would be signed between the Islamic
Republic and the officials from the said two countries,' he
hoped." http://t.uani.com/29tCUjF
Extremism
Tasnim
(Iran):
"Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei
warned against plots hatched by enemies to undermine Iran's Islamic
Establishment and highlighted the 'special' role the country's students
could play in thwarting the plots... The Leader then called on the
student associations to establish 'a 'unified anti-US and anti-Zionist
front' among Muslim world's students'. 'By using advanced means of
communication and in cyberspace, general campaigns can be formed by
Muslim students based on the opposition to the policies of the US and
the Zionist regime of Israel so that when needed, millions of young
Muslim students create a big movement in the Islamic world,' the leader
added. Elsewhere, Ayatollah Khamenei praised rallies held across the
country on the occasion of the international Quds Day, saying that the
massive presence of the people in the rallies in the hot weather of the
summer was 'truly a unique phenomenon' which was ignored by hostile
media outlets." http://t.uani.com/29hmYw9
Terrorism
Reuters: "A camp for Iranian
dissidents near Baghdad's international airport was shelled on Monday,
wounding more than 40 residents, the opposition People's Mujahideen
Organisation of Iran (PMOI) said. 'According to reports from Camp
Liberty, as of midnight tonight, more than 40 residents were wounded or
injured in the missile attack on the camp,' Shahin Gobadi, a
Paris-based PMOI spokesman, said in a statement. The bombardment caused
major destruction in the camp, including fires and deep craters, Gobadi
added. Another PMOI spokesman, Shahriar Kia, said earlier that the
group suspected 'Iraqi groups affiliated with the Iranian' government
were responsible for the shelling." http://t.uani.com/29fo0Iw
Human
Rights
AP: "Famed Iranian sculptor
Parviz Tanavoli said Sunday he has been barred from leaving the country
without explanation while trying to travel to Britain. Authorities
confiscated the artist's passport early Saturday morning while he tried
to board a flight out of Tehran's Imam Khomeini International Airport.
He had been scheduled to give lectures at the British Museum and Asia
House in London. Tanavoli told The Associated Press that he does not
know why he was prevented from leaving. Immigration authorities
directed him to the country's main passport office, but he came back
empty-handed after spending several hours there. 'They said absolutely
there is nothing we can do,' the 79-year-old artist said. 'They tell me
it's not political but they don't tell me what it is.' ... Despite his
international acclaim, Tanavoli has faced difficulties with Iranian
authorities before. Authorities confiscated 57 pieces of his artwork
more than a decade ago. He eventually got 11 back following a court
ruling two years ago, only to have them taken away again weeks
later." http://t.uani.com/29lo1fC
AP: "Iranian women report they
are being barred from attending a major volleyball tournament featuring
the Olympic-bound men's national team, reigniting a debate about
whether Iran should be allowed to host international matches. Despite a
commitment from volleyball's world governing body that women would be
able to attend this weekend's World League tournament at the Azadi
Sport Complex in Tehran, Iranian women who have pushed to make sporting
events more open say they haven't been able to purchase tickets despite
multiple efforts to buy them online. Female fans are traditionally
barred from attending male-only sporting events in Iran - efforts by
authorities to enforce strict interpretations of Islamic norms - but
many women are pushing to change that practice. The International
Federation of Volleyball, Switzerland-based FIVB, streamed the
Argentina-Italy and Iran-Serbia matches Friday, showing a segregated
section of women in the stands... Tara Sepehri Far, an Iran researcher
with Human Rights Watch, has tracked the controversy. 'We've been
following the case closely and I am disappointed to say that despite
FIVB's claims to have assurances from the Iranian Volleyball
Federation, the tickets have not been available to women so far,' she
said in an email to The Associated Press along with a screen shot of
the ticket website." http://t.uani.com/29iTJyb
AFP: "Hundreds of journalists in
Iran have received an anonymous text message warning against contact
with 'hostile' organisations outside the country, the ISNA news agency
reported. 'All contact and collaboration with hostile elements based
abroad, by mail or other methods of communication, is a crime and will
be brought to justice. This SMS is the last warning,' the message said.
Iranian media reported that as many as 700 journalists and public
figures received the SMS on Friday evening. Lawmaker Ali Motahari said
the message had 'created worry among journalists.' 'The intelligence
ministry cyber-police must find the origin of this SMS and inform the
public, and the judiciary must act against those responsible,' he said.
'The Press Supervisory Board is responsible for the media and other
bodies must not interfere.' Some journalists who received the message
said on social media that they would lodge complaints. Iran bans its
citizens from having any contact with Persian-language media based
overseas, including the BBC's Persian service and Voice of America. In
April, an Iranian court sentenced four journalists arrested in November
2015 to between five and 10 years in prison for 'colluding' with
foreign governments and harming 'national security.'" http://t.uani.com/29iUZ4z
Domestic
Politics
Bloomberg: "Iranian President Hassan
Rouhani said salaries that were paid to heads of state-run banking and
financial institutions were unfair, seeking to contain public anger
that put his administration on the defensive as he prepares to stand
for re-election next year. Four chief executive officers of state-run
banks and the management of the Islamic Republic's $80 billion
sovereign wealth fund have resigned or were replaced over the last week
after details of their salaries were leaked in May. On Saturday -- the
same day Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei demanded 'firm' action
against 'astronomical salaries' -- the minister for economic affairs
announced a monthly pay cap of $6,250... Rouhani said on Twitter the
payments were 'not illegal but neither were they fair' and promised to
change existing laws which allowed government-backed banks to pay up to
$325,000 to executives. 'Wherever negligence and mistakes have taken
place, the government will not stutter in its apology to the people,'
he said. The president's supporters see the pay debate as part of a
campaign by hard-line opponents to upset his re-election chances. 'It's
a serious challenge right now, not just for Rouhani but for the whole
system,' said Saeed Laylaz, an economist who was an adviser to Khatami.
