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TOP STORIES
The Trump administration is actively considering waivers
on sanctions it will reimpose next month for countries that are
reducing their imports of Iranian oil, a U.S. government official
said on Friday.
Iran's parliament voted Sunday to join a global
convention to cut off terror financing, hoping to avoid further
international sanctions as the 2015 nuclear accord unravels.
The UN human rights chief is condemning Iran's execution
of a woman convicted of murdering her husband five years ago when she
was 17 years old.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC
NEWS
Iran is finding it hard to receive payments for its
natural-gas exports to Iraq, as U.S. pressure hits one of the Islamic
Republic's most crucial sources of revenue beyond crude. Iran's
latest difficulties highlight the ways in which U.S. sanctions, set to
take effect in November, are already affecting the country's key
industries and its international customers.
Iranian exports of ultra-light crude oil known as
condensate fell 46 percent in the six months to Sept 22 from a year
earlier, the semi-official news agency ISNA reported on Sunday,
quoting figures form Iran's customs.
India will buy 9 million barrels of Iranian oil in
November, two industry sources said, indicating the world's
third-biggest oil importer will continue purchasing crude from the
Islamic republic despite U.S. sanctions coming into force on Nov. 4.
The United States has secured a judgment in a civil
action seeking the forfeiture of $396,589 associated with a United
Arab Emirates-based company, Royal Pearls General Trading, that
allegedly engaged in illegal business dealings involving a company in
Iran, announced U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu and Sean M. Cox, Special
Agent in Charge of the FBI's Springfield, Illinois Field Office.
Oman has long been nicknamed the "Switzerland of
the Middle East" thanks to the nation's peace-focused diplomacy
measures and a tendency toward neutrality and mediation... Now, for
the first time in many years, Oman's policy of neutrality is being
challenged thanks to increased pressure on Iran coming from the
United States, as well as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Through the center of this dilemma runs a proposed natural gas
pipeline between Iran and Oman.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said the kingdom
has met its promise to Washington to make up for Iranian crude oil
supplies lost through U.S. sanctions.
As if they needed it, U.S.-China relations face a new
flashpoint on Nov. 4, when Washington's new sanctions on Iran take
full effect with the stated objective of cutting Tehran's oil exports
to zero, from a current 1.7 million barrels a day. China, which buys
about one-quarter of Iran's crude, is shaping up as the center of
global resistance to this unilateral action.
Iran's oil buyers have a month to halt their trades or
risk getting banned from the US financial system for violating
secondary sanctions that return November 5.
MISSILE PROGRAM
Declining relations between the U.S. and Iran may thus
signal affirmatively an increase in military and economic support to
the GCC countries, shoring up regional defenses and substantially
raising the cost of Iranian military action. Escalating tensions,
however, also come with a higher chance of war, which, with a nuclear
Iran, would pose an existential risk to the region. In such an
eventuality, defense against incoming nuclear and non-nuclear missiles
would be a top regional priority.
TERRORISM & EXTREMISM
Austria's conservative government plans to impose a ban
of Islamic extremist symbols from the terrorist groups Hezbollah and
Hamas.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
On the one-year anniversary of the global #MeToo
movement, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declared a
solution for Western women facing sexual harassment: wear a hijab.
His statement comes amid growing unrest over the law that mandates
that Iranian women wear the hijab, or headscarf, in public. In recent
weeks the Iranian government has arrested several activists who have
protested the law.
It has been more than two years since Qu Hua saw her
husband Wang Xiyue. The Princeton doctoral student was in Iran
studying century-old archives when he was arrested in August 2016.
The US citizen is now serving a 10-year sentence after being
convicted on two counts of espionage.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS & NEGOTIATIONS
The United States will confront Tehran at the UN's top
court on Monday over billions in frozen assets, in a case that could
deepen the Trump administration's rift with international
justice.
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
An Iranian businessman accused of defrauding thousands
of investors was returned to Iran with Interpol's help on Saturday
after he fled abroad, state media reported, a week after Tehran
sentenced three people to death in a drive against economic crimes.
The Islamic Republic of Iran continues to witness a rise
in the amount of seized opium and opiates such as heroin or morphine,
owing largely to its location on the Golden Crescent, a drug pathway
leading from Afghanistan and Pakistan through Iran to European
markets.
Nearly 280,000 have been killed and more than four
million injured in car accidents in over a decade in Iran, says the
Islamic Republic's traffic police chief.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
Russia is working quietly to open avenues of
communication between Jerusalem and Tehran "in order to reduce
tensions and prevent friction" in Syria, London-based Arabic
daily Asharq Al-Awsat reported Saturday, citing a senior Russian
source. The source told the paper the move was made in light of
Moscow's decision to provide the Assad regime with advanced
anti-aircraft missiles.
The deputy commander of Iran's revolutionary guards
warned Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday to
"practice swimming in the Mediterranean" because he would
be forced to abandon his country.
Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman Al Saud,
in an interview with Bloomberg, in response to a question regarding
Yemen and how he sees the conflict evolving and when it will end,
said: "We hope it will end as soon as possible. We don't need
that on our border."
French government revealed that the Iranian Intelligence
Ministry was behind the plan to attack the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq
conference near Paris, causing a diplomatic crisis between the two
countries... This time, the French authorities have accused Tehran directly,
while Iran and its agents have been suspected of planning other
operations in France and Europe.
Israel was dealt a bad hand when it comes to regional
security, and Syria is the latest-and trickiest-card in the deck. On
the one hand, the weakness of the Bashar al-Assad regime diminishes a
leader whose country has never reconciled its past conflicts and
territorial disputes with Israel and often proved a remorseless foe.
On the other hand, Iran and Hezbollah are exploiting Syria's
instability, and Israelis fear the country will become a new
launching pad for Iranian influence and attacks-essentially, another
Lebanon.
IRAQ & IRAN
Why are members of an Iranian Kurdish resistance group
based in neighboring Iraqi Kurdistan being targeted by Iranian
missiles? And what can the West do to help?
AFGHANISTAN & IRAN
Russia continues to compete for influence in
Afghanistan, where international reconciliation efforts are underway,
while Iran is playing both sides of the Afghan conflict, according to
a top U.S. military official... Russia is not the only nation seeking
influence in Afghanistan. CENTCOM's [Gen.] Votel said the Iranians
have "hedged their bets" in Afghanistan, by trying to have
relationships with both the Afghan government and the Taliban.
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