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TOP STORIES
To check Iranian influence in Syria, the United States
needs a coherent strategy whose pieces fit together. The United
States has leverage but appears unsure how to use it, which tempts
rivals such as Russia, Turkey and Iran. "The most expensive option
in the Middle East is doing 'nothing.' This simply imposes greater
costs on future policymakers," argues Norman Roule, a former
chief of Iranian operations at the CIA and the Office of the Director
of National Intelligence. He recently became an adviser to United
Against Nuclear Iran, an advocacy group.
Tehran has told United Nations nuclear inspectors of its
plan to build nuclear reactors for ships... Iran's disclosure is
almost certain to reignite tensions with US President Donald Trump's
administration...
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday urged Russia
and Iran to rein in Syrian forces' offensive against a rebel-held
suburb of Damascus, calling the attacks a massacre.
UANI IN THE NEWS
...The group United Against a Nuclear Iran on Feb. 21
published an open letter to the head of FATF requesting that tough
warnings against interaction with Iranian financial institutions be
reinstated. It called efforts by the government of President Hassan
Rouhani to counter terrorist financing and money laundering
"nominal," given the role played by Iran's Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in regional conflicts and the
Iranian economy.
IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL
Iran will withdraw from the landmark 2015 nuclear deal
if there is no economic benefit from it and major banks continue to
fail to do business with the Islamic Republic, Iranian Deputy Foreign
Minister Abbas Araqchi said Thursday.
NUCLEAR & BALLISTIC-MISSILE PROGRAMS
In its new Worldwide Threat Assessment for 2018, the
U.S. intelligence community warns that Iran continues to
"enable" attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels against America's
Persian Gulf partners. The new assessment highlights "an
attempted 3 December cruise missile attack on an unfinished nuclear
reactor in Abu Dhabi," an important indication that the Iranian
proliferation threat encompasses cruise missiles, not just ballistic
ones.
IRAN PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
The fate of a British-Iranian woman jailed in Iran has
been tied to the settlement of a £400 million debt that London owes
Tehran, the family of one of the prisoners has said. Nazanin Zaghari
Ratcliffe, who has been held in an Iranian jail since April 2016,
said an Iranian judge told her that her release was being held up
because of a dispute over the interest owed on an unfulfilled arms
deal dating back to the 1970s.
Critics voiced outrage Thursday that Iran's justice
minister will travel to Geneva next week to address the UN's top
human rights body, despite facing Swiss and EU sanctions over rights violations.
ECONOMIC NEWS
Iran has announced its intent to establish a national
cryptocurrency.
HEZBOLLAH & LEBANON
The United States should hold Iran, not only Hezbollah,
responsible for any massive missile attack on Israel from southern
Lebanon, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) said on Thursday
after he and a bipartisan delegation including six other senators met
with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
TERRORISM & EXTREMISM
Three suspected Bahraini militants wanted on terrorism
charges died at sea in unexplained circumstances this month and
another is missing, activists said, after they appear to have fled
the country by boat headed for Iran. The incident shines a light on
alleged links between a small, armed fringe of Bahrain's Shi'ite
Muslim opposition and Iran, which authorities in the Western-allied
Gulf kingdom accuse of helping stoke years of attacks against its
police.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
The European Parliament has declined a request to host
an exhibition of caricatures meant to display the true face of the
Iranian regime and its human rights violation[s], which will instead
take place outside the building in Brussels on Wednesday.
SYRIA & IRAN
The last thing Syria needs is more war, but when
pro-regime forces entered the Kurdish enclave of Afrin this week to
end Turkey's incursion into northern Syria, that's exactly what it
got. As the civilian death toll ticks upward, one actor in the brutal
civil war is taking advantage of the bloodshed: the Islamic Republic
of Iran.
GULF STATES, YEMEN, & IRAN
Saudi Arabia has freed nine Iranian fishermen detained
two years ago, Iranian state TV said on Thursday but a tenth
fisherman was killed in the initial incident, his brother said.
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
Iranian media are reporting the country's aviation
organization has temporarily banned flights of all ATR-72 aircraft
after a deadly crash that killed 65.
Iran's hardline factions once dubbed him "the
miracle of the third millennium". But Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, the
former firebrand president, has turned into "the ally of the
Satan," in the words of one hardliner, as he has become an
increasingly disruptive force embarrassing those who secured his path
to power. The populist politician whose presidency was tainted by
corruption allegations, suppression and crippling sanctions, has
recently heightened his criticism of regime leaders whom he accuses
of inefficiency.
In her 38-year career, which is as long as the history
of the Islamic republic, Iran's first and only female conductor had
led as many public performances as the number of fingers that hold
her baton. Last month, however, Nezhat Amiri conducted a 71-member
orchestra performing at Tehran's most prestigious concert hall - a remarkable
milestone in a country where it is considered taboo for state TV to
show musical instruments, women are not allowed to sing solo and
female musicians have been prevented from going on stage in
provincial cities.
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