Eye on Iran: Sanctions Continue to Hinder MTN in Iran

For continuing coverage follow us on Twitter and join our Facebook group.    Top Stories WSJ: "Troubles in Iran continue to dog South Africa's largest mobile-phone operator, MTN Group Ltd., even as it accelerates a multibillion-dollar expansion drive across Africa and into Asia. In an interview, MTN Chief Executive Sifiso Dabengwa said the company is still trying to find a way to get money out of Iran, its second-fastest growing market in terms of new subscribers. U.S., European and United Nations sanctions aimed at cutting off funding for a suspected Iranian nuclear-weapons program have prevented the business from repatriating funds, including a €300 million ($391 million) loan it made to its Iranian joint venture and several hundred millions in profit. In addition, a new round of sanctions has bitten into supply deliveries. The company has had to slow down some projects because it can't get certain supplies. Mr. Dabengwa didn't elaborate on what those projects were." http://t.uani.com/11j98QL AP: "Secretary of State John Kerry called for patience despite widespread frustration with the recent failure of negotiations between six world powers and Iran over its disputed nuclear program and growing fears of Tehran developing a weapon of mass destruction. Testifying Thursday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Kerry said he was disappointed by the inconclusive talks in Kazakhstan earlier this month, but insisted that a diplomatic resolution is still the best option. The international community fears Tehran is developing a nuclear weapon; Iran insists its work is for peaceful purposes. Congress has repeatedly pressed for tough sanctions on Iran, convinced that undermining its economy and oil revenue will thwart its nuclear program. Kerry, in urging patience, highlighted uncertainty in Tehran, with a power struggle two months ahead of June elections, and said he did not expect 'anything dramatic' in the next few weeks. 'We don't need to spin this up at this point in time,' Kerry told the panel." http://t.uani.com/13mbwGp FT: "Two former Iranian presidents, Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami, are under increasing pressure from moderates to run in the June presidential election, say their aides. Hossein Marashi, Mr Rafsanjani's former chief of staff and a close ally of the 78-year-old conservative former president, said the possibility that one of the two politicians might run and enjoy the support of the other one had increased to '50 per cent' in recent weeks... But analysts believe the pair will announce their candidacy only if Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, who has the final say in all state affairs, guarantees that a victory would not be blocked by forces under his command, notably the Revolutionary Guards. Reformists believe the elite force 'engineers' - a code name for rigging - final election results. There is no sign yet that Ayatollah Khamenei is ready for such a compromise, even though supporters of the former presidents are trying to rally public support and make it difficult for the top leader to reject it at a sensitive time." http://t.uani.com/15rqYoL   Nuclear Program NYT: "With Chuck Hagel scheduled to begin his first visit to Israel as secretary of defense on Sunday, Israeli defense and military officials issued explicit warnings this week that Israel was prepared and had the capability to carry out a lone military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also spoke of dealing with the Iranian nuclear threat in an interview with the BBC broadcast on Thursday. Israel has 'different vulnerabilities and different capabilities' from the United States, he said. 'We have to make our own calculations, when we lose the capacity to defend ourselves by ourselves.' Israeli officials have been expressing growing frustration with what they view as ineffective international efforts to halt what Israel and the West see as an Iranian quest for nuclear weapons. Despite economic sanctions and rounds of diplomatic talks, the officials say, the Iranian centrifuges continue to spin." http://t.uani.com/10lTsiU NYT: "The Defense Department is expected to finalize a $10 billion arms deal with Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates next week that will provide missiles, warplanes and troop transports to help them counter any future threat from Iran. A weeklong visit to the region by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel will culminate a year of secret negotiations on a deal that Congressional officials said will be second only to the $29.5 billion sale of F-15 aircraft to Saudi Arabia announced in 2010. But the delicate balancing act that was necessary in weighing the differing interests of each nation made it among the most complex ever negotiated." http://t.uani.com/13mbgah AP: "Two diplomats say Iran and the U.N. nuclear agency have agreed to mid-May talks focused on restarting a probe of suspicions that Tehran has worked secretly on atomic arms. Their last meeting in February extended a string of inconclusive attempts by the International Atomic Energy Agency to re-launch investigations stalled for more than five years." http://t.uani.com/ZDKki9 Sanctions WT: "International sanctions are squeezing Iran's economy but are doing little to dissuade the regime's nuclear ambitions, the top U.S. intelligence officer told Congress on Thursday. 'It's having a tremendous impact on their economy, by any measure,' National Director of Intelligence James R. Clapper said of the sanctions in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee. 