Eye on Iran: Sign of Thaw With Iran: American Cellphones Ringing in Tehran
TOP STORIES
Sign of Thaw With Iran: American Cellphones Ringing in Tehran | The New York Times
Until recently, an American phone in Iran would not receive any signal. But that has quietly changed. This past week, a spokesman for AT&T acknowledged that the company was providing voice and data service in Iran to its customers with American phones through a partnership with a local firm, RighTel. An employee at the Iranian company, fully owned by a state entity, confirmed the partnership. While the announcement that Airbus and Boeing will provide dozens of jetliners to Iranian carriers garnered worldwide headlines last month, the deal that AT&T clinched in March, making it the only American provider to offer phone service in Iran, flew under the radar... It remains unclear how AT&T and RighTel will settle accounts. A representative for AT&T said the company would not disclose information on financial arrangements made with the Treasury or with its Iranian partner. One possible clue: RighTel is owned by the Social Security Organization of Iran, a state entity that has large stakes in several domestic banks.
Obama Administration Further Eases Financial Sanctions on Iran | The Wall Street Journal
The Obama administration further eased financial sanctions on Iran through regulatory measures that could significantly bolster Tehran’s ability to access global financial markets and attract foreign investment. The U.S. Treasury Department on Friday evening released new guidelines for dealings with Iran that loosen restrictions on the country’s ability to trade in U.S. dollars, according to the documents published on Treasury’s website. The Treasury also widened the potential business partners for non-American investors in Iran by announcing that U.S.-sanctioned Iranian entities can partake in projects provided they aren’t the controlling shareholder... The Treasury’s decision to announce the new guidelines on Iran at 6 p.m. on a Friday evening—ahead of the three-day holiday weekend—was viewed by congressional officials as an attempt by the administration to blunt further criticism from Capitol Hill. Administration officials have hinted for months that the Obama administration might take measures to ease Iran’s access to U.S. dollars. Current Treasury sanctions ban Iranian banks and companies from conducting any business through the American financial system. The Treasury announced on Friday, however, that Iran could legally gain access to dollars through non-U.S. banks and institutions, provided they have no direct contact with the U.S. financial system.
Obama Administration Draws Criticism Over Iran Investment Policy | The Wall Street Journal
New U.S. guidelines on foreign investment in Iran sparked concerns that the measures would benefit Tehran’s elite military unit, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps... “The new guidance overturns the long-running understanding that the U.S. dollar cannot be used to facilitate international trade with any Iranian entities, let alone sanctioned entities. And by allowing foreign subsidiaries of U.S. companies to transact business with Iranian entities, the president is ignoring the clear text of a law passed by Congress,” Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) said on Sunday. Sen. Mark Kirk of Illinois, who chairs a Senate banking committee with oversight over Iran sanctions law, said the new guidelines amounted to the White House granting Tehran new concessions. Meanwhile, Rep. Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.) said Treasury’s changes “green-light business with terrorists. The updated FAQs remove barriers for foreigners to engage with firms the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps controls. From this and other appeasements, it appears the Obama administration has given up on any democratic or pro-Western future for Iran.” ... “The administration seems to be doing everything possible—from roadshows to new interpretations of regulations—to encourage business with Iran,” said Juan Zarate, who served as a senior Treasury and White House official in the George W. Bush administration. “At a time of growing concern about Iran’s adventurism, support to terrorism, and clerical and IRGC control of the economy, this seems to be a moment for the U.S. and the world to be applying even more scrutiny—not less.”
REGIONAL DESTABILIZATION
Houthi rebels fire 2 missiles at US Navy destroyer in Red Sea | Fox News
Iranian-backed Houthi rebels fired two missiles at a U.S. Navy destroyer operating off the coast of Yemen in the Red Sea on Sunday -- though neither missile hit the ship, the Pentagon said in a statement. Though the American warship wasn't struck, the ship was definitely targeted, a U.S. defense official told Fox News. This dramatic escalation comes a week after the U.S. Navy sent warships to the area when a United Arab Emirates flagged auxiliary ship was destroyed off the coast of Yemen by the Houthis. "We assess the missiles were launched from Houthi-controlled territory in Yemen," Pentagon spokesman Capt Jeff Davis said. "The United States remains committed to ensuring freedom of navigation everywhere in the world, and we will continue to take all necessary steps to ensure the safety of our ships and our servicemembers." ... U.S. officials have long accused Iran of supplying missiles and other weapons to the Houthis.
U.S. Official to Asharq Al-Awsat: We will Deter Iran along with our Partners | Asharq Al-Awsat
A high-ranking U.S. official told Asharq Al-Awsat that Iran is responsible for actions that are shaking the stability of Yemen and that the U.S. along with its partners will cooperate to restrain Tehran from these actions. The official, who preferred to remain anonymous, affirmed that the U.S. is committed to the navigation freedom in Bab al-Mandeb, decrying the assault of Houthis on the UAE ship “Swift.” These remarks came in response to the accusations of Iran’s spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that the U.S. is delivering weapons to Yemen.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
Jason Rezaian’s lawsuit against Iran ‘injudicious’ | Mehr News (Iran)
A Principlist parliamentarian has criticized Jason Rezaian’s filing of a lawsuit for his alleged unjust arrest as ‘a pretext to for a new wave of stealing nation’s assets in the US.’ Hossein Naghavi Hosseini, the spokesperson of Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, told reporters on Thursday that the court process which had led to Rezaian’s conviction were legitimate and he had accurately been convicted for spying; “his freedom marks the Islamic mercy on himself lavished by the Islamic Republic of Iran and a great achievement for us,” he added. “Rezaian’s claim that during 18 months in prison, he has been subject to spiritual and mental torture is an outright lie and the Islamic Republic was by no means exchanging a hostage during nuclear negotiations in order to hit a viable accord with the US; this is an injudicious decision and definitely, the legal deputy of the president and the Foreign Ministry will wage efforts to vindicate the rights of the nation should a court hear Rezaian’s case,” Naghavi Hosseini emphasized.
CONGRESSIONAL ACTION
Dems to McConnell: Pass 'clean' extension of Iran sanctions | The Hill
Senate Democrats are demanding Majority Leader Mitch McConnell bring up a straight 10-year extension of key Iran sanctions once lawmakers return to Washington next month. Seven Democrats — led by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) — sent a letter to the Kentucky Republican asking that he "prioritize" a clean extension of the Iran Sanctions Act during the Senate's end-of-year session. "Passing this vital legislation before its expiration is crucial to ensuring with the utmost certainty that the United States will continue to have the sanctions enforcement mechanism our national security demands," they wrote in Wednesday's letter, a copy of which was also sent to Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) who chairs the Banking Committee. McConnell said last year that any Iran proposal would need to have 67 votes — enough to overcome a potential veto — before he would allow it to get floor time. The Iran Sanctions Act will expire at the end of the year without congressional action. Though there is wide-spread support for extending ISA, lawmakers are deeply divided over what should be included in an extension... Democratic Sens. Debbie Stabenow (Mich.), Jeff Merkley (Ore.), Ron Wyden (Ore.), Amy Klobuchar (Minn.), Martin Heinrich (N.M.), and Brian Schatz (Hawaii) also signed Wednesday's letter.
Blumenthal unveils bill to ease terror victims' access to damages | The Hill
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) unveiled legislation Thursday that would make it easier for terror victims to recover court-awarded funds from Iran. The bill, according to Blumenthal, closes two loopholes that have allowed Iran and other state sponsors of terrorism to hide funds through illegal transfers to and from foreign banks. “Victims of terrorism and their families have waged courageous legal campaigns to hold state sponsors of terrorism accountable for their atrocities, only to be thwarted,” Blumenthal said in a statement. “My bill will ensure that state sponsors of terrorism cannot hide from American justice.” Under U.S. law, victims of terrorist attacks can sue individual terrorists and nations on the State Department's State Sponsors of Terror list — but often struggle to collect any funds a judge may award if the money is not housed in the United States. The so-called Terrorism Victims Protection Act would change current law to direct that blocked, in-transit funds are the property of the terrorist or state sponsor of terror... Blumenthal announced the legislation on the steps of the Hartford, Conn., District Court, alongside survivors and families of Marines killed by a suicide bomber in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1983. The victims are seeking to collect $1.67 billion in damages from Iran, awarded to them in a 2016 Supreme Court judgement.
Republicans press Lynch for answers on Iran payments | The Hill
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.) on Friday sent a letter to Attorney General Loretta Lynch requesting more information on the Department of Justice's role in $1.3 billion in payments to Iran. The letter said the Treasury Department has informed Pompeo that the Department of Justice gave the "appropriate approvals" for the payment. "What was included in these approvals? Who from the Justice Department granted these approvals?" the members of each Intelligence Committee asked in the letter, first obtained by The Hill. They also asked Lynch about reports that she personally approved several payments from the Judgment Fund to Iran citing a rarely used statute, 28 U.S. Code § 2414, which requires "certification by the Attorney General that [the payment] is in the interest of the United States." "Please explain how sending billions of dollars in cash to the world's foremost state sponsor of terrorism is in our country's best interest," they wrote.