Rouhani's opponents are seeking to find a 'new political crisis every
day in order to drag him down and crush his chances,' Laylaz
added." http://t.uani.com/29mvjjF
Opinion
& Analysis
NYT
Editorial: "One
year later, the nuclear deal between Iran and the major powers is
working. It has substantially restricted Iran's ability to produce
fissile material, the key ingredient for a nuclear bomb, and in that
way has made the world safer. We now have a score sheet on Iran's
compliance with its nuclear commitments from the International Atomic
Energy Agency, which is responsible for monitoring Iran's nuclear
activities, and from American officials. Since the deal was reached
last July, Iran has, as required, removed and placed in
I.A.E.A.-monitored storage two-thirds of the 19,000 centrifuges it used
for uranium enrichment at a facility at Natanz. It has ended all
uranium enrichment, a process that can be used to produce nuclear
bomb-grade fuel, and removed all nuclear material from its once-secret
facility at Fordow. It has reduced its stockpile of enriched uranium
from 12,000 kilograms, with a purity as high as 5 percent, to 300
kilograms, with a purity of no more than 3.67 percent and hence less
usable as weapons fuel. The core of a heavy-water reactor at Arak has
been filled with concrete. The bottom line: If Iranian officials
decided to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon, it
would take at least one year; without the deal, it would have taken
just two or three months... Iran, however, has yet to experience the
full economic benefits it had expected from the deal, which has weakened
reformers like President Hassan Rouhani. It gained access to about $50
billion in assets that were frozen overseas, opened new foreign bank
accounts and doubled oil exports, to two million barrels a day, but it
has not had the level of foreign investment that Mr. Rouhani had
promised. While international sanctions have been removed, most
American nuclear sanctions remain, like a ban on access to dollars,
which has complicated other deal-making and made risk-averse foreign
banks nervous about doing business in Iran... It's important that Iran
benefit from meeting its commitments, but there can be no complacency
about enforcing all the terms of the nuclear deal. Iran could also be
using its improved relations with the United States and other major powers
to play a more constructive role on other issues, especially the Syrian
crisis, in which Tehran has provided military support for President
Bashar al-Assad. Iran is still subject to separate American sanctions
for its failure to halt its ballistic missile program and improve its
human rights record, and for aiding terrorist groups. There are clouds
on the horizon that raise doubts about whether the nuclear deal can be
sustained. Those include growing tensions between Shiite-majority Iran
and Sunni-majority Saudi Arabia, concerns in Washington about Iran's
destabilizing activities in the region, and elections in the United
States this year and in Iran in 2017 that could strengthen the forces
eager to upend the agreement." http://t.uani.com/29gpXVV
UANI Advisory Board Olli Heinonen in FDD: "On
December 2, 2015, the IAEA issued its assessment on past and present
outstanding issues related to Iran's nuclear program and its Possible
Military Dimensions (PMD). Buried in a footnote is a crucial detail:
the presence of man-made uranium particles at the Parchin military
complex. Last week, The Wall Street Journal's Jay Solomon reported U.S.
officials saying those particles likely relate to previous nuclear
weapons activities, thereby raising even more questions. For example,
where is the nuclear material used for those nuclear weapons
activities, and what is the source of the particles found at Parchin?
The question of whether Iran still has undeclared nuclear material is
therefore critical. Since 2004, the IAEA has sought answers from Iran
on PMD. A key focus of these investigations was hydrodynamic testing in
a high-explosives test chamber at Parchin, according to information
provided to the Agency. Iran granted the IAEA access to the facility
twice in 2005, but the IAEA was unaware of information that
subsequently surfaced on high-explosive tests. In 2011, the IAEA asked
for clarifications relating to a test chamber in Parchin. Failing to
get a response, the Agency requested access to the location in 2012,
but Iran refused. Instead, Tehran embarked on several changes and
clean-up activities, including shrouding the main building, as well as
removing, replacing, or refurbishing external wall structures and part
of a building's roof. Overhead imagery further showed that five other
buildings in the vicinity were demolished during that time, as well as
indications of significant paving-over and landscaping at and around
the site. On July 14, 2015, alongside the nuclear agreement, the IAEA
and Iran agreed on a Road Map to address outstanding issues, including
those related to Parchin. Under these special arrangements, Tehran took
environmental samples while the Agency observed remotely. Iranian
authorities had stated that the identified building had always been
used to store chemical material for the production of explosives.
However, environmental samples did not indicate explosive compounds or
their precursors that would have corroborated that explanation. Rather,
sampling turned up two chemically modified particles of natural
uranium. Such a small number of particles with this elemental
composition and morphology is insufficient to definitively connect the
location with nuclear activities, but the IAEA concluded that the
information available does not support Iran's statements on the
building's purpose." http://t.uani.com/29e8a0f
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Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against
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Iran, Inc., a tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the
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email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com
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regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons. UANI is an
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