Eye on Iran: Europe's Banks Are Staying Out of Iran
Top Stories
Bloomberg: "European companies flocking back to Iran are doing so without their favored lenders at their side. Less than two years after BNP Paribas SA agreed to pay a record $9 billion U.S. fine in part for dealings with Iran, many of the continent's biggest banks remain unwilling to go anywhere near Iran-related business for fear that they will run afoul of remaining U.S. sanctions on the country. That's opened the way for Chinese and Persian Gulf lenders, as well as European institutions such as Belgium's KBC Groep NV, to grab a slice of the business of funding companies' investments in Iran. The reluctance adds a complication for manufacturers from Airbus Group SE to PSA Group, the maker of Peugeot cars, as they seek to capitalize on growth in Iran. The funding issue has become a financial diplomacy hot-spot. In France, the government, worried that companies may lose exports, has started talks with the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control to get a commitment that banks can do business without incurring legal woes, two people with knowledge of the matter said. 'Banks want the maximum certainty,' said Tanguy Coatmellec, a Dubai-based partner at Ernst & Young's financial-services advisory group. 'A big part of the risk is really the U.S. political position over the long term. Either financing methods will be found or these contracts won't be finalized.' France's Societe Generale SA, Germany's Deutsche Bank AG, Zurich-based Credit Suisse Group AG, ING Groep NV in the Netherlands and the U.K.'s Standard Chartered Plc are among the big European banks that say they're generally not prepared to do business in Iran yet... 'The situation today is still a bit premature to have a position there,' BNP Paribas Chief Financial Officer Lars Machenil said Tuesday in a Bloomberg Television interview when asked about the bank's plans to finance companies signing deals in Iran. Clarification will be needed over conditions for financing Iran-related business. he said. Companies 'can go with their own financing' or seek other ways of funding including local financing, he said. Societe Generale doesn't plan to restart activities in Iran given the uncertainties that remain, the bank said in an e-mailed statement Thursday. 'The differences between European and American regulations lead to strong operational risks for financial institutions,' the bank said... Given the size of the fines that the U.S. has imposed in recent years, large banks with dollar operations prefer not to re-enter the Iranian market as long as the identity of the next U.S. president is unclear and given that Republican candidates threaten to revise the nuclear accord, Ernst & Young's Coatmellec said. 'It's going to be hard to finance big massive projects, while small ones could possibly find funding,' he said." http://t.uani.com/1UvtuDf
Times of Israel: "Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Sunday that the United States is the Middle East's main enemy, with the 'Zionist regime' a close second. Speaking at a meeting in Tehran on Sunday with the head of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), Ramadan Abdullah, Khamenei said that looking at the turmoil in the region in a 'macro' sense, the US was clearly to blame, with Israel following closely behind. PIJ is an Islamist terrorist organization. In comments carried by Iranian websites, some of which were then posted to Khamenei's Twitter page, the Iranian leader unleashed a series of anti-US and anti-Israel remarks. Khamenei, said Iran's Mehr News agency, 'reaffirmed that with this perspective in regional issues, Iran sees the United States as main enemy with the Zionist regime standing behind it. He pointed to extensive, unprecedented sanctions of US and its followers against the Islamic establishment in recent years and dubbed the objective of them as discouraging Iran from continuing its path; 'but they failed to achieve their goals and will fail in future as well.'' The ongoing unrest in the Middle East, Khamenei alleged, is a continuance of the 'war' waged on Iran by US-led Western governments since the Islamic Revolution in 1979 'and the Palestine issue is the key issue,' Khamenei tweeted. The Iranian leader said Iran was backing embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad 'because those standing against Syria are in fact enemies to core of Islam and serve the interests of the US and Zionist regime.' In yet another swipe at the US, the Iranian supreme leader said an 'arrogance front' has tried to portray the unrest in the region as a power play between Shia and Sunni Islam but that 'clash is a colonialist, US plot.' The supreme leader further said that 'defending Palestine' was an Iranian duty that also symbolized 'defending Islam,' and vowed to keep supporting the Palestinian cause." http://t.uani.com/1pY3TWQ
