Friday, February 8, 2019

Eye on Iran: U.S. Calls On Iran To Halt Space Launches That Defy U.N. Resolution



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The U.S. State Department said on Thursday it was aware of reports of a failed Iranian attempt to launch a satellite into space last month and it called on Tehran to halt activities that violate U.N. resolutions. "I've seen the reports, and it failed, correct?" State Department spokesman Robert Palladino told a news briefing, his first since the start of the year.
  

In the frigid air of a Tehran winter, a mother of two stands in a long line of shoppers waiting for the chance to buy discounted meat at a store supported by Iran's government. "Yesterday, after nearly two hours in the line, the shopkeeper said: 'It is finished, try another day,'" Zahra Akrami said recently. "And now I am here again." Her struggle represents the economic paradox that faces Iran as it marks the 40th anniversary of its Islamic Revolution.


Iran's oil customers should not expect new U.S. waivers in May, the U.S. Special Representative for Iran, Brian Hook, said this week, urging buyers to stop importing Iranian oil. "What we have announced is the policy to get to zero imports of Iranian crude as quickly as possible. We are not looking to grant any future waivers or exceptions to our sanctions regime, whether it is oil or anything else," Hook told Japanese public broadcaster NHK while on a visit to Japan.

NUCLEAR DEAL & NUCLEAR PROGRAM


Despite howls of protest by the Left, the foreign-policy establishment, and European leaders, and contrary to misleading assessments by U.S. intelligence agencies, it is now clear that President Trump's decision last May to withdraw the United States from the controversial 2015 nuclear deal with Iran (the JCPOA) was the right call and is a huge policy success.

SANCTIONS, BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC NEWS  


Iraq will not be part of the sanctions regime against Iran, Prime Minister Adil Abdul Mahdi stressed on Wednesday. Abdul Mahdi made the comment during a meeting with the head of Iran's Central Bank, Abdul Naser Hemmati, Governor of the Central Bank of Iraq Ali al-Allaq and the accompanying delegations. The Iraqi people have "suffered from embargo and realize the damage that peoples incur from its consequences," according to a statement from the PM's office.


Iran's state-run electricity firm Tavanir on Friday signed a deal to extend exports of 1,200 megawatts to neighbouring Iraq, state news agency IRNA reported. The two countries also signed initial accords in Tehran on power production, exports and technology transfers, IRNA said.  "Debts have been scheduled and repayments have started," Iranian electricity minister Reza Ardakanian was quoted as saying at the signing ceremony.
  
MISSILE PROGRAM


The United States has vowed to remain "relentless" in pressuring Iran to deter its missile programme after the Islamic Republic unveiled a new ballistic weapon days after testing a cruise missile. Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) revealed a new ballistic missile with a range of 1,000km, their official news agency Sepah News reported late on Thursday, a development that Tehran maintains is part of its defence capability.


Iran's Revolutionary Guards inaugurated a surface-to-surface ballistic missile with a range of 1,000 km (621 miles), the semi-official Fars news agency reported on Thursday, ignoring demands Western demands that Tehran halt its missile program. Fars published pictures of an underground missile factory called "underground city", saying the "Dezful" missile was a version of the Zolfaghar missile that has a 700 km range and a 450 kg (992 lb) warhead.


Satellite images revealed on Thursday a second failed attempt by Iran to launch a satellite into orbit, despite US and European warnings that its space program helps the country develop ballistic missiles. Iranian Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri said that his country would "not fear threats" aimed at forcing it to negotiate its defense and missile capabilities.


On the same day Donald Trump called out Iran in his State of the Union address as a major target of his administration, Tehran test-fired a satellite rocket in defiance of US warnings not to do so. Satellite images released on Thursday by the firm DigitalGlobe suggested Iran sought to launch a satellite into orbit on Tuesday as part of its space programme.

U.S. IRAN RELATIONS & NEGOTATIONS


Iranians will chant "Death to America" as long as Washington continues its hostile policies, but the slogan is directed at President Donald Trump and U.S. leaders, not the American nation, Iran's supreme leader said on Friday. "As long as America continues its wickedness, the Iranian nation will not abandon 'Death to America'," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told a gathering of Iranian Air Force officers marking the 40th anniversary of Iran's Islamic Revolution, according to his official website.

