Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Eye on Iran: Iranian Vessel Points Weapon at U.S. Helicopter: Officials


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A small Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard vessel pointed its weapon at a U.S. military helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, two U.S. defense officials told Reuters on Monday, an action they described as "unsafe and unprofessional." The incident is the latest in a series of similar actions by Iranian vessels this year, but the first reported since Republican Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 8. During his campaign, Trump vowed that any Iranian vessel that harassed the U.S. Navy in the Gulf would be "shot out of the water," if he was elected. Trump is due to take office on Jan. 20... The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the incident took place when a Navy MH-60 helicopter flew within half a mile (0.8 km) of two Iranian vessels in international waters. One of the vessels pointed a weapon at the helicopter, the U.S. officials said. "The behavior by our standards is provocative and could be seen as an escalation," the officials said. At no point did the crew of the helicopter feel threatened, they added.

The US dollar is once again at the center of attention in the Iranian currency market with its recent pattern on the upside, the only notable difference this time around being that the higher prices come as the central bank is anticipating a unified currency rate by the end of March... The upset victory of the Republican Donald Trump in the US presidential election became an added source of concern and pushed up forex rates. On the first day in Tehran after the elections, the US dollar sold for 36,580 rials, up from the previous day's close of 36,400. The dollar even crossed 37,000 rials briefly and it was reported that due to the wild swings in the market some moneychangers had pulled down their shutters. However, three weeks after the chaotic vote in the US, the dollar's rising trajectory shows no sign of abating. On Sunday, it broke the 38,000 rials threshold -a point few thought it would cross- and reached 38,400 rials in latest pricings. This entails a more than 6,000 rials discrepancy between the unofficial and official rates which undermines the Central Bank of Iran's repeatedly emphasized plan to unify the rates before the fiscal year is out in March.

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani hailed as a "relentless warrior" the Cuban leader Fidel Castro, who died aged 90 Friday. In a message to the late leader's brother President Raul Castro, Rouhani said the death of the leader of the Cuban revolution caused him "great grief and sorrow." "In this age - when oppressed nations around the world suffer from violations of the most obvious and fundamental human principles such as peace, justice and freedom - it is fortunate there are free men and warriors who do not give up fighting until the last days of their lives to keep the flag of justice high," he said in the message. Rouhani met Raul and Fidel Castro in September in Cuba. Castro had met Iranian officials, including supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on a visit to Iran in 2001.

UANI IN THE NEWS

Doing business with Iran is a dangerous proposition, German companies were warned on Monday in a full-page advertisement published by an advocacy group in a major Frankfurt newspaper. The ad, authored by the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), ran in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung as a two-day economic conference - titled "Market Opportunities in Iran" - got underway in the German financial hub. In a statement released on Monday, UANI senior adviser and former director of Germany's Federal Intelligence Service Dr. August Hanning said: "The only way for German companies to avoid the risks inherent in the Iranian market is to abandon these business pursuits entirely. The Iranian regime remains a bad actor in the global community, given its ongoing extensive support of terrorism and its high profile and deliberate promotion of Holocaust denial. German business leaders should not reward this noxious regime until substantial and permanent reforms are implemented." As was reported by The Algemeiner, a similar UANI ad published in the Financial Times "soured the mood" at the Iran Investment Summit in Singapore last month.

U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS

The U.S. military presence in the Gulf poses the main risk of conflict in the region, an Iranian military official said on Tuesday after Washington said an Iranian vessel had pointed its weapon at a U.S. helicopter in the strategic Strait of Hormuz... "Everybody knows that the main problem in the Persian Gulf is the U.S. presence," an unidentified official in the Revolutionary Guards was quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency.

