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TOP STORIES
As Saudi Arabia holds a naval drill in the strategic
Strait of Hormuz, a powerful Iranian general has been quoted as
suggesting the kingdom's deputy crown prince is so
"impatient" he may kill his own father to take the throne.
Harsh rhetoric has been common between the two rivals since January
but the remarks by Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani's take
things to an entirely different level by discussing Saudi King Salman
being killed. Meanwhile, Iran already has warned Saudi Arabia to stay
away from its territorial waters as heavily armed Saudi frogmen and
warships take part in the Gulf Shield 1 drill across the larger
Persian Gulf, adding to the tensions between the two rival Mideast
powers.
As the Obama administration scrambles for options in
Syria, officials lament that the United States has no leverage over
the Assad regime, Russia or Iran to persuade them to halt their
ongoing atrocities, especially in Aleppo. But behind the scenes, the
White House is actually working to weaken a sanctions bill lawmakers
in both parties see as providing leverage against all
three. According to lawmakers and staffers in both parties, the
White House is secretly trying to water down the Caesar Syria
Civilian Protection Act, a bipartisan bill that would sanction the
Assad regime for mass torture, mass murder, war crimes and crimes
against humanity. The bill, guided by House Foreign Affairs Committee
ranking Democrat Eliot Engel (N.Y.), would also sanction entities
that aid the Syrian government in these atrocities; that includes
Russia and Iran... The House was set to pass the bill late last
month, but the White House made an 11th-hour plea to lawmakers to
delay. The White House said the vote would upset the then-active
cease-fire agreement with Moscow, and Democrats pulled their support,
said Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), one of the original sponsors of
the bill. Now the White House has told members and staffers that
the bill's sanctions on Iran could violate the nuclear agreement the
Obama administration struck with Tehran last year and the Russia
sanctions could hurt any future efforts to work with Moscow
diplomatically on Syria.
Montreal's Homa Hoodfar says members of Iran's
Revolutionary Guard psychologically tortured her during dozens of
interrogations over the course of 112 brutal days in Tehran's
notorious Evin prison. They threatened "they would send my
dead body back to Canada," the retired Concordia University
professor told CBC News in her first interview since her release on
Sept. 26... She says the interrogators tried to break her
spirit. The worst part, she said, was when they played music from the
funeral of her husband, who died in December 2014. They had found the
music on Hoodfar's iPad... Hoodfar says she hopes she wasn't
traded as part of an embassy deal. "I know that has
happened sometimes," she said. "But that's one of the
concerns I have."
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
Key documents relating to the Obama administration's
secret negotiations with Iran, including a $1.7 billion cash payment,
are being stored at a highly secure site on Capitol Hill, preventing
the public and many in Congress from accessing them, according to
multiple sources who described the situation to the Washington Free
Beacon. The documents are not technically classified but are
being kept in a "secure reading space" where the majority
of congressional officials cannot access them. Those cleared are
forced to relinquish their cellular devices and are barred from
taking notes, undermining the ability of staffers to brief their
lawmakers on the contents, according to the sources. Sources
further disclosed that joint U.S.-Iranian signatures across the three
documents add up to a package deal between Washington and Iran's
Intelligence Ministry, the country's internal spy agency. Sources
familiar with a closed-door January briefing by senior Obama
administration officials told the Free Beacon they were informed the
United States negotiated with "the Iranian intelligence
apparatus."
SANCTIONS RELIEF
Iran's state-owned oil company sold condensate to BP
Plc for the first time since sanctions were lifted in January,
marking the country's re-emergence as one of the world's top
suppliers of crude oil and natural gas liquids. National Iranian Oil
Co. will supply South Pars condensate to BP for loading between
September and October, said an NIOC official, asking not to be
identified because of internal policy. The shipment may be used by
one of BP's own refineries or resold to other users, the official
said by phone.
French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen has reached a deal
with Iran's biggest carmaker to open a plant producing 200,000
vehicles a year, renewing an old partnership with Iran Khodro Co
following the lifting of international sanctions. The two
companies showcased five models on Wednesday to be produced by IKAP,
a joint venture first announced in January during a visit to France
by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
Reyl Bank has announced that it is opening bank
accounts for Iranian individuals and companies through its branches
in Geneva and Dubai, allowing accountholders to transfer money, said
Sharif Nezam Mafi, head of Iran-Switzerland Chamber of Commerce on
Tuesday. "Reyl is not a large bank, but the move is a starting
point for further cooperation between Iran and Switzerland," he
was quoted as saying by Tehran Chamber of Commerce, Industries and
Mining's website.
