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WSJ: "A leading member of Saudi Arabia's royal family warned that Riyadh could seek to supplant Iran's oil exports if the country doesn't constrain its nuclear program, a move that could hobble Tehran's finances. In closed-door remarks earlier this month, Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal also strongly implied that Riyadh would be forced to follow suit if Tehran pushed ahead to develop nuclear weapons and said Saudi Arabia is preparing to employ all of its economic, diplomatic and security assets to confront Tehran's regional ambitions. 'Iran is very vulnerable in the oil sector, and it is there that more could be done to squeeze the current government,' Prince Turki, a former Saudi ambassador to the U.S. and U.K., told a private gathering of American and British servicemen at RAF Molesworth airbase outside London. The Arab Spring uprisings are intensifying the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran, who face off across the Persian Gulf and jostle for influence with neighbors from Syria to Yemen. It's a Cold War, fueled by oil and ideology, between Shiite Islamists who rule Iran and the Sunni Saudi royal family, each of whom consider themselves leaders of the world's Muslim populations." http://t.uani.com/jUqL1a
Reuters: "Iran's state shipping line rejected on Tuesday the latest U.S. indictments against it, saying the move was another attempt by Washington to damage the Islamic Republic's economy, state television reported. U.S. prosecutors took aim at the state-sponsored Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, known as IRISL, on Monday, indicting several companies and individuals for helping the blacklisted firm's suspected weapons proliferation activities by allegedly falsifying bank records. The Manhattan District Attorney's Office said IRISL used bogus companies to dupe New York-based banks into processing wire payments totalling more than $60 million. 'Iran's shipping line called America's action unfair and against international laws and regulations,' state television reported. 'Taking such actions are in fact aimed at harming an influential part of Iran's economic infrastructure and paralysing the country's imports and exports,' it added." http://t.uani.com/kWkAq9
AFP: "Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's plan to merge the strategic oil ministry into an enlarged energy portfolio has been 'cancelled,' the official parliamentary website said on Tuesday. 'The merger of the two ministries has been cancelled and taken off the government's agenda to merge ministries,' the website quoted Hossein Sobhani-Nia, a member of the parliamentary management committee, as saying. Sobhani-Nia said the decision had been taken by a subcommittee made up of representatives from both parliament and the government, which had 'come to the conclusion that the oil ministry should remain independent because of its significance.' The merger of the oil and energy portfolios had become a major bone of contention between Ahmadinejad and the conservative-dominated parliament after the president moved to implement plans to streamline his cabinet in early May. On May 15, Ahmadinejad announced he had personally taken charge of the oil ministry for an interim period, after dismissing former oil minister Masoud Mirkazemi the previous day." http://t.uani.com/mLEZ5e
Nuclear Program & Sanctions
Reuters: "Iran's nuclear energy chief said on Tuesday he had held 'very good' and 'transparent' talks with the head of the U.N. atomic agency and had invited him to visit the Islamic state's nuclear facilities. The rare meeting in Vienna between Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani and Director General Yukiya Amano of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) follows increasingly strained ties between Tehran and the U.N. body over the last year. Iran has rebuffed IAEA appeals for information and access to help clarify allegations of military-linked nuclear work. Western powers suspect Iran is seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability, a charge it rejects. Abbasi-Davani, head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, said the two sides pledged to resolve their problems through more dialogue in future. 'We don't have differences of view,' he told reporters." http://t.uani.com/jW6f3E
KUNA: "Local prosecutors in New York City announced Monday that they would bring charges against more than 15 companies and individuals, alleging that they evaded US sanctions on Iran by falsifying records of transactions at New York City banks between September 2008 and 2010.The indictment names Iran's state-sponsored shipping company, the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL), along with 10 other firms and 5 individuals... United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) President, Ambassador Mark Wallace, applauded the Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. for his diligence in enforcing the law, and urged other District Attorneys in America to prosecute companies in their jurisdictions, who continue doing business in Iran. This indictment, he added, 'further highlights Iran's deceptive shipping and business practices, and is all the more reason why shipping companies around the world should immediately stop doing business with Iran. The regime has once again shown how far it will go to deceive the world and violate sanctions as it continues to obtain technology and supplies for its illegal nuclear weapons program.'" http://t.uani.com/jxENs8
Human Rights
