TOP STORIES
France's PSA Group
is pushing ahead with an Iranian plant investment and production
ramp-up in the face of a hardened U.S. stance against Tehran under
President Donald Trump that could play to the carmaker's advantage, a
senior executive said. The group's Peugeot brand is about to begin
production with local partner Iran Khodro, while PSA is also
preparing to invest more than 100 million euros ($106 million) in a
new Citroen plant with partner SAIPA, PSA Middle East chief
Jean-Christophe Quemard [said]... Peugeot returned to Iran last year
after an international deal to lift sanctions in return for curbs on
Tehran's nuclear activities, and has reclaimed its place as the
country's top-selling car brand with a 32 percent market share last
year, according to IHS Automotive data. The carmaker inked a 400 million
euro ($424 million) Peugeot production agreement last June and a 300
million deal for Citroen four months later... "This is
our opportunity to accelerate," he said. "It will become
even harder for American companies to operate, that's for sure We've
opened up a lead and we plan to hold on to it"... German brands
may be treading carefully because-unlike French rivals-Volkswagen,
Daimler and BMW have extensive U.S. sales and production... Mansour
Moazami, Iran's deputy industry minister, told the Tehran conference
that VW may soon finalise a production deal with an Iranian company.
VW had no immediate comment when contacted by Reuters. Renault, PSA's
larger domestic rival, is also adding production and new models with
Iranian partners and may overtake Peugeot's sales by 2019 thanks to
its low-cost vehicle architectures, IHS predicts
Over the weekend,
Prime Minister Stefan Lofven led a Swedish delegation to Iran. Lofven
was received warmly by the Islamic Republic's political elite -
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei tweeted positively about his meeting with
Lofven, adding that Sweden had a "good reputation" in Iran
- and the two countries agreed upon a number of trade-related deals.
Back home, however, coverage of the Swedish government delegation's
trip to Tehran has focused on something else. As Sweden's media noted
Monday, a number of female officials who joined the trip, including
Trade Minister Ann Linde, chose to wear Islamic headscarves while in
Iran... Lofven's Swedish government describes itself as a
"feminist government," and it has spoken of the need for a
"feminist" foreign policy. Hillel Neuer, executive director
of U.N. Watch, a human rights group and frequent critic of Iran ,
noted this apparent contradiction in a tweet shared Sunday night.
Masih Alinejad, a journalist and activist who started a Facebook page
that invited Iranian women to share photographs of themselves without
a hijab, also criticized the Swedish delegation. "By actually
complying with the directives of the Islamic Republic, Western women
legitimize the compulsory hijab law," Alinejad wrote on
Facebook. "This is a discriminatory law and it's not an internal
matter when the Islamic Republic forces all non-Iranian women to wear
hijab as well"... Other Swedish politicians were [also]
critical. Jan Björklund, leader of the opposition Liberals party,
told Aftonbladet newspaper that the headscarf is "a symbol of
oppression for women in Iran" and that the Swedish government
should have demanded that Linde and other female members of the
delegation be exempted from wearing it.
Michael Flynn, the
national security adviser who emerged as a key player in President
Donald Trump's Iran strategy, resigned just as Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu arrived for his first White House summit with
Trump... The timing of Flynn's resignation was inopportune for
Netanyahu... A key agenda item at the summit will be how to
confront Iran given the strictures of the deal reached in 2015
between Iran and the international community trading sanctions relief
for a rollback in Iran's nuclear program.
UANI
IN THE NEWS
European
governments are protesting Iran's treatment of an Iranian-born
scientist, now a resident of Sweden, who was arrested last year in
Iran and who could now face the death penalty. The scientist,
Ahmadreza Djalali, a physician who specializes in disaster medicine
and has taught at universities in Belgium, Italy and Sweden, was
arrested in April while driving to his family's house after arriving
in Iran for a conference, an Italian newspaper has quoted his wife as
saying... The Swedish Embassy in Tehran has asked for "consular
access" to the researcher, but when the newspaper Expressen
asked Prime Minister Stefan Lofven about the matter, he said that the
embassy still had not gotten word about Dr. Djalali and pledged to
bring up the issue with the Iranian government. Mr. Lofven has begun
facing pressure from critics who say the Swedish government should
tie Dr. Djalali's case to discussions over sanctions. United Against
Nuclear Iran, an organization founded by the American diplomat Richard
C. Holbrooke, who died in 2010, took out a full-page ad in the
newspaper Dagens Nyheter, demanding the cessation of business
contacts between Swedish companies and the Iranian government.
Former Sen. Mark
Kirk (R-Ill.) said the Trump administration should
"declassify" the entire Iran nuclear deal and "close
the loophole" that allowed the Obama administration to directly
pay Iran $1.7 billion without congressional approval. "The best
thing the Trump administration can do is declassify the entire
agreement and publish it so the Congress and the American people can
look at it and see the negotiating record and understand all of the
terms as they were put forward before the parties," Kirk said
during a United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) and the Jewish Institute
for National Security of America (JINSA) Capitol Hill briefing on
Thursday about the future of Iran policy... Kirk also encouraged the
United States to work with Saudi Arabia to combat the Iran regime's
actions such as sponsoring terrorism. He said the Saudis would jump
at any chance to "screw" the Iran regime after its plot to
assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, D.C.
IRAN
NUCLEAR DEAL
The head of the
United Nations' atomic agency said Tuesday the administration of U.S.
President Donald Trump has yet to be in touch with him or others
about their criticism of the Iran nuclear deal.
U.S.-IRAN
RELATIONS
Vice Adm. Robert
Harward, a former deputy commander of the U.S. Central Command,
became the front-runner late Monday to replace Michael Flynn as the
White House national security adviser, following lengthy discussions
among top advisers to President Trump and several Cabinet members
after Flynn resigned... According to his Navy biography, Harward is a
native of Rhode Island who "grew up in a Navy family and
graduated from the Tehran American High School in Iran"...
Harward served under [Defense Secretary James] Mattis while he was at
U.S. Central Command and remains an ally and friend of the defense
secretary. The officials said Harward, who has been under
consideration as a possible undersecretary of defense for
intelligence, is seen by key players around Trump as a steady pick
for the post following the tumult that surrounded Flynn. The
officials also described Harward, who had a tour on the National
Security Council during George W. Bush's presidency, where he worked
on counterterrorism strategy, as someone who had a high profile in
security circles but a low public profile, which is part of his
appeal.
In his White House
briefing room debut, Mr. Flynn declared that the administration was
"officially putting Iran on notice" after the country launched
a ballistic missile. "The Trump administration condemns such
actions by Iran that undermine security, prosperity and stability
throughout and beyond the Middle East, and place American lives at
risk," he said, without specifying how the United States would
respond. "In these and other similar activities," Mr. Flynn
said, "Iran continues to threaten US. friends and allies in the
region."
SANCTIONS
RELIEF
Iran says Russia's
planemaker Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company is moving closer to a deal
to sell its Superjet 100 aircraft to the country. Maqsoud
As'adi Samani, the secretary of the Association of Iranian Airlines,
was quoted by the domestic media as saying that Sukhoi had already
started technical talks to obtain a license from the US Treasury
Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to sell the
planes to Iran... The 108-seat twin-engine SSJ-100 is among Iran's
options for renovation of its fleet of regional jets, alongside
Japan's Mitsubishi Regional Jet and Brazil's Embraer. Russia's
media reported in December of last year that Sukhoi had sealed a
basic deal with an unnamed Iranian company to study the projected
sales of its SSJ-100s. Interfax news agency quoted an anonymous
Russia aviation official as confirming the development. The official
added, however, that the agreement was still not binding.
FOREIGN
AFFAIRS
Iranian President
Hassan Rouhani will visit Oman and Kuwait on Wednesday, state media
reported, in his first visit to the Gulf Arab states since taking
power in 2013... Kuwait's foreign minister paid a rare visit to
Tehran late in January to deliver a message to Rouhani on a
"basis of dialogue" between Gulf Arab states and arch-rival
Iran.