MOL Group, a leading international integrated oil and
gas company from Hungary, has confirmed the purchase of Iranian heavy
crude oil... According to traders and shipping data, MOL has
commissioned a cargo of 140,000 tons of Iranian heavy crude oil for Oct.
23. The cargo will be delivered from Iran'sKharg Island terminal to
Croatian port of Omisalj.
An Indian telecoms company, Mahindra Comviva, that
provides value-added services for mobile operators, opened an office
in Tehran on Monday. The company has been providing solutions in
consumer value management like campaign management, loyalty management
and retailing solutions to MTN Irancell over last eight years.
Iran is signing joint venture agreements with
international companies to start manufacturing train wagons in Iran
to meet its railroad expansion needs and reduce reliance on imports.
Iranian Rail Industries Development Company and Chinese rolling stock
manufacturer Nanjing Puzhen Co. LTD. signed an agreement in Tehran on
Tuesday to jointly manufacture 215 wagons to be used in subways
trains across Iran, IRNA reported.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
The Syrian war went through one of its bloodiest
stretches in recent weeks, with Iranian proxies battling
Turkish-backed rebels for control of the city of Aleppo. At the same
time, Iran's foreign minister visited Ankara for the second time in
two months for talks on how to improve bilateral ties, boost mutual
trade, and bolster energy cooperation. This rapprochement
between Sunni-majority Turkey and Iran's Shiite theocracy, which
began earlier this year and picked up pace after the failed July coup
against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, defies the easy
characterizations of the region's mayhem as a sectarian conflict.
SYRIA CONFLICT
Iraqi militia fighters are pouring into Syria to
reinforce the Assad regime's siege of rebels in Aleppo, further
complicating the tangled web of alliances the U.S. relies on to fight
Islamic State, which can turn an ally on one side of the border into
an enemy on the other. The Shiite militias, who have fought
alongside U.S.-backed Iraqi government forces against Islamic State
in Iraq, are now fighting Syrian Sunni rebels, some of them armed and
trained by the U.S. ... Al Nujaba is part of a triad of Iraqi
Shiite militias currently besieging eastern Aleppo. The other two are
Asaib Ahl al-Haq and Abu al-Fadl al-Abbas, commanders said. Asaib
fought American troops during the decadelong U.S.-led war in Iraq.
Leaders of all three militias deny allegations of abuses and of
stoking sectarian tensions... "The use of the Iraqi
[militias] reflects how the Iranian outreach in the region is
becoming more and more aggressive and Iran is using solely Shiite
forces to increase the level of warfare across the region to achieve
their political means," a senior Arab diplomat based in Beirut
said. "But it's only serving to increase sectarian tensions in
the region and the cycle of bloodshed perpetrated in this competition
between Saudi Arabia and Iran."
SAUDI-IRAN TENSIONS
Saudi Arabia recently began its naval war games that
included live fire exercises in the Arabian Gulf and Strait of
Hormuz, the world's most important oil route. Warships,
speedboats, air navy aircraft, marine corps and special security
naval units were some of the artillery that were in focus during the
exercises... Saudi Arabia's naval force overtakes Iran's by far
greater numbers as its frigates cannot be monitored by radars and has
appropriate defenses covers suitable air ranges. Iran's frigates were
last purchased and designed during the 1970s and are modeled after
the Moudge and Alvand classes.
HUMAN RIGHTS
The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, has given a
damning assessment of human rights in Iran, highlighting the
"alarming rate" of executions and saying little progress
has been made under president Hassan Rouhani. In spite of his
achievements on the international front, most notably reaching last
year's landmark nuclear deal, Rouhani's promises of domestic
improvements have stalled in the face of resistance from hardliners.
Ban's 19-page report, released this week, says he remains "deeply
troubled" by accounts "of executions, floggings, arbitrary
arrests and detentions, unfair trials, denial of access to medical
care and possible torture and ill-treatment".
Iranian authorities must immediately repeal the
conviction and sentence of Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee, a writer and human
rights activist who is due to begin serving six years in prison on
charges including "insulting Islamic sanctities" through
the writing of an unpublished story about the horrific practice of
stoning, Amnesty International said today.
