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TOP STORIES
President Trump said Sunday that the U.S. will "absolutely"
sanction European companies that do business with Iran.
An international group that monitors money laundering
worldwide said on Friday Iran had until October to complete reforms
that would bring it into line with global norms or face consequences
that could further deter investors from the country.
In January, the Comoros Islands quietly cancelled a
batch of its passports that foreigners had bought in recent years...
Reuters found that more than 100 of 155 people who had their Comoros
passports cancelled in January were Iranians. They included senior
executives of companies working in shipping, oil and gas, and foreign
currency and precious metals - all sectors that have been targeted by
international sanctions on Iran... Diplomats and security sources in
the Comoros and the West are concerned that some Iranians acquired
the passports to protect their interests as sanctions crimped Iran's
ability to conduct international business. While none of the people
or companies involved faced sanctions, the restrictions on Iran could
still make a second passport helpful. Comoros passports offer
visa-free travel in parts of the Middle and Far East and could be
used by Iranians to open accounts in foreign banks and register
companies abroad.
NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR PROGRAM
Iran says it has restarted production at a
"major" uranium facility involved in its nuclear program,
though it still pledges to follow the terms of the country's landmark
atomic deal now under threat after President Donald Trump pulled
America out of the accord.
Iranian President Hassan Rohani is traveling to Western
Europe this week, amid continued uncertainty over the future of the
2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC NEWS
Iran will allow private companies to export crude oil,
part of a strategy to counter U.S. sanctions, and is urging fellow
OPEC members, including regional rival Saudi Arabia, not to break
output agreements, state media and officials said on Sunday. Iran is
looking at ways to keep exporting oil as well as other measures to
counter sanctions after the United States told allies to cut all
imports of Iranian oil from November.
The Iranian central bank's efforts to stem the rial's
decline and stamp out the currency black market have backfired,
undercutting President Hassan Rouhani's case that he can parry the
U.S. war on the Iranian economy. Rather than choking off the illegal
transactions, the introduction of a fixed exchange rate in April has
encouraged some traders to profiteer by charging higher black market
prices for goods they imported with dollars bought at the lower
official rate, officials say.
South Korea's oil imports from Iran could fall to the
lowest in three years in September as buyers hold back booking
cargoes, hoping for a U.S. waiver from sanctions on Iran, several
sources with knowledge of the matter said on Monday.
Iran on Sunday asked fellow OPEC members to
"refrain from any unilateral measures" to increase oil
production beyond the 1 million additional barrels of crude a day it
already agreed to, a warning to Saudi Arabia after President Donald
Trump said the kingdom would increase production.
Tehran on Saturday urged foreign firms working in Iran
to resist US "threats" of sanctions, adding it was in talks
with French car makers about staying on in the country.
President Hassan Rouhani has given a 15-day deadline to
his trade minister to publish the full list of car importers, who
have received cheap foreign currency from the state. According to
published official records, Iranian entities and individuals seem to
have systematically misused subsidized foreign currency provided by
the government for importing essential goods.
Iran's oil minister criticized domestic opposition to
new oil contracts as the reason why oil exports have remained
relatively low, making Iran vulnerable to sanctions.
At the end of a tumultuous week, marked by a currency
crunch and rare protests by vendors in Tehran, economists are urging
Iran's President Hassan Rouhani to take decisive steps to deal with
the country's pressing economic challenges. On Tuesday, Iran's
exchange rate hit 79,000 rials to a US dollar on the black market -
up at least 110 percent from the same period last year.
Japanese refiners are ramping up purchases of U.S. crude
as it becomes cheaper relative to their usual Middle East supplies
and are assessing heavy grades from U.S. shale production
as a replacement for supplies from Iran, industry
sources said.
Indian refiners have been asked to prepare an
alternative crude oil sourcing plan ahead of the snapback of US
sanctions on Iran in November, while a clear response from the Indian
government on the US' stance on zero imports from Tehran is expected
to emerge in July, government and industry officials said Friday.
Saudi Arabia would effectively be quitting OPEC if it
heeds US President Donald Trump's call to boost crude production by
up to 2 million b/d, a senior Iranian oil official said
Saturday.
Aziz Ahmad is one of the unlikely winners of the
stand-off between the United States and Iran, turning his modest
transport service into an international foreign exchange operation
that is providing much-needed dollars to the stricken Iranian
economy.
MISSILE PROGRAM
The Islamic Republic of Iran sought to obtain illicit
goods for its missile program from Germany, the intelligence agency
for Germany's most populous state, North Rhine-Westphalia, announced
on Friday.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
Iranian state media say protesters have clashed with
police over water scarcity in the southwest for a second night. IRNA
says protesters threw stones and debris at police and set a car on
fire in a protest that began late Sunday in the city of Abadan...
