|
TOP STORIES
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
made a rare appearance at the United Nations Security Council on
Wednesday, putting aside his publicly stated skepticism of the
organization as he sought to broaden support for the hard-line
American stance on Iran. In particular, he accused Iran of having
destabilized the Middle East and beyond, through what he described as
the "reckless" development of ballistic missiles systems.
As U.S. President Donald Trump
re-imposed harsh economic sanctions on Iran last month, hackers
scrambled to break into personal emails of American officials tasked
with enforcing them, The Associated Press has found - another sign of
how deeply cyberespionage is embedded into the fabric of US-Iranian
relations.
An Iranian political activist
jailed for his messages on social media has died after spending 60
days on hunger strike, his family says. Vahid Sayadi Nasiri had been
accused of insulting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other
offences. He was released last March after serving two-and-a-half
years in prison but detained again five months later.
UANI IN THE NEWS
Last month I was surprised to
learn that the German airline Lufthansa has direct flights to Iran. In
fact, there are two other major European carriers that also have
direct flights to the Islamic Republic: Alitalia and Austrian
Airlines. One would think that countries that were directly involved
in causing World War II and the deaths of millions would have learned
the lessons of history. Evidently they have not. In light of
dangerous developments involving Iran and its loyal proxy Hezbollah,
I urge readers to think twice before booking their next flight on one
of these airlines.
NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR
PROGRAM
The United States will push the
U.N. Security Council to toughen its stance to prevent Iran from
working on ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons
and carrying out test launches, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
said on Wednesday. Pompeo also told the Security Council an arms
embargo on Iran should not be lifted in 2020 and called on the
council to establish "inspection and interdiction measures, in
ports and on the high seas, to thwart Iran's continuing efforts to
circumvent arms restrictions."
UN Secretary-General Antonio
Guterres underlined the significance of Iran's nuclear accord for
international security, urging the global community to make efforts
to uphold the hard-earned deal. In a report to the United
Nations Security Council on the implementation of sanctions on Iran
cited by Reuters on Tuesday, the UN chief called on all countries to
"ensure the continuity of this agreement that is fundamental to
regional and international peace and security".
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, &
OTHER ECONOMIC NEWS
OPEC said on Wednesday it had
offset a drop in sanctions-hit Iranian oil exports and lowered the
2019 forecast of demand for its crude, underlining the challenge the
producer group faces to prevent a glut even after last week's
decision to trim output. In a monthly report, the Organization
of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said 2019 demand for its crude
would fall to 31.44 million barrels per day, 100,000 bpd less than
predicted last month and 1.53 million less than it currently produces.
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan
Zanganeh said on Wednesday that, because of U.S. sanctions, India had
refused to allow a Russian-owned Indian refinery to use Iranian crude
oil that India had obtained under waivers. Zanganeh was responding to
a question in an interview on Iranian state television about why Iran
had not bought refineries overseas. He said large investments were
needed, and the refineries would be under the jurisdiction of the host
country.
China-based Yantai Jereh
Oilfield Services Group Co Ltd has agreed to pay more than $2.7
million to settle 11 "apparent violations" of sanctions
against Iran, the U.S. Treasury Department said on
Wednesday. "The apparent violations involved the
exportation or re-exportation, and attempted exportation or
re-exportation of U.S.-origin goods ultimately intended for end-users
in Iran by way of China," the department said in a notice on its
website.
China National Petroleum Corp
(CNPC) has suspended investment in Iran's South Pars natural gas
project in response to US pressure and to minimize tensions amid
trade talks between Beijing and Washington, three Chinese state oil
executives said. South Pars is the world's largest gas field and
CNPC's investment freeze is a blow to Tehran's efforts to maintain
financing for energy projects amid the re-imposition US sanctions on
its energy sector earlier this year.
MISSILE PROGRAM
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
on Wednesday said the U.S. would form and lead a coalition of
countries to oppose Iran's ballistic missiles in an attempt to curb
the program and its development. Mr. Pompeo, attending a U.N.
Security Council semiannual meeting on Iran, said the council should
not lift an arms embargo on Iran as scheduled in 2020 and should
toughen inspection and surveillance activities in "ports and
high seas" to block Iran from weapon transfers.
This week Iran confirmed that
it recently test-fired a missile, which the U.S. categorized as
a medium-range ballistic missile "capable of carrying multiple
warheads," a transgression of a 2015 United Nations Security
Council resolution. Unfortunately, this was hardly news: Iran has
made a habit out of testing, using and
even transferring ballistic missiles across the Middle
East.
The UN Security
Council convened Dec. 12 to address the implementation of
the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). US Secretary of State
Pompeo said that Iran's pace of missile activities has not
diminished since the JCPOA and that the United States seeks to
reimpose ballistic missile restrictions that were outlined in UN
Security Council Resolution 1929.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
One of the objectives of Iran's
annual budget for the next year is to decrease poverty, according to
Iranian officials. This comes after news of the latest report by the
parliament's research center, which says 11 percent more people have
fallen below the poverty line in the Tehran region as the national
currency rial has lost value dramatically over the past seven months.
The parliament puts the poverty line in the Iranian capital, Tehran,
at about $233 based on the free market exchange rate or $480 based on
the official exchange rate (roughly a monthly income of around 28
million rials) for a family of four and slightly more than one-fourth
of that for a single person.