OPINION
& ANALYSIS
Want a deal with
Vladimir Putin in the Middle East? Then start with the real
questions: Are the Russians prepared to abandon Iran and Bashar
Assad's Syria? If so, what would it take to pull it off? Start by
reminding yourself that Russia entered the Syrian battlefield upon
Iranian request... The Russian-Iranian embrace is very tight.
Virtually the entire Iranian nuclear program-whatever isn't North
Korean-is Russian, from the reactors to the air-defense systems that
protect them. The Iranians have committed to purchasing billions of
dollars worth of weaponry, including advanced Russian torpedoes to
attack the U.S. Navy in the Persian Gulf. Moreover, there is a
powerful Russian and Iranian interest in increasing oil prices, and
defeat of Iran in Syria and Iraq might drive petroleum prices down.
Again, good for the U.S., but bad for Mr. Putin. On the other hand,
an Islamist republic next door to Russia with a strong military and
nuclear capabilities can't make Mr. Putin very happy. He knows that
Iran produces a significant number of radical Islamic terrorists,
both Sunni and Shiite. He also knows that the Iranians smuggled
Qurans into the Soviet Union and supported separatist Muslim
movements in the 'stans and Chechnya. Mr. Putin would be happier with
a nonjihadi Iran that didn't aspire to become a nuclear power. But
Mr. Putin isn't likely to join the U.S. in changing the nature of the
Tehran regime, because a non-Islamist Iran with warm U.S. relations
wouldn't be in Moscow's interest either. At the moment, Mr. Putin is
arguably the most influential external force in the Middle East, and
it is doubtful he wants to compete with Mr. Trump for that role.
Thus, he'll try to cope with his Iran problems on his own... What,
then, is the best American strategy? Iran continues its campaign
against the U.S., and it won't end so long as the regime endures.
Therefore American policy must rely on dismantling the Khamenei
regime as peacefully as possible, perhaps from the inside out.. With
the Islamic Republic gone, the Trump administration would be in a
much stronger position to strike a deal with Mr. Putin. The road to
Moscow runs through Tehran.
Last week, US
President Donald Trump's administration all but declared pending
military action against Iran to push the Islamic Republic out of Arab
lands... [the administration is] not going to tolerate Iranian
harassment at sea any more. The suicide boat attack against a Saudi
frigate off the coast of Yemen was the last straw... The United
States is accepting GCC arguments that Iran is indeed behind the
Houthi missile program and well as backing Houthis fighting against
Saudi Arabia with almost daily intrusions into the Kingdom's two
provinces, Jizan and Najran, America's toolkit is about to open for
sending a strong message to Tehran... [T]his new round of DC-Tehran
shouting has important implications... There are a number of Trump
cards that are now in play. First, Trump is trying to get Iranian concessions
by listing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on the
terrorist list and not ripping up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of
Action (JCPOA) nuclear treaty at this time. Second is a message to
Russia. The Trump administration is floating the idea to Moscow to
trade Iran for Ukraine in a bold geo-political transactional move
with the Kremlin. Russia is concerned by escalating rhetoric between
the United States and Iran and sees itself as a negotiator which is
pleasing to GCC ears. Third, the Trump administration wants to show
that Washington is back in the region so they can help manage the
Middle East conflict which means controlling Iraq and jointly
operating with Arab partners to push back Iranian proxies. A maritime
clash is also part of the Trump transactional approach. Naval
exchanges are likely given that volume of harassment attacks by Iran
and its proxies against US and Arab naval ships... The best-case
scenario is that any confrontation is short and any damage to
shipping returns to normal after 30 days and not last four years like
the first Tanker War. But in terms of timeframe and assessment of
severity of a Tanker War II, there are a number of potential
escalatory outcomes. Any extended closure of maritime shipping will
be costly. Again, we are looking at Iranian forces will most
certainly try to block the Strait of Hormuz and paralyze
international shipping. It would wreak havoc with the world's oil
supply that would shoot oil prices higher that ironically provide
some budgetary relief to OPEC and non-OPEC countries. Tehran will do
its best to hinder US and allied naval operations by making it
engaged in prolonged mine countermeasure operations. Thankfully, the
US and the international community are ready for this potential
Iranian action through several years of multilateral drills, IMCMEX.
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