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TOP STORIES
US Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo has informed UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that
Washington was concerned over the Iranian regime's "destructive
and disruptive activities" in the Middle East. Pompeo and
Guterres discussed in Washington "the denuclearization
of the Korean peninsula, ongoing events in Venezuela, and
the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, among other
matters," the Office of the State Department's spokesperson said
in a press release on Wednesday.
In July 2017, Ahmadreza
Doostdar, a dual U.S.-Iranian citizen, visited the Oriental Institute
Museum at the University of Chicago, where FBI agents surveilled him
performing what appeared to be a surreptitious exchange of
information - a brush pass - with a woman in one of the museum's
rooms. After leaving the museum, Doostdar walked toward two nearby
Jewish centers, snapping photos with his phone camera, appearing to
pay particular attention to entrances and exits, including a wrought
iron fence at the perimeter of one the buildings.
Lawyers representing the family
of an American citizen from San Diego detained in Iran said Thursday
that the Navy veteran has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for
insulting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and for
disclosing private information by posting a photo on Instagram of a
woman he was visiting. Michael White, 46, was detained in Mashhad, a
religious city in eastern Iran, last July after traveling there to
visit the woman.
UANI IN THE NEWS
Unable to find European
financial institutions willing to accept payments for food and
medicine sold to Iran, Europeans have created a
so-called Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) to process trade,
beginning with unsanctioned goods. But the mechanism has yet to
become operational and it isn't clear whether it will also face US
penalties. Asked specifically about the SPV, Bradley Smith, deputy
director of the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, was
noncommittal. "We have to wait and see," he said. Peyman,
who was a sanctions adviser to the hawkish group United Against
Nuclear Iran before coming to the State Department, was more
critical. "I don't think we're keen on folks using the
SPV," he said.
NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR PROGRAM
New evidence disclosed in Iran's
secret nuclear files taken by the Mossad show that its underground
Fordow nuclear facility is older than it has admitted, according to a
think-tank report. This discovery could be significant, says the
Institute for Science and International Security, because it shows
that Iran is still lying to the international community about a
nuclear facility that has no reasonable use other than military.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC
NEWS
Indian state refiners will lift
8 million barrels of Iranian oil in April, a decline of about 12
percent from the previous month, industry sources said, as the nation
is in talks with the United States to renew the waiver from U.S.
sanctions against Tehran. The United States introduced sanctions
aimed at crippling Iran's oil revenue-dependent economy in November
but gave a six-month waiver to eight nations, including India, which
allowed them to import some Iranian oil.
South Korea's oil imports from
Iran fell 12.5 percent year-on-year in February, customs data showed
on Friday, as it resumed buying from the Middle Eastern nation under
a waiver from U.S. sanctions, which restricted trading
volumes. South Korea shipped in 983,497 tonnes of crude from
Iran in February, or 256,412 barrels per day (bpd), compared to 1.12
million tonnes a year earlier, according to the customs data.
February imports more than quadrupled from January volumes of 227,941
tonnes.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
A soft-spoken Iranian
academic and author, Sadegh Zibakalam, was the DW Freedom of
Speech Award recipient in 2018. A few months before he stood on the
stage at the Global Media Forum in Bonn, Zibakalam was arrested after
he gave an interview to DW's Persian service. In it he disagreed with
a government statement regarding recent protests in the country.
"I think my crime is that during an interview with Deutsche
Welle I gave a political opinion which was contrary to the
government's opinion," said Zibakalam.
From journalists to activists to
everyday people, no one is safe from being detained under vague laws
that criminalize most forms of expression in Iran. The situation is
only getting worse, says Amnesty's Raha Bahreini. One year after
Iranian political scientist Sadegh Zibakalam was honored with the DW
Freedom of Speech Award, DW's Ole Tangen Jr. spoke with human rights
lawyer and Amnesty International's researcher on Iran, Raha Bahreini,
about the current situation in the country.
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
Before wrapping up his official
visit to Iraq, President Hassan Rouhani was granted a rare audience
with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, an Iranian-born Shi'ite cleric
based in Iraq, and one of the highest religious authorities in the
Shi'ite world. Sistani rarely meets officials, and the exception he
made for Rouhani marked the first time the ayatollah has met with a
sitting Iranian president. He rejected an offer to meet with Rouhani's
predecessor, hard-line Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, during his 2008 visit to
Iraq.
Iran's Supreme Leader ayatollah
Ali Khamenei on Thursday told member of the country's Assembly of
Experts "not to be at each other's throats over this or that
convention or agreement." Khamenei was most probably referring
to international anti-money laundering and anti-corruption
conventions demanded by the international watchdog, the Financial
Action Task Force (FATF), a multilateral agency based in Paris.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
Lebanon's Hezbollah capabilities have doubled more than
100 times, the head of the defence office for Iran's Fikr Al-Islam
movement, Abbas-Ali Farzandi, said yesterday. Speaking at a ceremony
held in Iran's south-western province of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad,
he stressed that Hezbollah's capabilities "have risen
nowadays." "The capabilities of Hezbollah have doubled 100
times more than it used to be during the time of the 33-day war which
Israel launched on Lebanon in 2006," Farzandi was quoted by Fars
News Agency as saying.
Israel's Shin Bet security
service suspects Iran of hacking the mobile phone of Benny Gantz,
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's toughest rival in the April 9
election, an Israeli television station reported on Thursday
Gantz, a former chief of Israel's armed forces, was informed of the
hack five weeks ago, Channel 12 said, adding that the Shin Bet
believed Iranian state intelligence had accessed the ex-general's personal
information and correspondences.
Pro-Hezbollah and pro-Iran
regime media and social media accounts lit up on Thursday night,
after two rockets were fred at Tel Aviv from Gaza. It indicates
the close attention paid to tensions in Israel between Israel and
terrorist groups in Gaza. Lebanon's satellite TV station Al-Mayadeen,
which is generally supportive of the Syrian regime and Hezbollah,
wrote a story within minutes of the reports of Iron Dome being
activated. "Occupation admits that Palestinians bomb 'Tel
Aviv,'" the headline read.
Saudi Arabia's Minister of State
for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir said that the resolution of the
Syrian crisis will lead to the withdrawal of Iranian forces and
militias from the region. He was speaking in Brussels at the
conference on "Supporting the future of Syria and the
region" at the European Council on Thursday.
IRAQ & IRAN
President Hassan Rouhani became
the first sitting Iranian president to meet with Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani, the most senior Iraqi Shiite leader, when he visited the
holy city of Najaf on March 14. The meeting took place on the final
day of his three-day tour of Iraq. The historic meeting received
widespread coverage by Iranian newspapers and was well received by
both conservative and Reformist media.
MISCELLANEOUS
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will soon decide whether
to continue diplomatic talks and maintain his moratorium on missile
launches and nuclear tests, a senior North Korean official said
Friday, adding that the U.S. threw away a golden opportunity at the
recent summit between their leaders.
In mid-January and early
February, Iran attempted two satellite launches intended for
environmental monitoring purposes. The Payam (Message)
and Doosti (Friendship) ascended aboard Iranian-made
satellite launch vehicles (SLVs). Both launches failed to
place the satellites into orbit. The United States nevertheless
protested the space launches-mostly because the SLVs used the same
base technology as multistage intercontinental ballistic missiles
(ICBMs).
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