AP: "It's an Iranian rite of summer: Islamic morality squads pressure women to keep their headscarves snug and coverings in place, and after a few extra tugs for modesty's sake the crackdown inevitably fades. This year, however, Iran's summer fashion offensive appears bigger and more ominous, and has expanded the watch list to men's hairstyles and jewelry considered too Western. No official explanation has appeared for the sterner approach this season. But it fits with the steady push by Iran's ruling theocracy to reel back the liberal fashion trends that began in the 1990s - such as body-hugging coverings for women and earrings and tattoos for men - and to sweep away non-Islamic influences in universities and cultural institutions. The drive to turn back the clock - part of what Iran calls a 'moral security plan' - also could reach deeper as the all-powerful clerics running Iran move to reinforce their authority." http://t.uani.com/jqkJJw
Domestic Politics
AP: "Iran's newly appointed deputy foreign minister has resigned under pressure from hard-liners who view him as part of a movement seeking to weaken the role of Iran's powerful Muslim clerics, media reports said Tuesday. The dispute over Mohammad Sharif Malekzadeh is part of a burgeoning power struggle involving President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the parliament and the country's clergy. While Malekzadeh faces corruption charges, the opposition to his appointment appeared more ideological. In his resignation letter addressed to the foreign minister Tuesday, Malekzadeh denounced his critics. 'Despite dastardly manipulations and plentiful injustices done against me, I can't accept that you suffer from unjust pressures because of me anymore,' the official IRNA news agency quoted Malekzadeh as saying. Malekzadeh, who has denied the corruption allegations, is an ally of the president's chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei." http://t.uani.com/muI2kh
Foreign Affairs
UPI: "Iranian Revolutionary Guards are operating throughout Syria to assist in quelling anti-regime protests, a senior Israeli official said. In an interview with Haaretz Wednesday, the official, whose name was not published and described as 'a senior Israeli source,' said Iran is supplying Syria with military equipment as well as sophisticated communications equipment used to jam the Internet. Syrian residents have reported men wearing military uniforms were heard speaking Farsi or poor Arabic among themselves. 'In the Syrian army there is a ban on beards, so when we see military people with beards we can assume they're not part of the regular Syrian army,' the source told the newspaper. He said Hezbollah also is operating in Syria." http://t.uani.com/lZsRC6
Opinion & Analysis
Abbas Milani in The National Interest: "Ahmadinejad and his oligarch cronies have been having a rough couple of months. The ayatollah is out for blood, and those in 'elected' office are under attack. In fact, the dominant narrative taking over the Islamic Republic has lately sounded a great deal more like the magical realism of Gabriel García Márquez than the realpolitik of Hans Morgenthau. It has been two months of bizarre allegations of voodoo and venal sins taking place in the offices and homes of the president's closest aides and confidants-not to mention the far more run-of-the-mill charges of their financial corruption and sweetheart deals in places like Belarus. It has been a time of repeated open threats of the president's impeachment, the same president who was not too long ago the darling of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, close as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was to the supreme leader's own ideas and ideals. It has been a time when more than a hundred members of Iran's parliament, the Majlis, have requested an investigation into the last presidential election and the allegation that 9 million votes were purchased through cash payments from government coffers. Amazing how the tables can turn. Indeed, just like the police chief in Casablanca, these conservative (ayatollah-backing) members of the Majlis are 'shocked, shocked' that electoral cheating is going on in Iran. Lest we forget, Mir Hussein Moussavi (the 'losing candidate' in that same presidential election), his wife, Zahra Rahnavard, Mehdi Karroubi (the other 'losing' candidate) and his wife, Fatemeh, have been under house arrest for months-for making the same accusations of fraud. Thousands of Iranians have been imprisoned, and about a hundred of the regime's past ministers, deputy ministers and directors were put on Stalinist-era-like show trials to confess to the crime of alleging a bought-and-paid-for vote. Hundreds of young women and men were tortured, dozens raped and thousands forced into exile for questioning the June 2009 presidential-election results. It was of course all, according to Khamenei, a sinister U.S. plot to create a 'velvet revolution' using Gene Sharp's model and George Soros's money. And it has been months filled with charges of an even broader American-Zionist conspiracy. Naturally, they are the real masterminds behind the recent crisis, placing their 'infiltrators' in the president's entourage. The public has been told not to be fooled when the Western media or governments try to use these reports of voodoo, exorcism and demonic powers in the Iranian president's office against the clerical regime; a high-ranking official close to Khamenei just announced that while these heresies were rampant and unacceptable among Ahmadinejad's confidants, it should be remembered that the U.S. military has been tapping into such demonic forces for decades. He went on to opine that European militaries have also begun emulating America in the use of the devil's powers. For much of the spring, Ahmadinejad and the Iranian regime have stood on the edge of a political precipice. In early May, a commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) predicted that forces loyal to Ahmadinejad, now called 'the deviationist line'-yet another reminder of Stalinist- and Maoist-era monikers and purges-would 'stand up' to the regime, creating a far greater threat to the country than the instability circa June 2009, when an estimated 3 million people in Tehran came out to protest what they considered a fraudulent election. Another IRGC commander predicted 'a bloody year' ahead. And evidence that the looming clash might well be approaching came when forces close to Khamenei confronted the man Ahmadinejad had named governor of Shiraz Province, bringing the local government to a standstill. The president is increasingly attacked by much of the regime's vast propaganda machine, portrayed at best as a gullible dupe. He is surely 'possessed,' declared Mesbah-Yazdi, Ahmadinejad's onetime guru and spiritual guide." http://t.uani.com/lL3viJ