BUSINESS RISK
Former Top Treasury Official: Banks Still Don't Want to Do Business with Iran | The Weekly Standard
A former top Treasury Department official told THE WEEKLY STANDARD Thursday that major international firms still do not want to do business with Iran, despite efforts by the Obama administration to persuade foreign banks and businesses to reengage there. Stuart Levey, the Treasury Department undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence under the Bush and Obama administrations, said that though some sanctions on Iran were lifted after last summer's nuclear deal, firms remain wary of doing business with the Islamic Republic due to the country's support for terrorism and other illicit activities. "What you've seen more broadly ... is the sanctions get lifted, [but] the major international financial institutions will still resist doing business until the underlying facts change," Levey, now the chief legal officer for London-based HSBC Holdings, said during an event at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies... "You're trying to persuade foreign financial institutions to do business … under a background where American financial institutions are still forbidden, it's against the law" Levey told TWS. "That's something which every European bank and Asian bank is very well aware of."
SANCTIONS RELIEF
Royal Dutch Shell signs initial deal to return to Iran | AFP
Royal Dutch Shell confirmed Monday that it had signed an initial deal with Iran's National Petrochemical Company, paving the way for its return to the Islamic republic. "We can confirm that we have expressed our interest to further explore potential areas of cooperation with the National Petrochemical Company through a letter of intent," a spokesman for the Anglo-Dutch energy giant told AFP. Iran's Shana news agency, which is linked to its oil ministry, said the deal had been signed in Tehran on Sunday. Hans Nijkamp, Shell's vice president, attended the signing ceremony and told Shana that the company was seeking "a long-term presence in Iran". "We first need to see what are the areas where we think we can work together and then work out what commercial structures we use, what technical solutions, and ultimately you will indeed end up with a sort of a joint venture agreement," he said. "But it is too early today to put any timeline on that. We are very pleased that Iran is coming back to be a part of the global community. But it is still a fragile situation," he added, according to Shana.
Asia Soaks Up Iran’s Post-Sanctions Oil | The Wall Street Journal
Asian nations are stepping up their purchases of Iranian oil, underscoring Tehran’s deepening energy ties with the region amid a slow rapprochement with European crude buyers. China, India, Japan and South Korea are among big Asian oil consumers that have sharply boosted their imports of Iranian crude this year. China and India are looking to further lock down Iranian supply, with a large planned investment in Iran’s oil and gas infrastructure. Iran is seeking $130 billion worth of investment to bring its energy sector up to date after years of sanctions... In India, crude imports from Iran in August nearly tripled from a year earlier to 576,000 barrels a day, according to the National Iranian Oil Co. Exports to China—Asia’s biggest buyer of Iranian oil—in the same month grew 48% from a year earlier to 749,000 barrels a day, and are up 7% this year. Other Asian oil guzzlers have also brought in significant amounts of new Iranian oil, with Japan’s imports this year rising 45% compared with a year ago, and South Korea’s imports more than doubling.
Trafigura Aims to Boost Metals Trading With Post-Sanctions Iran | Bloomberg News
Trafigura Group Ltd., the second-biggest metals trader, wants to increase business with post-sanctions Iran. The Singapore-based trading house is seeking to hire a Persian-speaking executive for its refined metals division to work with its traders to “identify, analyze, assess and propose business opportunities in the Arabian Gulf, especially within the rapidly changing Iranian market,” according to a job posting on Trafigura’s website. The candidate will be expected to “understand the opportunities arising from the liberalization of the Iranian metals market,” Trafigura said in the ad. The job will “involve significant traveling to build relationships with key players in Iran,” it added. Trafigura and other commodity traders including Rotterdam’s Vitol Group, the largest independent oil trader, have re-entered Iran after the U.S. and European Union lifted sanctions imposed over the country’s nuclear program.
PTB Group to develop Iran’s biggest dry port and rail logistics terminal | Think Railways
PTB Perse International Forwarding Co. (Tehran), a subsidiary of the Swiss TransInvest Group, has won the tender for the concession to develop and operate Aprin Terminal, 20 kilometers from Tehran. The contract was signed at Iranian Railway headquarters in Tehran on September 18 at an official ceremony. The concession comprises a 25-year license for a so-called BOT (Build – Operate – Transfer) operator model, with a three-year construction phase and 22 years of operations. With an area of approximately 450 hectares, Aprin is to become Iran’s biggest dry port and a modern rail logistics terminal with customs clearance and bonded warehouse. The PTB Group was awarded the contract for the first phase, the development and operation of a 55-hectare sector; the annual capacity will be at 400,000 TEU, the sum invested in the infrastructure of the area will amount to approximately USD 30 million... With a staff of 450 working at 15 locations, the PTB Group is today renowned as one of Iran’s leading logistics services providers.
Thailand to revive Iranian economic ties through rice deals, trade | Reuters
Thailand aims to resume rice exports with Iran, the Thai commerce ministry said on Monday, following a trade meeting between the two countries in the Thai capital Bangkok. Trade leaders from the two nations met on the sidelines of the Asia Cooperation Dialogue meeting, a Thai-led meeting aimed at fostering dialogue among various regional organisations. Thailand and Iran agreed to resume bilateral trade and aim to increase their shared market from $310 million to $3 billion by 2021, said Thai commerce minister Apiradee Tantraporn, following a meeting with her Iranian counterpart Mohammad Reza Nematzade. Thailand, the world's second-largest rice exporter, also aims to export 700,000 tonnes of rice to Iran per year, Apiradee told reporters, the same level as before increased economic sanctions were imposed in 2012... On Sunday, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani arrived for the summit in Bangkok, marking the first Iranian presidential visit to the Southeast Asian nation... Thai Airways and Thai AirAsia X started selling direct flights between Bangkok and Tehran this year in a bid to attract wealthy tourists from the Middle East.
HUMAN RIGHTS
U.N. rights envoy urges Iran to free three dual nationals | Reuters
The United Nations human rights investigator for Iran called on Friday for the immediate release of three Iranians with dual nationality whose health is a matter of concern. Ahmed Shaheed, U.N. special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, in particular highlighted the case of the Iranian-British aid worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was arrested in April with her 2-year-old daughter and tried in August. An Iranian revolutionary court sentenced her to five years in prison on charges that remain secret, her family said last month. "Sentencing individuals for charges that are kept secret from defendants and their defense lawyers is a mockery of justice," Shaheed, a former foreign minister of the Maldives, said in a statement. He said her health had "seriously deteriorated" since her arrest.
Iran temporarily releases hunger-striking journalist | AFP
Iran has temporarily released a journalist for medical treatment after he became sick following a hunger strike, local media reported Sunday. Ehsan Mazandarani, who runs reformist daily newspaper Farhikhtegan, was arrested in late 2015 and sentenced in April to seven years for "acting against national security". "The health of my client, due to a hunger strike he was on, turned bad and he was transferred to hospital," his lawyer Hooshang Pourbabayi told the ISNA news agency.
DOMESTIC POLITICS
Tehran blames Kurd and Isis militants for clashes in north-west Iran | Financial Times
Details of the military operation were scant: there were “antirevolutionary and terrorist groups”, a “tense battle” and 12 militants killed. That Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards released any information at all about the clash this week was highly unusual, and suggests to some the regime’s growing concern about unrest in the north-west. For years, Tehran has boasted about the high level of security in its border regions, including the north-west, which has a large population from the Kurdish minority. But in recent months, state media has reported that the north-west has been hit by a string of clashes between regime forces and Kurdish separatists and Isis militants... Others also question the guards’ motives for making public the clashes, and whether they are using Isis as a pretext to further curb dissident ethnic and Sunni minorities.
Hard times fuel Tehran taxi glut | AFP
Mansour Faridfar did well on the black market until the law caught up and left him jobless, forcing him to join the thousands of "shakhsi" unofficial taxi drivers clogging Tehran's streets... Such fly-by-night careers are common in Iran thanks to decades of economic mismanagement and international isolation. The jobless rate currently stands at 11 percent. Tehran's mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf this week bemoaned the growing number of shakhsi caused, he said, by the "bad economic situation". "I've personally witnessed them dare to go to taxi ranks and take work away from (official) taxi drivers," he told a transport conference.
Iran cultural official resigns over concert in holy city | AP
Iran's state TV is reporting a cultural official has resigned after protests by religious authorities over a concert in the holy city of Qom. The Sunday report says Abbas Daneshi, head of the department of culture in Qom, resigned due to discontent among religious authorities over the event last month. Qom, about 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of Tehran is a center for Shiite Muslim education; among Shiites, it is considered one of the holiest cities inside Iran. The move is a blow to President Hassan Rouhani who has vowed a more open cultural policy. In recent months, religious authorities have criticized the government for allowing concerts in religious cities that host shrines of revered Shiite saints.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Nigerian state bans pro-Iran Shiite group | AFP
A Nigerian state where clashes between the military and Shiite Muslims led to over 300 deaths last year has banned the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), saying it was a security threat. Two days of violence began on December 12, when supporters of the pro-Iranian cleric and IMN head, Ibrahim Zakzaky, refused to allow the chief of army staff's convoy to pass through the northern city of Zaria in Kaduna state... in a press release issued late Friday, Kaduna state governor Nasir El-Rufai said IMN was a threat to Nigeria. "The Kaduna state government has issued an order declaring the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) an unlawful society," a statement said.
