Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Eye on Iran: US Adds Nine to Iran Sanctions Blacklist








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AFP: "The United States added nine individuals and entities to its Iran sanctions blacklist in a move condemned Wednesday by Tehran as a 'blatant violation' of goodwill amid long-running nuclear talks. The US Treasury named five men from Iran and elsewhere as well as Dubai-based Belfast General Trading for sanctions violations linked to efforts to support the Islamic republic's acquisition of US currency. It said Belfast General had converted more than $250 million of Iranian government-held currencies into dollar notes which were then delivered to Tehran. Also named were an official of already blacklisted Iran-controlled Asia Bank, involved in a separate operation to ship US banknotes to Tehran from Moscow. Douran Software Technologies, which the Treasury said helps the Iranian government's online monitoring and censorship operations, was also blacklisted. And Abyssec, an Iranian company which helps Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard in hacking and other online operations, was also named. 'Although we do not support the imposition of any new nuclear-related sanctions while negotiations are ongoing... we have made clear, by word and deed, that we will continue to enforce our existing sanctions,' said Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence David Cohen... The Treasury announcement was met with criticism in Tehran. 'We strongly disapprove of this action, which is a blatant violation of goodwill,' foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham told reporters. 'It will have no effect whatsoever on the Iranian government meeting its needs. We do not feel duty-bound by illegitimate sanctions,' she said." http://t.uani.com/1B47swY

Reuters: "Iran and six world powers are set to resume low-level talks on Iran's nuclear program in Geneva on Jan 15, with wide gaps remaining in their positions, the Iranian foreign minister said. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, the lead negotiator for Iran with the six powers known as 'P5+1,' made the remarks in a closed-door session with members of the Iranian parliament's National Security Committee, according to state news agency IRNA. 'We have stood firm and demand lifting of all sanctions at once,' Zarif said. 'If there are any rational proposals we will comply, otherwise we are ready for any outcome.' Last week, Zarif urged Western powers to drop "unrealistic" demands so the dispute can be resolved. 'I am confident that a comprehensive agreement is within reach,' he wrote to his counterparts across the West. 'But we will firmly resist any humiliating illegitimate demands.'" http://t.uani.com/1xfOrWX

Politico: "Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is predicting that the upcoming Republican-controlled Senate will pass laws imposing sanctions on Iran and approving the Keystone XL pipeline next year. 'I think we'll have a supermajority, a veto-proof majority, to impose additional sanctions on Iran and to require the administration to come before Congress for approval of any deal that [President Barack Obama] has with Iran,' Rubio said in an interview Wednesday with NPR host Steve Inskeep. 'I think the same is true of the Keystone pipeline, potentially.' Rubio said he would be prepared to vote for imposing sanctions as soon as today. He aims for a bill that would require congressional approval for sanctions and impose them 'upon a failure of the [nuclear] deal' within the next six months." http://t.uani.com/1BlXKUp

   
Sanctions Relief

Press TV (Iran): "Iran has received another segment of its frozen oil revenues under an interim nuclear deal with the P5+1 group, which allows the partial release of the blocked Iranian funds. The Central Bank of Iran announced on Wednesday that a total of USD 490 million was transferred to an Iranian account in Oman from South Korea, IRNA reported. The move came after the latest agreement between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council- the US, France, Britain, Russia, China - plus Germany to release another USD 4.9 billion of Iranian funds held in foreign banks by July 2015." http://t.uani.com/1y5YC1U