SANCTIONS RELIEF

MTN Group, Africa's biggest mobile phone company, is planning to expand in Iran, from where it has only just managed to begin reptratiating profits. The move is part of MTN's 10-year plan to cement its leading position in risky but lucrative frontier markets in the Middle East and Africa, where it aggressively expanded a decade ago... "We're very excited about Iran and the possibilities there," MTN's newly appointed head of strategy, mergers and acquisitions, Stephen van Coller, said in an interview with Reuters. "That digital economy in Iran is going to move fast." The company had been unable to repatriate its accumulated dividends until recently. It said in October it had started receiving the cash and this process would take at least six months. Another potential risk is U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's threat to scrap the nuclear agreement with Iran, which could bring back secondary sanctions on non-U.S. entities. Asked if Trump's win could deter or impact further investment in Iran, Coller said: "That's a tough question, I don't know really."

Iran is pulling ahead in the race for market share in the world's fastest-growing oil consuming nation, India, weakening the hold of rival OPEC members amid the group's struggle to agree on output cuts. Iran, which dramatically boosted crude sales in 2016 after they were curbed for years by sanctions over its nuclear program, is challenging the sway of Saudi Arabia and Iraq as it offers perks for refiners to help rebuild its standing in Asia's third-largest economy. Cargoes to fill strategic petroleum reserves helped Iran emerge last month as India's biggest supplier for the first time in 2016, according to data compiled by Bloomberg... Iranian supplies in October rose 56 percent to 759,700 barrels per day from a month ago, while shipments from Saudi Arabia were 717,000 barrels per day and Iraq's 488,000 barrels a day, shipping data compiled by Bloomberg show... Iran has offered attractive terms like 80 percent freight discount and 90 days of credit this financial year, Indian Oil Corp.'s Director Finance A. K. Sharma told Bloomberg in September.

The volume of trade between Oman and Iran has surged since international sanctions were lifted against Iran earlier this year. Oman's imports from Iran shot up by 396.2 per cent to OMR183.1 million in the first half of this year, from OMR36.9 million in the same period last year, according to the latest data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI). Also, re-exports from Oman soared by 23 per cent to OMR63.2 million in the first half of 2016, against OMR51.4 million in the corresponding period last year. Iran is expected to emerge as a significant trading partner of the Sultanate following the end of trade sanctions. According to experts, bilateral trade between Oman and Iran is likely to touch US$5 billion within five years, from the current $1 billion.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani on Monday expressed support for OPEC's plans to limit the cartel's output ahead of a crucial meeting this week. In a telephone conversation, the two leaders said the cartel's efforts were "an essential element" for returning stability to global oil prices, a Kremlin statement said. "The importance of steps taken by OPEC to limit the production of commodities was emphasised as an essential element for stabilising world oil markets," it said.

After more than a year in power, the Trudeau government's plans to re-establish diplomatic relations with Iran haven't led to any concrete results. The Iranian embassy in Ottawa remains shuttered and there isn't a Canadian ambassador in Iran - a country Canada still officially considers a state sponsor of terror. That didn't stop Liberal MP Majid Jowhari from privately hosting a delegation of Iranian parliamentarians at his Richmond Hill constituency office earlier this month. Jowhari, who in September sponsored a petition submitted by the Iranian Canadian Congress lobby group that called for the restoration of diplomatic ties with Iran, said the meeting took place at the request of the Iranian parliamentarians... The Iranian delegation with whom Jowhari met consisted of Alim Yarmohammadi, Yonathan Betkolia and Mehrdad Lahooti - who are MPs in the Iranian parliament, or Majlis - and Ali Bahraini, who is not an elected MP but is identified, by Jowhari's office and elsewhere, as secretary of a development committee. The Iranian delegation was in Canada to meet with officials at the International Civil Aviation Organization, which is headquartered in Montreal. Photos on Lahooti's Instagram account show they also visited the International Air Transport Association and CAE Inc., a Montreal company that specializes in aviation, defence and security training and flight simulation products.

