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TOP STORIES
A U.S. oil ban won't stop Iran from
selling its crude, the country's oil minister said, even as new signs
emerged that Tehran's crude exports are heading toward a
collapse. The Trump administration will remove exemptions for
buyers of Iranian oil beginning on Thursday, enforcing a
complete embargo on Iran's crude exports. But "bringing Iran's
oil exports to zero is a wish of the Americans, but it is an
illusion," Bijan Zanganeh said at an oil-and-gas conference in
Tehran on Wednesday.
"I haven't seen my brothers in
nine years now." So says Sepehr Atefi, who left Iran in 2009
when he was just 20 years old. Like many members of the Baha'i Faith,
Atefi grew up witnessing family and friends suffer from arbitrary
detentions, shop closures and harassment on a habitual basis.
"You can't be a teacher, work in the government or run a
restaurant because the [authorities consider] Baha'is 'ritually
unclean,'" said Atefi, who now lives in Germany and who recently
shared his experience of life in the Islamic Republic with The Media
Line news agency.
Iranian police have arrested dozens
of labor rights activists who rallied peacefully in Tehran to mark
International Workers' Day, sparking denunciations from Iranian and
global rights activists. VOA sister network RFE/RL's Radio
Farda said eyewitnesses told it that at least 35 people were
arrested outside the Iranian parliament during Wednesday's rally
marking the occasion also known as May Day.
NUCLEAR DEAL &
NUCLEAR PROGRAM
As part of a
reshuffle inside Iran's Foreign Ministry, veteran diplomat
Bahram Ghassemi was recently appointed as the country's new
ambassador to France. Ghassemi's mission is said to be focused on
reinvigorating international diplomacy to save the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a deal that has been shaky ever
since US President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of it
last May.
Quietly, in southwestern Iran,
something is taking place that risks destabilizing any number of the
world's political fault lines. Ostensibly with a mission to construct
two nuclear reactors, Russian companies are providing hard and soft
technical support to Iran's nuclear ambitions. As the activity
continues, the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant - the site of
Iran's first commercial nuclear reactor - is once again at
the center of questions about the nature of the regime's nuclear
plans.
SANCTIONS,
BUSINESS RISKS, & OTHER ECONOMIC NEWS
Qatar, which hosts the largest U.S.
air base in the Middle East, has spoken out against Washington's
decision to block all exports of Iranian oil, saying unilateral
sanctions were unwise because they hurt the countries that rely on
the supplies. The United States has demanded that buyers of
Iranian oil stop purchases by May 1 or face the prospect of
sanctions, ending six months of waivers that had allowed Iran's eight
biggest customers, most in Asia, to import limited volumes.
An Iranian oil tanker carrying over 1
million barrels of fuel oil suffered a malfunction in the Red Sea off
the coast of Saudi Arabia, authorities said Thursday, raising
concerns that the vessel could be leaking. The incident involving the
Happiness I came as U.S. oil exemptions for Iranian crude oil
purchases expired, part of President Donald Trump's maximalist
approach against Tehran. Saudi Arabia's state-run television channels
and news agency said authorities received a distress call from the
Happiness I over an "engine failure and the loss of
control."
The United States is tightening its
economic sanctions on Iran by ending a set of waivers Thursday that
had allowed some of the country's largest oil buyers to continue
their purchases. With the expiration of waivers for eight buyers,
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says the United States would be
exerting "maximum pressure" on the Iranian government.
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh
has said Tehran was mulling new ways to sell its oil to circumvent US
sanctions as he criticized Washington's policy to bring the country's
oil exports to zero. The United States has demanded that buyers of
Iranian oil stop purchases by May 1 or face sanctions, ending six
months of waivers that had allowed Iran's eight biggest customers,
most of them in Asia, to import limited volumes. Iran is examining
new ways to sell its oil, Zanganeh said, according to IRNA.
Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar
Zanganeh on Wednesday claimed two neighbouring countries were
"exaggerating" their production capacity to reassure
markets after the US ended sanction waivers for buyers of Iranian
crude. Zanganeh also said Washington's stated aim to bring Iran's oil
exports "to zero" was "an illusion". The White
House announced last week it would end from Thursday oil purchase
waivers granted to Iran's main customers -- including China, India
and Turkey.
Six months of exemptions from US
sanctions for countries still buying oil from Iran ended on Thursday.
President Donald Trump reinstated the sanctions last year after
abandoning a landmark nuclear accord, which he wants to renegotiate.