PROTESTS & HUMAN RIGHTS


Media advocacy group Reporters Without Borders said Thursday that Iranian authorities arrested, jailed and sometimes executed 1.7 million people around the capital Tehran alone in the first 30 years after the 1979 Islamic revolution. The organization revealed its count that included regime opponents, Baha'is and other religious minorities and at least 860 journalists.

MILITARY/INTELLIGENCE MATTERS & PROXY WARS


Iran released a quirky animated video showing one of its new submarines sinking a US Navy aircraft-carrier strike group in a funny, cartoonish way.  But the threat that Iran's submarines pose to US aircraft carriers is no joke, and it's unlikely the US takes it as a joke. The video opens with a shot of a Navy aircraft-carrier strike group transiting the Persian Gulf to the guitar solo in Queen's "We Will Rock You."


Iran's intelligence minister Mahmoud Alavi said on Thursday that at the onset of the 40th anniversary of the 1979 revolution several "sabotage plots" were discovered and "neutralized". In a meeting with ethnic Arab community leaders in the oil-rich Khuzestan province, Alavi said, "Until now many teams that tried hard to challenge the security of the country, especially at the threshold of the [revolution] anniversary, were unmasked and their members have been arrested".

IRANIAN INTERNAL DEVELOPMENTS


Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani set off a media firestorm by announcing that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called for "structural reforms," leading to speculation about the future of the government. During a trip to Qom Feb. 6, Larijani said, "The Supreme Leader instructed that within the next four months there will be structural reforms, which can possibly lead to budget reforms." He added, "After the work of the budget in parliament is finished, this discussion can be pursued." 

RUSSIA, SYRIA, ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN


With the presidents of Iran, Russia and Turkey slated to attend a new round of Syria peace talks within the Astana framework on Feb. 14, the relationship between Tehran and Moscow - two main allies of the Syrian government in its eight years of fighting against rebel and terrorist groups - is facing a new durability test, mostly due to the Israeli factor. On Jan. 21, Israeli warplanes carried out a series of strikes against alleged Iranian targets in Syria.


Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif is expected to pay a two-day visit to Lebanon later this week to meet with senior officials, as well as Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. The trip comes in wake of Nasrallah's recent announcement that Tehran was ready to offer Lebanon arms and funds. He did not disclose further details about the proposal. A diplomatic source said that Zarif would discuss with officials a proposal to provide the Lebanese army with an Iranian air defense system, which according to Nasrallah would make the military "the strongest in the region."

OTHER FOREIGN AFFAIRS    


Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Friday that Europe "cannot be trusted", a week after the EU launched a trade mechanism to bypass US sanctions on Tehran. "These days there's talk of the Europeans and their proposals. My advice is that they shouldn't be trusted, just like the Americans," he said at a meeting with air force officials, his website reported. "I'm not saying we shouldn't have relations with them. This is about trust," he added.

MISCELLANEOUS


We view Iran as a state with an ideology; but it is more accurately seen as an ideology with a state. The 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran was of vast consequence not only to Iran and its people, but also to the broader Middle East, to Sunni Islam as well as Shia, and to the development of extremism around the world. It continues to exert an often misunderstood and underestimated influence today. The leaders of the new Islamic republic took their beliefs extremely seriously. They quickly transformed the new state into a theocracy in which dissent was crushed, and exported a Shia version of Islamism to wherever it could put down roots.






Eye on Iran is a periodic news summary from United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) a program of the American Coalition Against Nuclear Iran, Inc., a tax-exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Eye on Iran is not intended as a comprehensive media clips summary but rather a selection of media elements with discreet analysis in a PDA friendly format. For more information please email press@uani.com.

United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a non-partisan, broad-based coalition that is united in a commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons.  UANI is an issue-based coalition in which each coalition member will have its own interests as well as the collective goal of advancing an Iran free of nuclear weapons.

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