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TOP STORIES
They were taken captive in Iran,
where they endured mock firing squads and beatings. After their
release, they spent decades fighting for compensation, first in U.S.
courts, then through Congress and finally won a victory three years
ago. But now, 40 years after the revolution that spurred their
kidnapping, survivors among the 53 American hostages held after the
U.S. Embassy was overrun say they are facing new frustrations.
The Iranian government's
Statistical Center has announced the inflation rate for the year
ending on February 20 as 42.3 percent. Iran's Central Bank, whose
statistics have been traditionally more realistic, has been
officially barred from publishing reports on inflation and rising
prices, and the Statistical Center is known for manipulating
disparaging reports to please the government, according to Iranian
media reports in recent months.
Iranian hackers came worryingly
close to Israel's missile warning system, sending the military
scrambling to protect alerts from being compromised, its top cyber
defense chief said. After detecting the hackers in 2017 and
monitoring them to discern their intent, the military blocked them
when it became clear what their target was, said Noam Shaar, outgoing
head of the cyber defense division in the army's Cyber Defense
Directorate.
UANI IN THE NEWS
...The organization is called United Against Nuclear
Iran, a bipartisan group formed 10 years ago to, really with the goal
of getting Iran to end its nuclear weapons program through economic
sanctions on people who do business with Iran which were adopted and
then really policing those sanctions and warning businesses that we
have reason to believe we are violating the sanctions to stop it and
or we'll call them out. On Friday, a really remarkable thing happened
- a spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry at her weekly briefing
attacked United Against Nuclear Iran for pressuring Russian
businesses, specifically attacked our founder and CEO Mark Wallace,
who was ambassador to the UN under President Bush 43, and we are just
responding and saying we're not going to be intimidated, we're going
to continue to pressure Russian businesses and all our businesses -
don't do business with Iran...
Russia's rebuke of an American
organization aligned with opponents of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal is
"unacceptable," President Trump's top national security
adviser said Saturday. "If President Putin is serious about
stabilizing the Middle East, confronting terrorism & preventing a
nuclear arms race in the region, he should stand with UANI &
against Iran," John Bolton tweeted. Bolton came to the
defense of United Against Nuclear Iran one day after a senior Russian
diplomat accused the nonprofit group of trying to "intimidate
Russian business" interests that seek to invest in Iran.
NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR PROGRAM
One day after the global
watchdog, Financial Action Task Force (FATF) extended a deadline for
Iran to adapt its legislation to international anti-money laundering
standards, Iran's nuclear chief expressed his cautious satisfaction.
Media in Iran quotes head of Iranian Atomic Energy Organization Ali
Akbar Salehi as saying the FATF deadline extension "shows that
the other party does not want conditions to reach a point that a
sense of deadlock emerges".
While the parliament weighs
President Hassan Rouhani's budget for the new Iranian year (beginning
March 21), senior officials at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran
(AEOI) have complained of the "minimal" budget allocated to
the Bushehr nuclear power plant. The head, deputy head, and spokesman
for AEOI have all criticized the government, saying the budget
allocated to the plant in southern Iran is so low that it endangers
the future of the nuclear reactor.
MISSILE PROGRAM
Iran successfully tested a cruise missile on Sunday
during naval exercises near the Strait of Hormuz, state media
reported, at a time of heightened tensions with the United States.
Tehran has in the past threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, a
major oil shipping route at the mouth of the Gulf, in retaliation for
any hostile U.S. action, including attempts to halt Iranian oil
exports through sanctions.
MISSILE PROGRAM
The Revolutionary Guards on
Sunday accused "enemies" of Iran of trying to sabotage
the country's missiles so that they would "explode midair"
but said the bid was foiled. "They tried as best as they could
to sabotage a small part which we import so that our missiles would
not reach their target and explode midair," Fars news agency
reported, quoting the Guards' aerospace commander Amir Ali Hajizadeh.
SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC
NEWS
Iran said on Saturday it had
many options to neutralize the reimposition of U.S. sanctions on its
oil exports, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, adding
that Tehran's regional influence could not be curbed as demanded by
Washington. "Apart from closing Strait of Hormuz, we have
other options to stop oil flow if threatened," Secretary of
Iran's Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani told
Tasnim.
As Iran marked the 40th
anniversary of its Islamic Revolution, a white-turbaned Shiite cleric
at one commemoration targeted President Hassan Rouhani, a fellow
clergyman, with this sign: "You who are the cause of inflation;
we hope you won't last until spring." Already lashed by
criticism over his collapsing nuclear deal and renewed tensions with
the U.S., the relatively moderate Rouhani faces anger from clerics,
hard-line forces and an ever-growing disaffected public that now
threatens his position.
Iran said on Saturday it had
many options to neutralise the reimposition of U.S. sanctions on its
oil exports, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, adding
that Tehran's regional influence could not be curbed as demanded by
Washington. "Apart from closing Strait of Hormuz, we have other
options to stop oil flow if threatened," Secretary of Iran's
Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani told Tasnim.
Afghanistan began exports to
India through an Iranian port on Sunday, official said, as the
landlocked, war-torn nation turns to overseas markets to improve its
economy. Officials said 23 trucks carrying 57 tonnes of dried fruits,
textiles, carpets and mineral products were dispatched from western
Afghan city of Zaranj to Iran's Chabahar port. The consignment will
be shipped to the Indian city of Mumbai.