Similar clashes over water scarcity broke out in the nearby city of
Khorramshahr late Saturday. Authorities say one protester and 10
police were injured, and videos posted online showed gunfire ringing
out.
Spreading unrest in Iran raises the prospect of broader
anti-government protests as the political leadership in Tehran faces
mounting pressure from a Trump administration effort to cut the
country's oil sales.
The Iranian government has come under further strain in
the wake of the axed nuclear deal, as economic sanctions begin to
bite and protests begin to surge once again.Showing that they still
have the clout to unsettle the government, as they did in 1978 when
they backed the Islamic Revolution that dethroned the Shah, merchants
beneath the vaulted domes of Tehran's Grand Bazaar last week began
shutting their stalls in a protest that lasted for three days.
Iran's Supreme Leader has accused the United States and
allies of fomenting unrest in Iran.
Since the 1980s, [Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and
Security (MOIS)] has violently neutralized ideological
opponents of the regime both at home and abroad. In response, the
Obama administration sanctioned two previous MOIS ministers as well
as the MOIS itself. To date, however, its current minister, Mahmoud
Alavi, has escaped Washington's attention. The latest demonstrations
in Iran highlight the urgency of renewed U.S. scrutiny. Because
Tehran views the MOIS as a linchpin of its revolutionary ambitions,
sanctioning Alavi would bolster the Iranian people's own challenge to
the regime's legitimacy.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
It is not in the interest of the hardliner leadership in
Iran to sit down for direct talks with the Trump administration.
Some of President Donald Trump's senior advisers and
cabinet members believe there is now a rare opportunity to bring
about the collapse of the Iranian regime, according to Israeli and
American sources...
SYRIA, RUSSIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
A centerpiece of the upcoming Helsinki summit between
President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will be the
future of Syria and a proposal to enlist Russia as a partner in
ousting Iran from that battlefield.
National-security adviser John Bolton said Syrian
President Bashar al-Assad's hold on power wasn't a strategic issue
for the U.S. and that President Donald Trump hoped to secure Russia's
help in evicting Iranian forces from the country.
The leader of Iran-backed Hezbollah, a key Damascus
ally, said on Friday a "very big victory" was near in south
Syria, where an army offensive has made rapid gains against
insurgents.
A handful of Sunni politicians have created an
"independent Sunni bloc" to challenge Lebanon's interim
Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who won 20 seats in May's parliamentary
elections.
[T]o avoid escalation in south Syria, Assad's forces
should not be allowed to reoccupy the area after the battle for
Deraa, and Russian forces should not be trusted to act as guarantors
of Iranian withdrawal. The only guaranteed way of keeping Iran out of
the south and far from the Golan and Jordan would be a third-party
buffer zone along Syria's southern borders.
OTHER IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
Iran's semi-official Fars news agency is reporting that
230 people have been poisoned by drinking polluted water in the
county's southwest.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has warned
government officials not be lazy or take their posts for granted as
President Hassan Rouhani's government tries to contain mounting
public anger over his management of a currency crisis.
GULF STATES, YEMEN, & IRAN
Lebanon's Shia Hezbollah movement and the Iran-backed
Houthi rebels are developing closer ties, reports say, fuelling
sectarian divides and driving instability in the region.
The Lebanese Army has begun yet another security
operation in the northern Bekaa Valley to end the endemic violence
and criminality in the fiercely tribal region that has been neglected
for decades by the Lebanese government. Lebanese troops fanned out
June 26, across Baalbek, the largest town in the northern Bekaa, and
took stricter measures at checkpoints on the main roads in the
area. But the crackdown is likely to have little effect in
an area that has become synonymous with criminal activities such as
hashish cultivation, car theft and currency counterfeiting
underpinned by strict adherence to traditional tribal codes, which
often leads to blood feuds, shoot-outs and eye-for-an-eye
retribution.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has announced his
desire to fight alongside the Houthi militia in Yemen during a
televised speech on Friday, in which he delivered several other
announcements.
Realistically, the Houthis have to believe that they
have been defeated before they will agree to a lasting deal, and to
the international policing that any deal is likely to require. One
prerequisite for this is that they no longer feel that Iran has their
back... [A] combination of concerted and coordinated pushback against
Iranian forces or their allies and proxies in Yemen, Syria and Iraq,
combined with calibrated economic pressure on the regime, would at
least keep them off balance.
AFGHANISTAN & IRAN
Hundreds of Taliban fighters are receiving advanced
training from special forces at military academies in Iran as part of
a significant escalation of support for the insurgents, Taliban and
Afghan officials have told The Times. The scale, quality and length
of the training is unprecedented and marks not only a shift in the
proxy conflict between the US and Iran inside Afghanistan, but also a
potential change in Iran's ability and will to affect the outcome of
the Afghan war.
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