'That said, it has not yet induced a change in their policy.' However, U.S. intelligence continues to hold that Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Hosseini Khamenei has not decided to build a nuclear weapon, Mr. Clapper said. Against the backdrop of nuclear threats from North Korea, some foreign policy mavens say the U.S. can't afford to wait until Iran has the capability and are urging a pre-emptive, limited military strike." http://t.uani.com/11K6Rh9 Domestic Politics Economist: "During a Persian new year's party (in late March) at Iran's flagship South Pars project in the Persian Gulf, where the world's largest known gasfield is being tapped, a labourer called on Iran's workers to unite. Behnam Khodadadi demanded better pay and conditions, and a proper trade union. Around 1,500 workers stopped security guards from detaining Mr Khodadadi. A week later he was fired from his job at Iran Industrial Networks Development, a contractor for the state-owned National Iranian Oil Company. Mr Khodadadi may have been muzzled, but disaffection is growing among Iranian workers as inflation outpaces wage rises and workers are laid off. At the same time attempts to organise labour are being suppressed in the run-up to June's presidential elections. 'They haven't paid us for at least four months and I have to keep borrowing money,' says Jamshid, a 32-year-old industrial worker in Tehran, the capital. Last month the minimum wage was raised by 25%, to 4.87m rials ($140) a month, but even by official criteria this is one-third of what is deemed to be a living wage in the capital. The drop in the rial's value means that, when it comes to the imports on which Iran relies, Iranian cash is worth barely a third of what it was in 2011, before the United States imposed sanctions on the country's financial system." http://t.uani.com/ZvPFwe AP: "Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad thanked government workers in a massive rally that was seen as a show of his power ahead of the June presidential election. The official IRNA news agency reported that an estimated 70,000 people attended the rare gathering on Thursday, which was held in a football stadium. Opponents of Ahmadinejad had accused him of planning the rally to promote his favorite candidate for the upcoming presidential election. But he did not refer to the election at the rally, and his favorite potential candidate, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, did not appear there." http://t.uani.com/117muO6 WashPost: "With a growing list of hopefuls to replace Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the campaign's most intriguing candidate may be a man who has not even announced whether or not he will run in the Islamic Republic's June 14 election. Powerful and mysterious, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei is, by most accounts, Ahmadinejad's most trusted adviser - but he is also divisive, reviled and distrusted by traditional conservatives, and was once deemed unfit for office by Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Questions remain over whether or not Mashaei could be cleared to run by the conservative bodies that have the power to vet candidates. If he does, many observers say his candidacy would represent a fresh challenge to the ruling clergy, a trend that began during Ahmadinejad's current term." http://t.uani.com/Zx6mas Opinion & Analysis Jillian Keenan in The Atlantic: "On April 16, a massive 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit southeast Iran, sending tremors across the region and causing casualties that are expected to reach into the hundreds. According to an Iranian official , it was the biggest earthquake to hit the country in 40 years. This devastation comes only one week after another earthquake hit the town of Kaki, also in southern Iran, killing at least 37 people and injuring more than 850 others. Shockwaves from both earthquakes were felt as far away as Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the UAE, and western Saudi Arabia. They are only the two most recent in a series of earthquakes that regularly haunt this seismically unstable country. Most ominously, the epicenter of the April 9 earthquake's first tremor, which measured a 6.3 on the Richter scale, was centered only 62 miles away from Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant. These incidents have raised global concerns that a subsequent earthquake could strike even closer to the plant, causing a nuclear disaster similar to the 2011 incident at Fukushima. Despite international outrage, however, the Iranian government remains unconcerned about the risk. Only hours after the April 9 earthquake, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Fereydoon Abbasi-Davani, reiterated Iran's intention to build two more reactors at Bushehr, along with 16 additional reactors in other parts of the country. This decision even defies a report that Iranian nuclear scientists secretly compiled in 2011 in response to Fukushima, which concluded that the potential consequences of an earthquake near the power plant might be catastrophic. 'The seismic danger to Iran and its implications for the reactor in Bushehr could be disastrous...similar to the disaster in Fukushima, Japan,' the report stated. The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, has taken the threat more seriously. In response to the first earthquake, GCC states met on Sunday to look into ways to address potential nuclear leaks stemming from the Bushehr plant, since a disaster there would have grave implications for them, too. Toxic nuclear material can be carried by wind and water for hundreds of miles, bringing irreversible damage far beyond the boundaries of the initial disaster. And on top of the air pollution and immediate human toll, a nuclear incident at the Bushehr plant would contaminate the Gulf waters that are a main source of drinking water for nearby countries. Finally, many major Gulf cities are far closer to Bushehr than the Iranian seat of government in Tehran; Kuwait City, for example, is a mere 155 miles from the nuclear power plant while Tehran is a more comfortable 807 miles away." http://t.uani.com/12slCGT Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) a program of the American Coalition Against Nuclear Iran, Inc., a tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Eye on Iran is not intended as a comprehensive media clips summary but rather a selection of media elements with discreet analysis in a PDA friendly format. For more information please email Press@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a non-partisan, broad-based coalition that is united in a commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons.  UANI is an issue-based coalition in which each coalition member will have its own interests as well as the collective goal of advancing an Iran free of nuclear weapons.