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TOP STORIES
Two days after saying he
intended to step down, Iran's foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif,
returned to his post after President Hassan Rouhani rejected the
resignation. There were smiles all around on Wednesday, as Mr. Zarif
appeared alongside Mr. Rouhani during a welcoming ceremony for a
visiting dignitary broadcast live on state television. Despite his
return, the major reason for Mr. Zarif's resignation - his diminished
status in the government - is not likely to change significantly,
analysts said.
Iran is smuggling upgrades for
Hezbollah's rocket arsenal through Syria in suitcases, two recent
reports based on Israeli intelligence reveal. According to these
reports, the upgrades, which are based on satellite navigation
systems (GPS), are meant to improve the rockets' accuracy. The kits
are no bigger than a carry-on suitcase and can thus easily be
smuggled aboard a plane.
In his latest report submitted
to the UN Human Rights Council February 27, UN Special Rapporteur on
the Situation of Human Rights in Iran Javaid Rehman raised his
concern over human rights violations in Iran, paying particular
attention to the way the death penalty is carried out in the Islamic
Republic. A British-Pakistani legal scholar and Professor of Islamic
Law and International Law at Brunel University, Rehman expressed deep
regret that children as young as nine years old can still be
executed, noting that at least 33 minors have been executed for their
offenses since 2013.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC
NEWS
Sanctioned by the U.S., Iran's
found a sweet way to use the cash it's accumulated from trading oil:
Purchase sugar from India. Iran is struggling to spend the rupees
it's made from oil sales to India that are sitting in the south Asian
nation's banks. Meanwhile, sugar stockpiles are stacking up in India
after a bumper crop. Now the two have struck a deal that eases each
other's woes -- albeit only to some extent.
When President Donald Trump
announced his administration's withdrawal from the 2015 Iran nuclear
deal and the reimposition of U.S. economic sanctions on Iran last
May, the naysayers confidently predicted failure. After all, they
lectured, it took years of combined American, EU, and UN Security
Council sanctions just to get Iran to suspend development of its
nuclear program.
Asia's crude oil imports from
Iran dipped in January to the lowest in two months after top buyers
China and India slowed down purchases and as Japan recorded zero
imports for a third month, government and trade data
showed. Asia's top four buyers of Iranian crude - China, India,
Japan and South Korea - imported a total 710,699 barrels per day of
crude from Iran in January, 49 percent lower than the same month in
2018, the data collated by Thomson Reuters showed.
President Trump and Kim Jong-un, North Korea's leader,
abruptly ended their second summit meeting on Thursday after talks
collapsed with the two leaders failing to agree on any steps toward
nuclear disarmament or measures to ease tensions on the Korean
Peninsula. "Sometimes you have to walk," Mr. Trump said at
an afternoon news conference in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
The human rights situation in
Iran has "severely deteriorated," according to a February
26 report from Amnesty International (AI). In the report, titled
"Human Rights in The Middle East and North Africa: Review of
2018," AI outlined state restrictions imposed on the freedoms of
Iranians, including freedom of expression, assembly, association, and
religion.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS & NEGOTIATIONS
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei called the United States an untrustworthy and
warmongering country on Wednesday, and urged neighbouring Armenia to
expand ties with Tehran despite U.S. pressures. Iran is
struggling with the sanctions imposed by Washington after U.S.
President Donald Trump pulled out of a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran
and six major powers last year, calling it deeply flawed.
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
After a 48-hour farce, it
appears Javad Zarif will remain as Iran's foreign minister after
President Hassan Rouhani rejected his Instagram resignation.
Photographs of the two men greeting the Prime Minister of Armenia in
Tehran this morning are circulating on social media platforms, where
Zarif's legions of admirers are proclaiming victory on his behalf. If
it a victory, it is at best pyrrhic.
Almost 36 hours after the
apparent resignation of Iran's foreign minister, there are finally
some answers to the many questions it raised. For instance, his
superior, president Hassan Rouhani, has not accepted his
resignation, which is required under Iranian law. Neither has the top
decision-maker in the country, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - if one is to
believe cryptic rumours of a "high-ranking official" having
told the diplomat that his exit is not "expedient".
The quick reversal of the
surprise resignation of Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran's smooth-talking
foreign minister who brokered the 2015 nuclear deal, has calmed a
brewing crisis in Tehran, but only temporarily. Domestic critics of
Zarif's engagement with Washington and the West may have cheered his
threatened retreat.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday after
meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow that getting
the Iranians and all foreign fighters out of Syria is also one of
Russia's stated goals. A diplomatic source added that Putin did not
place limitations on Israel's actions in Syria. Netanyahu said the
meeting with Putin was "good and productive," emphasizing
that Putin accepted his invitation to visit Jerusalem.
Israel's prime minister vowed
Wednesday to prevent Iran from securing a lasting presence in Syria
as he visited Moscow for talks focusing on regional security. For
Benjamin Netanyahu, it's the first trip to Moscow since September's
downing of a Russian warplane by Syrian forces that were responding
to an Israeli air strike. The incident left 15 Russian crew dead and
threatened to derail close security ties between Russia and Israel.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad
on Wednesday invited Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to
visit Damascus, state news agency IRNA reported, without specifying a
date for the trip. Zarif tendered his resignation two days ago
but Iran's President Hassan Rouhani rejected it on Wednesday, calling
it "against national interests".
GULF STATES, YEMEN, & IRAN
Manama: Saudi Arabia's Deputy
Defence Minister Prince Khalid Bin Salman Al Saud said that Iran's
foreign minister Mohammed Javid Zarif's authority was diminishing and
that his peace talks in Europe held no significance for those with
power in Iran. "Unfortunately, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
learned the hard way that Javed Zarif is just another face of the
same coin; now we know who is the jockey and who is the horse,"
Prince Khalid, the former Saudi ambassador to the US, posted on his
Twitter account.
Yemeni government's de-mining team dismantled four
explosive devices at the Red Sea Mills in Hodeidah hours before the
arrival of UN deployment team, World Food Program (WFP) and the
international expert on the international mine clearance program. UN
envoy General Michael Lollesgaard complained that Houthi militias are
trying to hinder the redeployment plan in Hodeidah, stressing that he
would send a letter to the United Nations in this regard.
OTHER FOREIGN AFFAIRS
A Greek court has refused to
extradite to Iran an Iranian political dissident and Christian wanted
in her country for alleged drugs-smuggling, citing fears that she
might face torture if returned. The court in the northern city of
Thessaloniki ruled Wednesday that the accusations were brought
against Farnaz Naderikia, 31, as a form of political and religious
persecution, her Greek lawyer Thodoris Karagiannis said. Naderikia,
who won asylum in Greece after entering illegally from Turkey with
her husband and 11-year-old daughter, was an aide of Iran's reformist
ex-Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi.
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