OPINION & ANALYSIS
Why Iran’s economy is too tainted to succeed | UANI Policy Director Jason Brodsky in The Hill
As finance ministers and global economic heavyweights gather in Washington for the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, Iran’s future in the international financial system will certainly be a topic of intense discussion. This year’s conclave will be the first since the implementation of the nuclear deal between the P5+1 and Iran in January 2016. IMF staff recently concluded a visit to Tehran, and reported that “economic conditions are improving substantially in 2016/2017.” They added that real GDP is projected to rise by at least 4.5%; oil production has risen to pre-sanction levels; and inflation is being tackled by the application of “ambitious reforms.” But policymakers and business leaders should not get swept up in the hype surrounding the alleged new Iranian gold rush in the aftermath of the lifting of sanctions. Iran’s economy remains mired in corruption, hobbled by political infighting; and wanting in transparency, with many key sectors controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—a terror organization sanctioned by the U.S. and international community. Thus, significant structural impediments to rejoining the international community loom large... In the end, betting on Iran at this juncture could turn into a disastrous gamble, for the mullahs have still not decided whether the Islamic Republic is a revolutionary religious cause or an ordinary nation-state, as Henry Kissinger once suggested.
Amid Syrian chaos, Iran’s game plan emerges: a path to the Mediterranean | Martin Chulov in The Guardian
Since their inception, the Shia irregulars have made their name on the battlefields of Iraq, but they have always been central to Tehran’s ambitions elsewhere. By not helping to retake Mosul, the militias are free to drive one of its most coveted projects – securing an arc of influence across Iraq and Syria that would end at the Mediterranean Sea... The strip of land to the west of Mosul in which the militias will operate is essential to that goal. After 12 years of conflict in Iraq and an even more savage conflict in Syria, Iran is now closer than ever to securing a land corridor that will anchor it in the region – and potentially transform the Islamic Republic’s presence on Arab lands. “They have been working extremely hard on this,” said a European official who has monitored Iran’s role in both wars for the past five years. “This is a matter of pride for them on one hand and pragmatism on the other. They will be able to move people and supplies between the Mediterranean and Tehran whenever they want, and they will do so along safe routes that are secured by their people, or their proxies.” Interviews during the past four months with regional officials, influential Iraqis and residents of northern Syria have established that the land corridor has slowly taken shape since 2014... The plan has been coordinated by senior government and security officials in Tehran, Baghdad and Damascus, all of whom defer to the head of the spearhead of Iran’s foreign policy, the Quds force of the Revolutionary Guards, headed by Major General Qassem Suleimani, who has run Iran’s wars in Syria and Iraq.
U.S. Surrenders Powerful Financial Weapon to Counter Iran's Missile Program | Simon Chin & Valerie Lincy in Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control
Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Obama administration secretly agreed to lift United Nations sanctions on two of Iran's missile financing institutions as part of a package of controversial accommodations with Iran in January. Critics of the move have focused on an alleged "quid pro quo" in which the delisting of Bank Sepah and Sepah International was part of a "ransom" paid for the release of Americans being held in Iran. But the decision to clear the banks also diminishes the ability of the United States and other governments to enforce U.N. sanctions on Iran's ballistic missile program, which remain in place until 2023. Specifically, the United States has weakened its ability to target the Iranian banks that finance missile development—one of the most powerful means of countering Iran's missile progress. Bank Sepah and its London-based affiliate Sepah International were two of only a handful of banks that had been sanctioned by the United Nations, thus cutting them off from the international financial system. They were targeted for their support of the Aerospace Industries Organization (AIO) and two AIO subsidiaries also sanctioned by the United Nations, the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group (SHIG) and the Shahid Bagheri Industrial Group (SBIG). Together, these entities oversee Iran's solid and liquid fueled missile development. Yet the United States agreed to lift U.N. sanctions on Bank Sepah and Sepah International as well as to remove them from the U.S. blacklist. This move came despite the United States calling Bank Sepah AIO's “bank of choice” as well as "the financial linchpin of Iran's missile procurement network [that] has actively assisted Iran's pursuit of missiles capable of carrying weapons of mass destruction."
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Mon, 10/10/2016 - 14:11