AFP: "The son of the longest-held civilian hostage in US history slammed the Obama administration today for abandoning the ex-FBI agent in an Iranian jail. Ex-CIA contractor and ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson has been missing for nearly a decade. Now 68, he disappeared in mysterious circumstances in March 2007 during a visit to the Iranian island of Kish. He was reportedly investigating cigarette counterfeiting in the region. After Iran released some US nationals it was holding following last year's international nuclear deal, his father's fate remains alarming, overlooked by Washington time and again, his son Dan Levinson wrote in an opinion in the New York Post. 'The White House and State Department have avoided acknowledging the basic fact that he is a hostage,' he said. 'When pressed by a reporter about this, a State Department spokesman spent 3-1/2 excruciating minutes refusing to call him a hostage.' ... 'My father has appeared in a video pleading for help and in pictures wearing chains, clearly being held against his will,' Levinson said. 'What further evidence is needed?' ... The younger Levinson argued on Monday that if Washington pressed harder, his father would be headed home. 'I have no doubt that if the administration told Iran there would be no further negotiations on any other issues until my dad is returned, Tehran would move quickly to resolve his case,' he wrote. 'But Washington has shown an unwillingness to do that, and we feel helpless... My father... is being abandoned.'" http://t.uani.com/1SJlo93
Nuclear & Ballistic Missile Program
AP: "With sanctions lifted, the head of Iran's nuclear program came to talk business with Czech leaders. The Czech Foreign Ministry said the two-day visit by Iran's vice president and nuclear chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, focused on developing a bilateral nuclear cooperation. The Czechs say that would contribute to better international control of Iran's nuclear program. Iran is seeking help from European nations to better its civilian program. After their meeting on the first day of Salehi's visit on Monday, Czech Foreign Minister Lubomir Zaoralek said a nuclear energy cooperation with Iran in particular 'represents a huge opportunity.' Zaoralek didn't offer details. The Czechs heavily rely on nuclear energy and plan to build more reactors... With the deal struck, Salehi said 'a new opportunity is in front of us.' In Prague, Salehi also met with Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka and visited the Institute of Nuclear Research in Rez, near Prague. Salehi was also scheduled to hold talks with the industry and trade minister on Monday night, and the head of the nuclear watchdog on Tuesday." http://t.uani.com/1rcNCOL
Business Risk
CNBC: "Iran has a message for the world's financial institutions: We want to do business again. Representatives of the Iranian government met the week before last with the Financial Action Task Force, the international body that has blacklisted the country from the global financial system. It was the first such meeting in eight years, and Iran's willingness to do so may signal that it isn't getting as much economic pop from the end of nuclear sanctions as it hoped it would. The governor of Iran's Central Bank, Valiollah Seif, disclosed the meeting, which took place in Paris, during an interview with CNBC. Seif said FATF representatives 'were surprised by the steps taken by the Iranian banks and financial institutions,' and 'that they were not aware of the changes we have made in our banking sector.' ... But a quick change in position from FATF is highly unlikely. In February, the institution issued the following statement: 'FATF remains particularly and exceptionally concerned about Iran's failure to address the risk of terrorist financing and the serious threat this poses to the integrity of the international financial system.' It went on to urge nations to take counter measures against Iran to protect their own banking sectors from money laundering and and terrorism financing risks emanating from Iran. FATF warned that if Iran didn't take further steps, it would urge countries to implement stronger counter measures at its next scheduled meeting in June." http://t.uani.com/21t2JAD
Sanctions Relief
Reuters: "Business Secretary Sajid Javid has postponed a major trade visit to Iran to focus on the future of Britain's steel industry, a spokesman from the business department said on Tuesday, as the government tries to save thousands of steelworkers' jobs. In March, India's Tata group announced plans to sell its entire UK steel operation, leaving the government battling to rescue an industry that has been hurt by cheap Chinese imports, soaring costs and weak demand. 'Given the Business Secretary's focus on the steel industry, he has decided to postpone his trip to Iran,' the spokesman said. 'He remains committed to exploring the opportunities for trade and investment with this emerging market.' ... He had planned to travel to Tehran this month on what would have been the biggest British trade delegation to Iran since the lifting of international sanctions in January." http://t.uani.com/1QQPKke