Iran and Iraq have quite
different views of their relationship status, with Tehran claiming
it's been jilted and Baghdad declaring it's being faithful.
Iranian Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh surprised Iraqi
officials Feb. 7 when he very publicly expressed dissatisfaction
with Iraq "reversing some oil agreements, and refusing to invest
in the border oil fields and to pay Iran its [$2 billion
in] debts."
The Persians have a saying, that
"a doctor must first cure his own balding head". The phrase
refers to the human propensity of preaching virtues to others, while
personally disregarding them. This idiom seemed particularly
applicable to Iran's foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, who
stirred up a storm during his recent visit to Beirut, when he
cheekily remarked that sanction-hit Iran was willing to provide
military and economic aid to the Lebanese state.
A new customs gate in the Saray
district of Turkey's Van province is expected to boost trade with
Iran, according to Turkish media. It is one of several links Tehran
is hoping to use to maintain its economy amid US sanctions and
following the US-backed summit in Poland that Washington hoped would
focus on Iran. Tehran is now pushing for more trade with Iraq and
Russia, and boasting it will not be affected by the sanctions.
PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS
Forty years ago, Iranian women
and girls of various political and social stripes helped to bring on
Iran's 1979 revolution to topple the shah. But according to some of
those disillusioned by decades of gender discrimination under the
leadership of the ensuing "Islamic republic," many of those
same women quickly fell victim to the religiously dominated hierarchy
that replaced the monarchy.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS & NEGOTIATIONS
Iran says an American detained
last July is not being held on security-related charges. Michael White,
46, was arrested after traveling to Iran to visit a woman he met
online. His family says he was arbitrarily detained. Iranian
officials say he was detained in connection with a private complaint.
Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Panahiazar told the semi-official
ISNA news agency Saturday that "there is no security or
espionage issue on the table."
IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS
Prosecutors in Iran
have filed a complaint against the minister of communications
and information technology for alleged "Internet
espionage," state media report. Mohammad-Javad Azari Jahromi was
accused of not following judicial orders related to Iran's Internet
controls, Javad Javidnia, the deputy for cyberspace affairs at the
public prosecutor's office, was quoted as saying on February 24.
RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
Some 43% of Hezbollah fighters who have been killed in
the Syrian civil war died fighting for goals disconnected from
Lebanese interests, according to an intelligence report released late
on Saturday. The report by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism
Information Center also said that 14% of the approximately 1,250
Hezbollah fighters who were killed in the war had died for purely
Iranian goals.
The United Kingdom's home secretary plans to outlaw all
of Hezbollah's organization this week. According to a report by The
Telegraph report by the paper's Sunday political editor Edward
Malnick, "Sajid Javid is preparing to ban Hezbollah, the Iran-backed
militant group, as soon as this week." The article said,
"The Home Secretary [Sajid Javid] is expected to proscribe the
entire Shia organization as a terrorist group, preventing supporters
from parading its flag through the streets of Britain. The move will
have to be approved by Parliament, raising the prospect that it could
be opposed by Jeremy Corbyn, who once referred to members of the
group as 'friends."'
Former head of Venezuela's intelligence services Hugo
Carvajal revealed powerful ties between the administration of
President Nicolás Maduro and the Hezbollah terrorist group, as well
as wide-spread corruption and drug activity, the New York Times
reported on Thursday. The nefarious activities were directed by
Maduro himself as well as Interior Minister Néstor Reverol and former
vice-president Tareck El Aissami.
The Secretary of Iran's Supreme
National Security Council said on Saturday that important changes
would occur this year in Iran's deterrence against Israel's actions
in Syria. He predicted that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would
be wary of a conflict prior to the April 9 election, and that his
political career would be over if he entered into one.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will discuss the Iranian
presence in Syria with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on
Wednesday, as well as possible ways to clamp down this presence.
"Yesterday we heard a senior official in Iran's terrorist regime
say, 'Iran has attained 90 percent of its goals in Syria,'"
Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem
Sunday. "That's not true. It's true they're trying, and
it's true we're preventing it," he added.
British intelligence MI6's chief
Alex Younger met recently with Mossad director Yossi Cohen in Israel
to coordinate intelligence efforts over concerns that Iran may be
gearing up to race toward developing a nuclear weapon. According to a
Channel 13 report on Friday night, the meeting took place at the
beginning of last week, and signaled a new level of seriousness in
Western intelligence concerns regarding Iran.
GULF STATES, YEMEN, & IRAN
The Custodian of the Two Holy
Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz, called on Sunday for a unified
international stance to stop Iran from supporting militias and
meddling in the affairs of other states. In his speech at the first
EU-Arab League summit held in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh,
King Salman said that Iran's support for Yemen's Houthi insurgents
and other militias in the region...
At least 12 soldiers loyal to Yemeni exiled President
Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi were killed and 60 others wounded in rebels'
missile attack toward southern border of Saudi Arabia on Sunday, a
military official said. The attack hit the soldiers in a popular market
near al-Buqa border crossing in the afternoon, the official told
Xinhua on condition of anonymity. He said the injured were
transported to hospital inside the southern Saudi border province of
Najran.
OTHER FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Iran has released a French
citizen arrested for entering the country illegally after other
charges were dropped, the state news agency IRNA reported on Sunday,
days after France's foreign minister discussed her case in
parliament. On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told
lawmakers France was in touch with Iran to improve the conditions of
the woman arrested in October on Iran's Gulf island of Kish for
allegedly signing an illegal mining contract.
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