Iran's leaders have remained defiant in the face of the sanctions and
vowed to overcome them, but the substantial impact they have had on
the country is clear.
US sanctions
against Iran are causing fuel shortages in government-held
parts of Syria. Iranian ally, the Lebanese Hezbollah group, is also
being prevented from sending fuel to Syria. The sanctions are working
in favour of Russia, which is looking to step in and fill the
gap in supply.
U.S.-IRAN
RELATIONS & NEGOTIATIONS
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad
Javad Zarif on Wednesday criticized the United States for seeking to
blacklist the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist group. "The
United States is supporting the biggest terrorist in our region, and
that is Israel," Zarif told reporters on the sidelines of the
Asian Cooperation Dialogue in Doha.
MILITARY/INTELLIGENCE
MATTERS & PROXY WARS
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khameni on Wednesday warned of "the enemy's war posture"
and said that the enemy "only in appearance does not have a
combat posture". At the same time, Khamenei added that "of
course our military is alert". In a meeting with teachers
Khamenei spoke about adversary's war readiness and its offensive
economic and political moves, as well as its attacks in cyberspace
and the "infiltration" of its intelligence organs.
IRANIAN INTERNAL
DEVELOPMENTS
Iran has been facing a severe
currency crisis in the past year, and that is making many Iranians
avoid a formal banking system. Officials in Iran estimate
the country's citizens have between $10bn and $25bn in foreign
banknotes stuffed under mattresses or kept in safes. That is a
problem for the Central Bank of Iran because it needs foreign
exchange to shore up the country's beleaguered financial system and
pay for imports of food, medicine and other humanitarian goods that
are exempt from United States sanctions.
Six months after the US sanctions
came into effect, Iran's economy appears to be struggling. Efforts by
the international community to salvage the nuclear deal and provide
an economic lifeline to Iran to dampen the fallout of the
sanctions have not borne fruit so far and recent devastating floods
in the oil-producing southwest of the country have only exacerbated
the situation.
Over the past year or so, the technology arm of the Central Bank
of Iran - the Informatics Services Corporation - has been
developing prototypes for a comprehensive, nationwide blockchain
platform. Named Borna, the platform aims to offer an integrated
environment and common standards as well as reduce the costs of
developing blockchain solutions and market entry for all of Iran's
banking and financial players.
RUSSIA, SYRIA,
ISRAEL, HEZBOLLAH, LEBANON & IRAN
...As bad as that is, he said,
antisemitism in the West is eclipsed by that coming from the East,
where Iran continuously threatens Israel with destruction. "We
do not ignore these threats, but we are not deterred by them,"
he said. "In the face of Iran, our policy is clear: in the
military field - an aggressive containment of Iran's attempts to
establish itself militarily near our borders. And in the political
arena - pressure, pressure and more pressure. In the face of threats
of annihilation, Israel will not extend its neck to slaughter.
Israeli researchers reported
Wednesday that violent attacks against Jews spiked significantly last
year, with the largest reported number of Jews killed in anti-Semitic
acts in decades, leading to an "increasing sense of
emergency" among Jewish communities worldwide.
GULF STATES,
YEMEN, & IRAN
Iran said Wednesday it hopes to have
good relations with arch-rival Saudi Arabia and its allies, and
called for an end to their bitter dispute with Gulf neighbour Qatar.
Riyadh broke off relations with Tehran in 2016 after protesters angry
at its execution of a top Shiite cleric torched its diplomatic
missions in Iran. The following year the kingdom and its allies
Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates imposed a trade and travel
boycott on Qatar, demanding that it mirror their hardline policies
towards Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood.
Bahrain's Foreign Minister, Sheikh
Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, warned Iran against "walking
towards the abyss", stressing that it "will not be allowed
to close for one day the Strait of Hormuz," as the country had
warned after the tightening of US sanctions against it. In an
interview with Asharq Al-Awsat in Paris, Sheikh Khalid said:
"Iran made major mistakes when it intervened in the affairs of
the countries of the region and sent its money, weapons and militias.
Yemen's government forces on
Wednesday accused the Houthi rebels of committing 3,719 cease-fire
violations in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah since December 2018,
killing 140 civilians. "The army has monitored 3,719 violations
committed by the Houthi militia in the province of Hodeidah since the
truce took effect on Dec. 18, 2018," Spokesman of the National
Army Abdu Majali said during a news conference held in the northern
province of Marib. Majali said the Houthi violations resulted in
"killing 140 citizens and wounding 811 others, mostly women and
children."
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