SYRIA CONFLICT

But buttressed by Russian air power, Iranian expertise and recruits that include Iran-trained Iraqi and Afghan militias and fighters from the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, the Assad government has reversed the tide, steadily regaining ground it lost earlier in the war. "The Russian and Iranian intervention has completely changed the dynamic for Assad," said Robert S. Ford, a former American ambassador to Syria and now a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. "Look at the fighting in Aleppo," he added. "There are at least as many Lebanese Hezbollah and Iraqi-Iranian militia fighters as there are soldiers born in Syria, so the war of attrition that was going against Assad is no longer doing that because of Iranian manpower." But the darker side is what kind of country would be left. "So Assad stays there and the Russians and Iranians prevail, but they govern over a half-dead corpse, and Syria is just this gaping wound that stretches as far as the eye can see," Mr. Ford said. Mr. Assad would also be beholden to his two sponsors, Russia and Iran, reviled by many of his own citizens in the Sunni-majority country and rejected by some of the main Sunni powers in the Middle East. That could mean he would face efforts from Iran to solidify its regional reach by expanding Shiite influence in Syria and demanding a role in conquered areas such as Aleppo, perhaps even assigning Iranian-backed Shiite militias there, some experts said.

SAUDI-IRAN TENSIONS

For decades, Saudi Arabia has had its way at OPEC. All of a sudden the position has turned: Riyadh finds its power waning against a resurgent Iran and Iraq. As Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries ministers gather for a meeting on Wednesday, Saudi Arabia is trying to reassert its authority by hinting it's prepared to walk away from the negotiations. Genuine warning or bluff, Tehran and Baghdad may be willing to take the risk. Both have seen Saudi Arabia gain market share and neither is as dependent on oil prices as Riyadh. "Iran and Iraq have assumed that Saudi Arabia will cut unilaterally because it wanted higher prices and thought they could put the Saudis into a corner," said Amrita Sen, chief oil analyst at Energy Aspects Ltd. "Riyadh has effectively said it isn't in a corner and will not do a deal unless everyone else contributes." ... Saudi Arabia is sticking to its same offer: cut production, but only if Iran freezes at current levels and Iraq also reduces output. Iran and Iraq are also holding to their own positions. The first wants to be able to recover to its pre-sanctions level of 4 million barrels per day and the second to freeze, rather than cut... Both sides fought to the very last barrel: the Saudis told Tehran it needs to cap output at 3.707 million barrels a day; Tehran offered in exchange a cap at 3.975 million barrels a day. The difference, a mere 0.3 percent of global oil supply, could still scupper the deal. Iran's frustration was evident. In an article published on Monday by the official news service, Shana, Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh said reviving the country's oil output was "the national will and demand of the Iranian people."

HUMAN RIGHTS

Despite the Iranian regime's best efforts to stop the spread of Christianity, a large underground church movement is growing. Hundreds of Iranian citizens have been converting to Christianity, and many are being baptized in large ceremonies in underground churches held in private homes across the country. This month, Christian ministry ELAM estimated that more than 200 Iranian and Afghans were secretly baptized in a service just across the Iranian border. "It's an astronomical increase," Mani Erfan, CEO and founder of CCM Ministries, which has been involved in Iran's underground church movement for more than two decades, told FoxNews.com. "And it's been predominately young people. We call it an awakening." Erfan says much of Iran's young population has grown tired of the regime's oppressive religious rule, which often distorts Islamic teachings.

When Richard Ratcliffe's wife, Nazanin was arrested in Iran on her way back from a two-week holiday, he was convinced it was all a terrible mistake. A project manager for Thomson-Reuters Foundation, the charity worker had taken their baby daughter, Gabriella to meet her parents for the first time. Once authorities realised they were simply visiting relatives, both would surely be home within a matter of weeks. More than eight months have passed, and Richard is still alone in their West Hampstead flat, while Nazanin, a dual British and Iranian citizen, is serving a five-year prison sentence in a tiny cell, shared with another inmate.






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@uani.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.

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