Reuters: "German deputy Economy Minister Uwe Beckmeyer said on Tuesday Iran had promised to repay soon old debts arising from state guarantees for German exports, clearing the way for fresh guarantees to be issued. 'Iran has now recognised its old debts and promised me to pay them in the near-term,' Beckmeyer told Reuters. Iran owes Germany about 500 million euros ($578.90 million) under so-called Hermes covers, a German government arrangement that protects German companies if foreign debtors fail to pay." http://t.uani.com/1X6rZw6
Bloomberg: "Caran d'Ache SA, a century-old Swiss maker of writing instruments, supplied Iranian school children with pencils before the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Now, it's betting on a partnership with a pistachio exporter to make a comeback in the country of 77 million. Used by artists including Pablo Picasso, the maker of colored pencils and pastels reopened for business in Iran last year... The Swiss company's pens, pencils and colors are sold in stores of Iran's Daya Group together with a range of other products, such as Swiss watches. Alliances with large local groups such as Daya, which operates in businesses ranging from consumer goods to healthcare and is also an exporter of pistachio nuts, are opening up doors for companies such as Caran d'Ache... Iran is currently the family-owned pencil maker's third-largest market in the Middle East and sales growth of 25 percent is expected in 2016 and the next two years, according to Chief Executive Officer Jean-Francois de Saussure. The CEO was part of a business delegation that accompanied Swiss President Johann Schneider-Ammann on a trip to Tehran in February." http://t.uani.com/1SKLl4E
Iraq Crisis
WSJ: "Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr traveled to Iran on Monday, a top aide said, a day after hundreds of his supporters withdrew from Iraq's fortified International Zone following protests that paralyzed the government. Ibrahim Al Jaberi, head of the Sadr office in Baghdad, said the cleric had departed for Iran Monday, but provided no other details on his itinerary. The cleric's travel to Iran could provide some indication of whether Mr. Sadr might turn to Tehran to help resolve the current standoff with the Iraqi government and smooth over divisions within his own Shiite community. The protests have surfaced simmering tensions. Some of Mr. Sadr's supporters are angry not only with government mismanagement but also with Iran's influence in Iraq. Tehran has funded and equipped Shiite militias to help combat Islamic State, which now controls Iraq's second largest city, Mosul. Yet the Iran-backed militias have become powerful in their own right, on par now with the country's army. Many of Mr. Sadr's supporters could be heard chanting anti-Iranian slogans during the weekend protests-chants that are likely to offend mainstream Iraqi Shiites who consider Iran critical to the fight against Islamic State. Mr. Sadr's departure came as a spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, Hossein Jaberi Ansari, 'expressed Iran's readiness to use all its links in line with paving the way for Iraqi talks,' according to an official statement carried by Iran's state-controlled news agency." http://t.uani.com/1OcNfZI
Human Rights
World Affairs: "The Iranian government is broadcasting a music video made by the Basij militia recruiting children to fight in Syria's civil war... Iran's regime has done this before. During the Iran-Iraq War, which killed around a million people between 1980 and 1988, the Basij recruited thousands of children to clear minefields. After lengthy cult-like brainwashing sessions, the poor kids placed plastic keys around their necks, symbolizing martyrs' permission to enter paradise, and ran ahead of Iranian ground troops and tanks to remove Iraqi mines by detonating them with their feet and blowing their small bodies to pieces. Children have been fighting in wars as long as there have been wars, but shoving them into the meat grinder in the 21st century is a war crime expressly prohibited and sometimes even punished by all civilized governments. The International Criminal Court in The Hague, for instance, convicted Congolese warlord Thomas Lubanga Dyilo of war crimes in 2012 for 'conscripting and enlisting children under the age of fifteen years and using them to participate actively in hostilities.'" http://t.uani.com/1QQSVZc