When Iranian officials come to the United Nations,
they are usually met with questions about their human rights
practices, particularly the arrest of dual nationals... None of this
does any good, however, for the scores of Iranians without foreign
citizenship who are jailed for their political or religious
convictions. Among them is a 60-year-old spiritual leader, Mohammad
Ali Taheri, who has developed a large following for his teachings.
As one of the most successful women to ever play the
male-dominated game of chess, Nazi Paikidze is used to having her
moves watched closely. Her latest has drawn international
attention: Paikidze announced last week that she will boycott
February's Women's World Chess Championship in Iran because the
players will have to wear hijabs... Islamic coverings for women
in public - required in Iran and some other nations such as Saudi
Arabia - have increasingly become a target for both protests and
struggles over Muslim identity. Some activists in Iran have launched
online campaigns against the hijab rules, while other women
continually test the boundaries by pushing back headscarves to near
gravity-defying levels.
DOMESTIC POLITICS
As in western capitals, Tehran's "one
percent" divisions are on clear display and roiling politics
before May's presidential election. Iran may have already had its
Donald Trump in the shape of former leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but
disappointment at the slow pace of change has given the country's
chastened conservatives a weapon with which to attack successor
Hassan Rouhani as the man who sold out to the west. Since coming
to power in 2013, Rouhani reversed most of the populist economic and
foreign policies that had left the country isolated, its economy in
recession and inflation rampant. While those changes culminated with
the nuclear deal that ended international sanctions in January,
residual U.S. restrictions have blocked the awaited flood of investment.
OPINION & ANALYSIS
The situation in Aleppo is horrific. Every day, we see
the Syrian regime committing war crimes against its own citizens,
openly and without shame. It does this with proud support from Russia
and its president, Vladimir Putin, but also with the help of another
country: the Islamic Republic of Iran. For this reason alone, the
world should refuse to return to "business-as-usual" with
Tehran... For more than five years, the world has largely
ignored Iran's central role in the Syrian tragedy.,, Since 2011,
Iran has provided the Assad regime with massive financial support, an
endless supply of ammunition and weapons and tens of thousands of
fighters from its Revolutionary Guard Corps, Hezbollah and loyal Shia
militants from Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere... There is
little doubt that Tehran will use the new Boeing products - made in
the US - to transport ammunition, weapons and fighters to Damascus,
to help continue the slaughter of innocent Syrian civilians. Yet
Boeing apparently doesn't care; and it is not the only company
looking to make a profit... Since the CEOs of these companies
couldn't care less about the tragedy of Aleppo and Iran's role in
Syria, it is up to us - citizens and activists - to convey a very
different message: that human life is worth more than corporate
profits. Call these CEOs, call your representatives, and demand
that we hold Iran accountable for its crimes.
Robert Levinson, missing since March 9, 2007, is a
career law enforcement official (DEA, FBI) turned private
investigator, but he has been my friend for much longer than the nine
years he has been missing. I found out about 'a former FBI agent's
disappearance' while sitting in a meeting on an unrelated issue with
the FBI at our Embassy in Paris in 2007. It did not become personal
to me until I saw it was my friend and he had gone missing in
Iran... Despite the government's attempts to label it something
else, Bob is a hostage and Bob is still out there. His family
deserves closure and I am sure they would agree to do everything and
anything, up to and including going into the Witness Security Program
and disappearing themselves, if it meant they could have him back
alive. Bob is a good man, and he deserves the full resources of the
U.S. government to get him home. He and his family have suffered long
enough.
In our struggle for the soul of Islam, this young
chess champion's courage emboldens us, because like-minded liberals
too often stay silent, afraid of being called
"Islamophobic" or intolerant of "diversity." Too
many liberals accept discrimination in the name of Islam, leaving
reform-minded Muslims and others hanging. Compulsory hijab is
not part of our culture. Yet women are criminals in Iran if they
remove their headscarves to feel the wind in their hair. Forcing
women to cover their hair imposes a false identity on us. For years,
a battery of Iranian clerics had the advantage of the bully pulpit,
boasting that women embraced the hijab, but, since the launch of the
#MyStealthyFreedom campaign, thousands of women have posted selfies
without headscarves, showing the emptiness of the mullahs'
claim... Iran has a choice on its next move: continue its ban or
host a world championship that accepts a young chess champion from
America, as she is, brilliant, dynamic, collegial - and
scarf-less. Now that would be a win-win.
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