Kevan Harris in The Iran Primer: "Iran's biggest economic problem is the growing production slump at its factories and workshops. For both workers and the business elite, Iran's domestic industrial troubles are far more pressing--and generating far more public anxiety--than international sanctions. The biggest danger for Iran in 2011 is the combination of higher unemployment and inflation produced by government inaction, unintended consequences of subsidy reform, and dwindling foreign capital caused by banking sanctions. The issue has been described as rokood-tavarom, or 'stagflation,' by Iran's leading financial newspaper Donya-ye Eqtesad. To stimulate the economy, Iran's Central Bank devalued the international exchange rate of its currency by 11 percent on June 8-a sharp reversal after years of propping up the rial. The exchange rate fell abruptly to 11,750 rials to the dollar. The bank's action is intended to help Iran's large industrial sector increase non-oil exports to its neighbors. The devaluation makes Iranian exports of cement, copper, petrochemical and agricultural products cheaper for other countries. Yet the Central Bank's move may in fact only compound problems for Iranian businesses. Iran's industrial sector also needs to import machinery and raw materials, so decreasing the rial's value may 'hurt the economy and the nation's industry' as imported goods become more expensive, noted parliamentarian Hamid Reza Fooladghar. The government's failure to support industry after reforms in energy subsidies last year is a central cause of the slump. For the general population, the regime promised 45 dollars per person monthly to offset increased prices of basic goods, fuel and utilities. But the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did little to aid industries. It promised the Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Mines to make loans and credits available to alleviate increased costs, but it offered no cash. It also banned business from increasing prices for a long list of household goods to prevent inflation. So, Iranian industries were squeezed on both sides: The government provided no tangible aid as industrial costs soared, but companies were barred from raising prices to cover those costs. Under these conditions, Iran faces a looming crisis in an already ailing industrial sector." http://t.uani.com/kXOQqc
Jaime Daremblum in The Weekly Standard: "Analyzing Argentina's foreign policy can sometimes be more suited to psychiatrists than journalists. Consider, for example, how President Cristina Kirchner and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman have handled bilateral relations with Iran. n 1992 and 1994, Buenos Aires was rocked by a pair of deadly bombings, the first of which hit the Israeli embassy, and the second struck the headquarters of Argentina's largest Jewish Community Center. Hundreds were killed or wounded by the attacks, and subsequent investigations left no doubt that Iran and its terrorist proxy Hezbollah were responsible. Indeed, the murderous operations had been directed from the Iranian embassy in Buenos Aires. Unfortunately, official inquiries into the bombings stagnated for several years as a result of judicial apathy and government corruption. Then, in the mid-2000s, the late Argentine president Néstor Kirchner revived the investigations and aggressively pursued justice. Four years ago, international arrest warrants were issued through Interpol against several high-profile Iranians, including an ex-president and leaders of the Revolutionary Guard Corps. In speeches before the United Nations and at various official gatherings in Washington, Néstor Kirchner demanded greater Iranian cooperation with the bombing probes and condemned Tehran for its refusal to hand over suspects wanted by Interpol. His wife, Cristina, who succeeded him as president in 2007, kept up the pressure. Now it appears that Buenos Aires has changed its position dramatically-or maybe not. Two months ago, veteran Argentine journalist Pepe Eliaschev published a stunning article in the pages of Perfil, a Buenos Aires newspaper. The article, based on confidential documents, revealed that Timerman had secretly traveled to Damascus for a meeting with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, asking him to help improve Argentina's economic relationship with Iran. Timerman also noted the urgent need of $1.2 billion. In exchange for closer bilateral trade and financial ties, Timerman offered to freeze all judicial proceedings related to the 1994 Jewish Community Center bombing and let the Iranians off the hook. The scandal that erupted following the publication of Eliaschev's piece called into question the integrity of Timerman and Kirchner. Both remained silent at first, and then eventually both declared in unison that they would not 'dignify' the article's allegations with a response. But they never denied the story. Indeed, a few days ago, Eliaschev was summoned to the Argentine attorney general's office, where he was asked to reveal his sources. (He refused.) The issue of an alleged deal with Iran surfaced again in late May, when Perfil reported that, according to data from the agriculture ministry, Argentine exports to Iran doubled between 2009 and 2010, with continued growth this year." http://t.uani.com/liMOAp
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