The Hill: "In Iran, religious freedom is 'deteriorating,' according to a new government report. Religious minorities are subject to arrest, torture and even execution 'based primarily or entirely upon the religion of the accused,' the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom wrote in a report issued Monday. The population of Iran is 99 percent Muslim, made up mostly of Shi'a Muslims. According to the report, the government discriminates against people of other faiths - such as Sunni Muslims and Christians - who are facing 'increasing religious freedom abuses.' 'Since President Hassan Rouhani was elected president in 2013, the number of individuals from religious minority communities who are in prison because of their beliefs has increased,' the report noted... In Iran, the report encouraged the Obama administration to 'ensure that violations of freedom of religion or belief and related human rights are part of multilateral or bilateral discussions with the Iranian government whenever possible, and continue to work closely with European and other allies to apply pressure through a combination of advocacy, diplomacy, and targeted sanctions.'" http://t.uani.com/1rQQqlE
WashPost: "'I believe Atena is a victim of the judicial system ... and people who should have supported her,' Nikahang Kowsar said last summer, after fellow Iranian political cartoonist Atena Farghadani was sentenced to more than 12 years in prison for drawing her nation's parliament as animals for her critique of birth-control laws. Now, less than a year later, Farghadani could win her release this month, reports Kowsar, now a board member of the Washington-based Cartoonist Rights Network International, which fights to protect artists around the world. The Post's Comic Riffs caught up with Kowsar - who was once jailed in Iran for his work - to talk about the status of Atena's case." http://t.uani.com/1VId3Vp
ICHRI: "The mother of imprisoned newspaper columnist Afarin Chitsaz will make a judicial complaint to protest the beating of her daughter in prison. Maryam Azadpour, who recently broken her silence on Chitsaz's case, described her daughter's ordeal in an interview with the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. 'They blindfolded my daughter and beat her with a water bottle to get a confession out of her,' Azadpour told the Campaign. 'The abuse was not carried out by the main interrogator, who was very respectful towards her. But in any case, we will pursue this matter with the case judge.' Political prisoners in Iran are often subjected to isolation, threats, and intense psychological and physical pressure, in order to be forced into making false confessions, which are the frequently broadcast by Iranian state TV to defame individuals and used in court as evidence to convict them. Arrested on November 2, 2015 by the Revolutionary Guards' Intelligence Organization, Afarin Chitsaz, a columnist who wrote for the official daily newspaper of the Rouhani administration, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for 'collaboration with foreign governments' and 'assembly and collusion against national security' in April 2016." http://t.uani.com/1W4vjIy
ICHRI: "Mahmoud Beheshti Langroudi, a teacher and activist who was sentenced to five years in prison and an additional four-year suspended prison sentence during a trial that lasted less than eight minutes, has been on hunger strike since April 20, 2016 in Tehran's Evin Prison to protest 'the tyrannical sentence issued by the Revolutionary Court,' a source told the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. 'I will go on a hunger strike and refuse everything except water, tea, sugar and salt until my sentence is terminated and a public trial is held based on Article 168 of the Constitution,' wrote Beheshti, a teacher for 25 years, in a statement published on the Teachers and Workers Rights website (Hoghooghe Moalem va Karegar) on April 20, 2016. 'If anything bad happens to me during or after the hunger strike, the responsibility will be with those who are silent or indifferent towards my demand for justice,' he said. The source told the Campaign that Langroudi's family is worried because he has already become extremely weak from undergoing several hunger strikes in the past year. 'Mr. Beheshti Langroudi has committed no crime other than trying to improve conditions for students and teachers,' said the source. 'That's why he has been sentenced to so many years in prison.' Langroudi was sentenced to five years in prison in June 2013 for 'colluding against national security' and 'propaganda against the state' by Judge Abolqasem Salavati of Branch 15 of the Revolutionary Court. He was also issued the four-year suspended prison sentence." http://t.uani.com/1SJieSL
Domestic Politics
AP: "Iran's President Hassan Rouhani has rallied for more freedom of speech in his country, saying government critics should not be imprisoned. Rouhani says that 'critics should not be detained, critics should not be sent to jail.' He spoke at the annual Tehran International Book Fair on Tuesday. The remarks, which underscored Rouhani's 2013 election promises of reform in Iran, came after weekend parliamentary runoff elections in which a moderate-reformist bloc supporting the president secured the biggest faction of seats in the 290-seat chamber. But Rouhani also assailed those whose texts involve 'lying, blaming and weakening the power of the nation.' In April, Iran's judiciary sentenced four pro-reform journalists to prison terms ranging from 5 to 10 years after convicting them on charges of acting against national security." http://t.uani.com/1VIcHhA