Iraq Crisis

Guardian: "Thousands of Revolutionary Guards gathered in Tehran on Sunday for the funeral of Iranian Brigadier General Hamid Taqavi, who was reportedly killed by a sniper while organising the defence of the Iraqi city of Samarra against Islamic State (Isis) militants... Taqavi, 55, was the most senior Iranian military commander killed in Iraq, where Tehran calls its role 'advisory' in assisting the Iraqi army, Kurdish forces and Shia militias against Isis. While Taqavi's funeral illustrated the clear official Iranian commitment to its armed forces, the murkier dimensions of Tehran's growing role in the brutal sectarian conflict engulfing Iraq and Syria were highlighted by the death of Wathiq al-Battat, an Iraqi militant with long links to Iran and leader of one of Iraq's several Shia militias. The Mukhtar Army, the Iraqi militia, recently announced its leader Wathiq al-Battat had been killed in Diyala province. Battat had been a player in the shady war between Iraqi Shia militias and the Sunni militants of Isis. As general secretary of Hezbollah in Iraq, al-Battat's militant anti-Sunni sentiments often unnerved Iraq's mainstream Shia leaders. But he had often boasted of his links to Iran's IRGC and proclaimed his loyalty to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader." http://t.uani.com/1HZZJAm

AFP: "Iran is to help Iraq rebuild its army under an agreement that could formalise Tehran's military support for its neighbour, which remains under assault by the Islamic State (IS) group. No details of the pact were released but state television said the two sides had 'agreed to continue cooperation in the defence arena with the creation of a national army to protect the territorial integrity and security of Iraq.' The memorandum of understanding was signed late Tuesday in Tehran where Iraqi Defence Minister Khaled al-Obaidi is holding talks with his Iranian counterpart Hossein Dahqan. 'The two sides stressed the need for consultations to ensure security, because terrorism affects not only security in Iraq but security throughout the region,' the statement added." http://t.uani.com/1B44ngg

Human Rights

Reuters: "The United States called on Tuesday for the release of U.S. citizens held in Iran, but denied a report that Washington had proposed a prisoner exchange for a former U.S. Marine. A lawyer for Amir Hekmati, an Iranian-American former Marine jailed in Tehran, was quoted in a report on Tuesday on Iran's semi-official Tasnim News Agency as saying that the United States had sought his release through a prisoner swap. 'Those reports are not accurate,' U.S. State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke told a news briefing. 'The U.S. government has not proposed a prisoner exchange for Mr Hekmati ... We do however call on the Iranian government to release Amir Hekmati immediately, as well as detained U.S. citizens Saeed Abedini and Jason Rezaian, and to assist us in locating Robert Levinson.'" http://t.uani.com/1vFSSpJ

IranWire: "A civil rights and environmental activist has been given a three-year suspended prison sentence. Security forces arrested Mohammad Sadiq Manguri in November after he took part in a protest in support of a popular Kurdish singer, Hassan Zirak. The Kordpa site reported that the Revolutionary Court tried Manguri, who is secretary of the environmental preservation and conservation society in Mahabad and a prominent Kurdish civil rights activist, without his lawyer being present. Judicial authorities have not issued Manguri with a formal verdict. Manguri, 33, and a number of other activists took to the streets after a local television station conducted a public survey about Kurdish pop singer Hassan Zirak, who died over 40 years ago. Activists say the poll, which was broadcast on the channel, defamed and deliberately insulted the singer, who is considered a hero by many Kurds." http://t.uani.com/1x3MEV9

Domestic Politics

Al-Monitor: "On Dec. 27, 2009, demonstrators took to the streets to protest the results of the June 2009 presidential elections, which they claimed were rigged in favor of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It was one of the bloodiest days of the so-called Green Movement protests that shook the Islamic Republic of Iran. Inflaming tensions further, the date fell on Ashoura, a Shiite holy day and a sensitive one for the government. Three days later on Dec. 30, 9 Dey in the Iranian calendar, pro-government protesters took the streets in a show of force to condemn Green Movement protesters, who they claimed were being supported by foreigners, particularly the United States, Britain and Israel. The Green Movement protests that day became known as the Ashoura protests and the pro-government protests three days later became known simply as 9 Dey. The anniversary of 9 Dey is now a significant date for the Iranian media. Many officials give interviews about its significance, state television runs specials surrounding the events and social media becomes particularly active. Many conservative-linked social media pages shared political cartoons showing the Green Movement protesters as agents of foreign governments." http://t.uani.com/1vstRxh