Following the publication of its
damning report on a three-decade long campaign of misinformation by
the Iranian authorities about the mass prisoner killings of 1988,
Amnesty International today published a video interview from December
1988 showing Iran's then prime minister, Mir Hossein Mousavi, denying
and distorting the truth about these crimes against humanity. The
video clip has been released in response to a public debate ignited
since the report's publication about the extent to which Mir Hossein Mousavi
and his government were aware of the mass killings while they were
taking place between late July and early September 1988, and his role
in the official campaign to conceal the truth about what happened.
Dissident Iranian lawyer Ghasem
Sholesaadi has been sentenced to six years in prison, his lawyer said
Wednesday. Sholesaadi was arrested Aug. 18 while taking part in a
small protest outside the Iranian Parliament against the barring of
candidates from elections. The conservative-dominated Guardian
Council reserves the right to veto any candidates from presidential
and parliamentary elections.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS &
NEGOTIATIONS
Almost halfway through his term, U.S. President Donald
Trump's administration has yet to launch a coordinated assault
against Hezbollah's terrorist finance networks in the Western
Hemisphere, especially in the Tri-Border Area of Argentina, Brazil,
and Paraguay, the Iran-backed terrorist group's most active financial
hub in the region. That may be about to change, though.
President Trump has revived most
of the U.S. sanctions on Iran that were dropped during Barack Obama's
2015 nuclear deal with the Islamic Republic. More sanctions are
coming. But to halt Iran's march toward enriched uranium and
functional ballistic missiles for good, the White House must convince
more Americans and U.S. allies to join in raising pressure on the
regime. The fruits of Tehran's imperialism won't wither until the
world chokes its roots.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
said Wednesday he wants to build a "coalition of responsible
nations" to push back against malign Iranian actions -- as
European countries took to the U.N. Security Council to ramp up
pressure on the regime. "The United States will continue to unite
sovereign nations in their responsibility to work for the peace and
security of their own people and a stable international order,"
he said at a meeting of the council on non-proliferation. "The
United States will continue to be relentless in building a coalition
of responsible nations who are serious about confronting the Iranian
regime's reckless ballistic missile activity."
Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei urged Iranians on Wednesday to stay united, saying the
United States would exploit divisions and was likely to launch plots
against Iran in 2019. Iran is struggling with the economic
impact of President Donald Trump's decision to pull out of a 2015
nuclear deal between Iran and six major powers and re-impose
sanctions.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo said on Wednesday that Iran is defying U.N. Security Council
resolutions on its missile programme and called on council members to
take action to protect against the malign activity. "This
threat is real and upon us. We clearly see that the JCPOA (Iran
nuclear deal) didn't succeed in stopping this malign activity,"
Pompeo told reporters after attending a council meeting.
Washington's special envoy for
Iran says the U.S. administration is looking into the visas of
relatives of Iranian officials who are residing in the United States
with an eye to possible action to expose hypocrisy within the ranks
of Iran's government. Brian Hook announced the review in a December
11 video in which he said the United States was "working"
on the issue, without providing details.
MILITARY/INTELLIGENCE MATTERS
& PROXY WARS
Iran needs some 500 planes and
would likely back buying the Sukhoi Superjet 100 if Russia is willing
to sell them to its airlines, Iranian news agencies reported the
country's top civil aviation official as saying on
Wednesday. Iran needs to upgrade its ageing passenger fleet and
is seeking to avert U.S. sanctions on Tehran. The U.S.
Treasury has revoked licences for Boeing Co and Airbus to sell
passenger jets to Iran after President Donald Trump pulled the United
States out of the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement in May and reimposed
sanctions.
From a desert hillside guarded
by Iraqi Shiite paramilitaries, commander Qassem Muslih can spot
Daesh (ISIS) hideouts across the frontier in Syria. But he also keeps
a wary eye on U.S. warplanes soaring overhead. "The Americans
are spying on us," he says, squinting skyward. "But we
can hold the borders. We'll fight whoever lays a finger on Iraq and
its holy shrines."
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan
Zanganeh joined Twitter, citing the need for more effective
communication with Iranians and the world. "I have come to
Twitter for a more dynamic and effective relationship with domestic
and foreign audience," read his first tweet. The Oil
Ministry's public-relations office confirmed @BijanZanganeh is the
minister's Twitter handle.
Since February
2011, Iranian opposition leaders Mir-Hossein Mousavi, his
wife Zahra Rahnavard and Mehdi Karroubi have been effectively
under house arrest with virtually zero access to the
outside world. The punishment without trial came after Mousavi
and Karroubi, two of the defeated candidates in the country's 2009
presidential elections, leveled accusations of vote rigging and
called for public protests.
The Iranian parliament's
research center says a worsening domestic economy means a broader
range of Iranians are living in poverty, based on their monthly
incomes. In a report released Tuesday, the parliamentary
researchers said the poverty line for a family of four living in the
capital city of Tehran rose to a monthly income of 27 million rials
in the June to September quarter, or $650, according to Iran's
official exchange rate of 42,000 rials to the dollar.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL,
HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
Israel does not rule out acting
militarily inside Iran's border if it feels that is necessary for its
security, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday. Asked
at an annual appearance before the foreign press if Israel would act
inside Iran's borders, Netanyahu said, "Our redline is our
survival. We do what is necessary to protect Israel against the
Iranian regime that openly calls for the annihilation of the Jewish
state."
IRAQ & IRAN
U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry
tweeted on Thursday that he had discussed energy cooperation with
Iraqi Kurdish leader Masrour Barzani. "My final meeting in Iraq
was with @masrour_barzani, Chancellor of Kurdistan Security Council,
where we continued discussions on the importance of energy
collaboration and the role that Kurdistan plays in an energy secure
Iraq and eliminating the influence of Iran," he said.
|
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment