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TOP STORIES
Lawmakers are plunging into another fight over Iran
sanctions with economic restrictions on the country set to expire at the
end of the year... Outraged by President Obama's nuclear deal,
Republicans are seeking to put new restrictions on Iran. And a few moderate
Democrats appear willing to go along. But the White House is in no
mood to negotiate. It has said strengthening the sanctions law could be
interpreted as going back on the nuclear deal, meaning the president
would likely veto tougher legislation... So far, the talks about a
bipartisan deal have been fruitless. The sticking point has been a
push from advocates of tougher sanctions to bar the White House from
using national security waivers to ease sanctions in the future.
A bitter war of words between Iran and Saudi Arabia
intensified Wednesday ahead of the annual hajj pilgrimage from which
Iranians have been excluded for the first time in decades. Iran's
supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei blasted the
"incompetence" of the Saudi royal family as he met with the
families of victims of a deadly stampede during last year's hajj.
"This incident proves once again that this cursed, evil family does
not deserve to be in charge and manage the holy sites," Khamenei
said.
Oil analysts are dusting off their favorite output
statistics to figure out how much more crude Iran must pump before it
hits pre-sanctions production levels, potentially triggering its
participation in a Saudi Arabia and Russia-led supply-freeze plan. The
whole premise may be misguided to begin with: the Persian Gulf country
will probably go far higher. Iran is continuing to add new
production from fields along its border with Iraq.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
The U.S. Navy again has accused Iranian patrol boats of
harassing an American warship in the Persian Gulf, this time with a
Revolutionary Guard vessel nearly causing a collision with the USS
Firebolt. Why does this keep happening? The hard-liners who dominate
Iran's security forces were largely opposed to the landmark nuclear
deal... Police have arrested a number of dual citizens on
security-related allegations since the deal was struck, and there has
also been an uptick in provocative acts at sea. The U.S. Navy has
recorded 31 instances of what it describes as "unsafe and/or
unprofessional interactions" with Iranian forces this year alone,
compared to 23 in all of 2015.
CONGRESSIONAL ACTION
Sen. James Lankford wants answers from President Barack
Obama on cash payments delivered to the Iranian government, and he wants
them in writing by Sept. 19. In a letter sent to the White House on
Thursday, Lankford (R-Okla.) laid out a set of 13 questions for the president,
mostly pertaining to the cash payments delivered to Iran, the first of
when have been labeled by many as a ransom payment to secure the release
of U.S. prisoners... In his letter to Obama, Lankford asked Obama
for specifics about the cash payment, including if Iran had expressed a
specific preference for cash and if the U.S. was aware at all of how the
Iranian government had spent the money. The Oklahoma senator also asked
Obama to "detail all direct or indirect payments the U.S. has made to
Iran" since the nuclear deal was reached.
BUSINESS RISK
Standard Chartered expects it will remain under U.S.
supervision for several more years over lapses in Iran-related anti-money
laundering efforts because it needs more time to improve its internal
standards, sources with knowledge of the matter said. Under a
deferred prosecution agreement it reached with U.S. authorities in 2012,
the bank is due to remain under supervision by an independent monitor
until the end of 2017. The sources said the bank now expects that date to
be extended, possibly by several years... StanChart rival HSBC also
has a deferred prosecution agreement with the DoJ set to expire next
year, after it reached a $1.92 billion (1.44 billion pounds) settlement
in December 2012 on charges tied to money laundering. U.S.
authorities have since 2004 imposed more than $16 billion in fines on
banks worldwide for breaching sanctions related to Cuba, Iran, Libya,
Myanmar, Sudan and terrorism.
SANCTIONS RELIEF
Polish refiner Lotos could sign a long-term oil deal with
Iran after receiving its first supplies from Iran last month, the deputy
head of Lotos said on Thursday. Two tankers carrying 2 million
barrels of oil from Iran arrived at the port of Gdansk on the Baltic Sea
in mid-August.
Today, Topsoe - a global technology, catalyst and services
vendor to the petrochemical and refining industry - officially opened its
offices in Tehran at a ceremony. With the new office, Topsoe will
reinforce its already strong ties with Iranian petrochemical and refining
companies.
MILITARY MATTERS
Mass media in Brazil and Venezuela reported that Tehran
and Caracas developed a program to manufacture Cruise missiles. Veja
Magazine said it received a document that reveals Iran supporting a
Venezuelan program in 2009 to develop missiles and chemical compounds
following the sanctions imposed on Tehran then.
HUMAN RIGHTS
Britain and Iran restored full diplomatic relations on
Monday by appointing ambassadors in one another's capitals - although
four Britons are still being held prisoner in Iranian jails... including
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a 37-year-old charity worker, and Kamal
Foroughi, a 77-year-old grandfather who is in danger of going
blind. Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, said the "upgrade
in diplomatic relations" would provide an "opportunity" to
raise these "consular cases about which I am deeply
concerned"... But the relatives of the Britons being held in
Iran are increasingly anxious about their fate. Mr Foroughi, who has been
in Evin prison in Tehran for six years, is developing cataracts and needs
an urgent operation to avoid blindness.
It has now been over six months since Baquer Namazi, a
respected former employee of UNICEF, was detained in Iran. His colleagues
at UNICEF, and especially those who once worked with him, are deeply
concerned about his health and well-being - as we stated on 3 March. Our
concern has grown ever since... UNICEF does not engage in politics.
We hope that Mr. Namazi will be treated as the humanitarian that he is,
and that a humane perspective can be brought to his plight.
OPINION & ANALYSIS
Iran's link to al Qaeda goes back to Sudan in the early
1990s, when Osama bin Laden lived in the nation's capital, Khartoum. The
Sudanese religious scholar Ahmed Abdel Rahman Hamadabi brought Sheikh
Nomani, an emissary of Iran, to meet bin Laden and the nascent al Qaeda
leadership... As a result of these consultations, the Washington
Institute's Matthew Levitt and Michael Jacobson concluded, "Iran and
al-Qaeda reached an informal agreement to cooperate, with Iran providing
critical explosives, intelligence, and security training to bin Laden's
organization." Because Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)
already supported Hezbollah operationally and financially, a vehicle was
in place through which they could support and influence al Qaeda... The
coordinated 1998 truck bombings targeting the U.S. embassies in Kenya and
Tanzania were a direct result of the Iranian terror
training... After 9/11, Iran became a more important haven for al
Qaeda fighters who fled from Afghanistan as the Taliban collapsed. Iran claimed
that these terrorists were under "house arrest." In reality,
Iran regularly granted the terrorists freedom to move within Iran and to
cross into Iraq and Afghanistan to carry out attacks. From their safe
base in Iran, al Qaeda members planned terrorist operations, including
the 2003 attack in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia that killed 26 people, including
eight Americans, and the 2008 attack on the American Embassy in Yemen
that claimed 16 lives, including six terrorists. It took the U.S.
government 10 years to publicly acknowledge Iran's aid to al Qaeda. In
2011, the Treasury Department officially accused Iran, as a Wall Street
Journal report put it, "of forging an alliance with al Qaeda in a
pact that allows the terrorist group to use Iranian soil as a transit
point for moving money, arms and fighters to its bases in Pakistan and
Afghanistan." As recently as July 20, 2016, the U.S.
blacklisted three members of al Qaeda who were living in Iran, saying
these al Qaeda facilitators in Iran had helped the jihadist group on the
battlefield, with finance and logistics, and in liaising with Iranian
authorities. Newly declassified letters captured in the May 2011 raid
that killed Osama bin Laden reveal how crucial Iran has been to al Qaeda.
In a 2007 letter, bin Laden directed al Qaeda not to target Iran because
"Iran is our main artery for funds, personnel, and
communication"... On the 15th anniversary of 9/11, the U.S.
should not be rewarding Iran for its deadly actions with gifts of
sanctions relief, and the easing of arms embargoes and ballistic-missile
restrictions. It is time to hold the regime accountable for its reckless
aggression and support of terrorism.