Mehr (Iran): "The secretary of Iran's Judiciary Human Rights Council has praised the country's police as being world's cleanest police forces. Mohammad Javad Ardeshir Larijani, who was addressing a high-level coordination meeting of the Council on Tuesday, said that inglorious conduct of the US police in handling the colored people recently stood in clear distinction when compared with the Iranian police, which he described as being 'free of racial discrimination and ethnic impartiality.'" http://t.uani.com/1EIzC4y

RFE/RL: "Severe air pollution in Iran's capital, Tehran, has put nearly 400 people in hospitals with heart and respiratory problems. Hassan Abbas, a Tehran emergency services official, said on December 30 that the city's dirty air had caused another 1,434 people to be treated in their homes for similar problems." http://t.uani.com/1B44Yia

Opinion & Analysis

Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic: "In an interview in late 2006, I asked then-Senator Barack Obama to talk about the challenges to rational deterrence theory posed by the behavior of rogue states. 'Whatever you want to say about the Soviets,' Obama answered, 'they were essentially conservative. The North Korean regime and the Iranians are driven more by ideology and fantasy.' Earlier this year, I asked Obama the following question: 'What is more dangerous: Sunni extremism or Shia extremism?' His answer was revealing, suggestive of an important change in the way he has come to view the Iranian regime. He started by saying, as would be expected, 'I'm not big on extremism generally.' And then he argued-in part by omission-that he finds the principal proponent of Shiite extremism, the regime in Tehran, more rational, and more malleable, than the main promoters of Sunni radicalism. 'I don't think you'll get me to choose on those two issues,' he said. 'What I'll say is that if you look at Iranian behavior, they are strategic, and they're not impulsive. They have a worldview, and they see their interests, and they respond to costs and benefits. And that isn't to say that they aren't a theocracy that embraces all kinds of ideas that I find abhorrent, but they're not North Korea. They are a large, powerful country that sees itself as an important player on the world stage, and I do not think has a suicide wish, and can respond to incentives. And that's the reason why they came to the table on sanctions.' Since becoming president, Obama has made the argument that Iran could be induced, cajoled, and pressured into compromise, a view that has been proven provisionally, partially, correct: Sanctions, plus Obama's repeated (and, to my mind, at least, credible) threat of military action, convinced Iran to temporarily halt many aspects of its nuclear program in exchange for limited sanctions relief. But Obama and his international partners have been less successful at bringing Iran to permanent denuclearization... As Iran and its interlocutors move into what stands to be the fateful year for these negotiations, a credible deal does not look to be achievable; so far, at least, the Iranians seem unwilling to make the truly creative concessions necessary to meet the West's minimum requirements. Especially if a deal is ultimately proven to be unachievable, another question will arise: Is the price the U.S. has paid to reach this elusive deal too high? An admirable aspect of Obama's foreign-policy making is his ability to coolly focus on core issues to the exclusion of what he considers to be extraneous matters. This is also, however, a non-admirable aspect of his policymaking, in particular when the subject at hand is Iran's role in supporting the killer Assad regime in Syria. Obama seems to believe that a nuclear deal is, in a way, like Casaubon's key to all mythologies: Many good things, he believes, could flow from a nuclear compromise. In an interview last week with NPR's Steve Inskeep, the president suggested that a nuclear agreement would help Iran become 'a very successful regional power that was also abiding by international norms and international rules.' This, he said, 'would be good for everybody. That would be good for the United States, that would be good for the region, and most of all, it would be good for the Iranian people.' This is a wonderful notion, the idea that the end of Iran's isolation could lead it to moderate its more extreme impulses. But there isn't much in the way of proof to suggest that Iran's rulers are looking to join an international order whose norms are defined by the United States and its allies. In fact, there is proof of something quite opposite: Iran seems as interested as ever in becoming a regional hegemon, on its own terms. And its supreme leader, and his closest confidants, have made it clear, over and over again, that he is not interested in normalizing relations with the United States. Across the greater Middle East, Iran's efforts to extend its influence have been blunt and brutal: It supports Shiite insurrections in Yemen and Bahrain; it attempts to manipulate Lebanese politics through its Beirut-based proxy, Hezbollah; it intervenes in Gaza and against the already-fading hope for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Arab crisis; and certainly its unceasing threats to eradicate a fellow member-state of the United Nations, Israel, suggest that Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has a vision for Iran that differs from Obama's. But nothing underscores the Iranian regime's imperialistic, hegemonic nature more than its support for the Assad regime in Damascus. Without Iran's assistance, Assad would have fallen a long time ago. The death toll in Syria is more than 200,000; half of Syria's population has been displaced. These dark achievements of the Assad regime would not have been possible without Iran. Thousands of Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps troops and advisers, plus Iranian weaponry, have made all the difference for Assad... Gary Samore, a former Obama administration official who was in charge of the National Security Council's Iran nuclear file, told me this month that he would use Iran's deep exposure in Syria to U.S. advantage. 'Confronting Iran forcefully in Syria and Iraq increases chances for a nuclear deal because Iran will only meet our nuclear demands if it feels weak and vulnerable,' Samore wrote in an email. 'Conversely, Iran's sense that it is winning in Syria and that it is indispensable in Iraq decreases chances for a nuclear because the Supreme Leader won't make nuclear concessions if he feels strong and ascendant.' Is it likely that Obama will move toward a policy of containing Iran in Syria, and away from his more accommodationist stance? Arab states that count Iran as an enemy and the U.S. as a friend have asked him repeatedly over the past two years to treat Iran as a root cause of the Syrian catastrophe. But Obama appears focused solely on achieving a nuclear deal with Iran, in part because he seems to believe that Iran is ready to play the part of rational and constructive actor, rather than extremist would-be hegemon. I hope he's right, and I hope he achieves a strong nuclear deal, but I worry that he is empowering an Iranian government that isn't about to change in any constructive way. In the meantime, the Iranian regime continues to get away, quite literally, with murder." http://t.uani.com/1EIBDgY