Opinion & Analysis
UANI Advisory Board Member Michael Singh in Baker Institute: "In Rouhani and his team, especially Foreign Minister Zarif, US officials face Iranian counterparts who have proven willing to engage with Washington transactionally when it is in Iran's interests to do so, in contrast to their domestic foes for whom anti-Americanism often trumps more pragmatic considerations. This not only made the conclusion of the JCPOA and the release of the various American captives possible, but has led US officials to ponder the possibilities for broader engagement with Iran. There is scant evidence, however, that such engagement is 'changing' Iran or its policies, or that it should therefore be pursued by Washington as an end in itself. Nor can US officials afford to approach engagement with Iran purely transactionally, bearing in mind that Iranian officials in consenting to engage diplomatically are doing so to further their own interests, which tend to deviate significantly from if not stand in stark opposition to those of the United States and its allies in the region. Given the strategic challenge that Iran poses to US interests in the Middle East -- in its support for terrorism and subversive non-state actors, threat to freedom of commerce and navigation in regional waterways, pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, and other destabilizing pursuits -- the American approach to diplomacy with Iran cannot simply consist of a series of transactional engagements but should instead be nested in a broader strategy to counter the challenges posed by Iran and advance a stabilizing regional agenda. Indeed, the paradox of American engagement with Iran is that Rouhani's approach, if successful, could result in an Iran that eventually emerges strengthened but whose regional strategy is unchanged, in the same way that the US opening to Beijing, for all of its benefits, also helped facilitate China's transformation into a highly capable rival. While the US partnership with China was justified by the more urgent need to confront the Soviet Union, however, the strategic rationale for empowering Iran is far less clear. Some argue that doing so would offer a form of balancing and that a more confident Iran could ultimately result in a more stable region; however, such an outcome would require Iran to abandon an approach to regional security which arises not only from external but internal factors, such as the preeminence of irregular 'revolutionary' institutions like the IRGC over conventional military institutions. Others argue that the greater threat is Sunni jihadism, represented by the likes of ISIS, necessitating cooperation with Iran against a common enemy. This notion, however, ignores the role that Iran's regional activities -- and the toppling of Iran's most notable regional rival -- have played in contributing to the virulent sectarianism that nourishes ISIS." http://t.uani.com/23lWq0U
Dan Levinson in NYPost: "Recently, reports have surfaced that the US government is going out of its way to grant Iran access to the dollar for financial transactions, which officials had said would not happen as a result of last summer's nuclear deal. For my family, such a failure by the Obama administration to stand by its commitments concerning Iran would be another in a series of failures that are very personal to us, with life-and-death consequences. My father is Robert Levinson, the longest-held hostage in US history, who was kidnapped in Iran on March 9, 2007. What incentive does Iran have to send my father home if it is already being handed everything it wants? I have no doubt that if the administration told Iran there would be no further negotiations on any other issues until my dad is returned, Tehran would move quickly to resolve his case. But Washington has shown an unwillingness to do that, and we feel helpless. My father appears to be a secondary issue. Last June, I testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee with family members of three other Americans held in Iran to press for the return of our loved ones. In January, my family found out while watching the news that my father was the only one of those captives not coming home as part of an exchange. Meanwhile, media have quoted an Iranian official saying the two sides are close to another deal involving two Iranian Americans arrested in recent months. Again, my father, a CIA contractor and ex-FBI agent who was the only one of the imprisoned Americans acting in service to his country when he was taken, is being abandoned. We've lost track of how many times he has been left behind. In the three weeks after the January swap, we went on a full-court press in the media, asking #WhatAboutBob. During that time, we did not hear directly from a single administration official." http://t.uani.com/1Y5byyx
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Tue, 05/03/2016 - 14:22