While the specific exemptions allegedly received by Iran
appear minor, the report did raise a serious concern: the secrecy
surrounding oversight of the agreement. These exemptions were
granted by the multilateral Joint Commission overseeing the agreement-a
body that operates confidentially. This Commission has the
authority to issue additional exemptions in the future that could
materially affect Iran's nuclear weapon capability, and these decisions
would remain hidden from the public... Keeping the Commission's decisions
secret weakens the deal. It erodes public confidence that the deal
is maintaining strict limits on Iran's nuclear capability... The
best outcome would be to make Joint Commission's proceedings more
transparent. If exemptions granted by the Commission are
reasonable, few would complain. The agreement does allow the
Commission to "adopt or modify" its procedures if all members
agree, but the Commission is unlikely to do so in favor of greater
transparency. Iran, one of seven governments represented on the Commission,
would surely object. Even if the United States cannot change the
Commission's rules, the administration should brief Congress on
Commission decisions in a comprehensive way. It is not clear that
this is happening... The Joint Commission's secrecy, together with
the reduced nuclear reporting by the IAEA since the deal was implemented,
has resulted in less visibility into Iran's nuclear program and a
troubling lack of transparency on how the agreement is operating.
Congress, independent experts, and the public know less rather than more
about what is happening at Iran's nuclear sites. While the
Obama administration promised that the deal would provide an
unprecedented level of visibility into Iran's nuclear program, reality so
far has proven otherwise.
Photos released by North Korea of its launch of long-range
ballistic missiles are the latest proof of the close military cooperation
between Pyongyang and Tehran, an Israeli expert in the field told the
news site IsraelDefense on Tuesday. According to Tal Inbar - head of
the Space and UAV Research Centre at the Fisher Institute for Air &
Space Strategic Studies - what was new in the photos was the shape of the
warheads attached to the Nodong missiles, known in Iran as the
Shahab-3. Until now, such warheads - first detected by Inbar in Iran
in 2010 - have not been seen in North Korea. At the time, Inbar dubbed
them NRVs (or, "new entry vehicles"), which became their
nickname among missile experts around the world.
The situation is arguably as bad as it was in 1987, when
Iranian pilgrims in Mecca shouted political slogans that prompted
trigger-happy Saudi National Guard forces to open fire, killing scores.
Even without Iranians in Mecca this year, the risk of further escalation
between the two countries is high. In this regard, a key
decisionmaker on the Saudi side will be Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin
Salman, who will likely favor a resolute rather than conciliatory
approach... Saudi Arabia's own Shiite minority, concentrated in the
oil-rich Eastern Province adjacent to Bahrain and the headquarters of the
U.S. Fifth Fleet, will likely be inflamed by the war of words, and
miscalculation is possible, even direct military clashes. In light of
this danger, the international community -- collectively and individually
-- should urge both sides to calm the rhetoric. At the very least,
the tension represents a setback for U.S. policy, since the Obama administration
had hoped that such animosity would be reduced at least somewhat by last
year's nuclear agreement with Iran... Part of the challenge of
quieting the situation is coping with the apparent belief in Saudi Arabia
and other Gulf Arab states that the Obama administration favors Iran.
Given recent reports of aggressive maneuvering by Iranian
Revolutionary Guard naval units in the Gulf, a confrontation with U.S.
forces is also possible. Accordingly, Washington's response to the spike
in tensions should combine diplomatic and military components -- for
example, dispatching Secretary of State Kerry or another senior official
to the kingdom while visibly reinforcing the Fifth Fleet. America's
allies in the region will be hoping for nothing less. Without a
significant U.S. response, Saudi Arabia will likely be tempted to
consider a more independent and perhaps dangerous course of action.
Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif's recent six-nation
tour of Latin America aims to send Washington a message that Iran will
continue to challenge U.S. interests in the region despite the nuclear
agreement. In particular, Tehran will sponsor terrorism, promote its
radical Islamist ideology, pursue illicit money-laundering schemes,
strengthen alliances with anti-American regimes, and ultimately threaten
the U.S. homeland. In response, the Obama administration should devise a
comprehensive strategy commensurate to the threat, and make clear that it
will not accept any form of Iranian aggression in its
hemisphere... Such an approach, at a minimum, should entail robust
sanctions on sectors of Iran's economy that supports its regional
aggression and ballistic missile program, and on any other country that
enables Tehran's misbehavior. If the White House continues its passivity,
it should not be surprised if Iran's presence in Latin America continues
to metastasize, ultimately posing a direct threat to the U.S. homeland.
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