Bill Spindle in WSJ: "For Iran, 2015 is shaping up to be a make-or-break year for two of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's biggest foreign-policy projects: achieving recognition for the country's nuclear program and spreading his country's sway across the Middle East. As the former goal has received most of the international attention, the latter has progressed steadily. 'Iran's biggest asset is staying power and strategic patience,' said Emile Hokayem, an analyst with the International Institute for Strategic Studies. 'They're deploying in the region the expertise and experience they've built up over decades.' Yet Iran's successes have come with major costs that likely will become even more apparent in the coming year. Iranian support and guidance, as well as legions of allied Hezbollah fighters from Lebanon, have been decisive in bolstering the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. But while Tehran has been girding Mr. Assad against what once looked like long odds of survival, the regime has lost control of more than one-third of its territory and perhaps an even greater share of its population. It has little prospect of regaining either. Likewise in Iraq, which like Iran has a Shiite majority, Tehran's consolidated influence since the U.S. troop withdrawal in 2011 has contributed to sectarian polarization and left the government dependent on Iranian-backed militias to fight the Sunni extremist group Islamic State. With Iran's economy crippled by the double whammy of international sanctions and falling oil prices, Syria and Iraq will become even more of a burden in 2015. In the end, Mr. Khamenei's two big projects could merge into one during 2015 or diverge. A nuclear deal with world powers could open the door to further cooperation with the U.S. in Iraq and Syria. But failure to strike such a deal could spark new tensions on all fronts between Iran and the international community." http://t.uani.com/1xvCwq6
    

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@UnitedAgainstNuclearIran.com

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