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Guardian: "A senior commander of Iran's revolutionary guards, who is subject to comprehensive international sanctions, has been nominated as the country's oil minister, a position that currently includes the presidency of Opec. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, sent a list of four ministers, including Rostam Ghasemi, commander of the revolutionary guards' Khatam al-Anbia military and industrial base, to the parliament for approval, the semi-official Fars news agency reported. Should the parliament confirm Ghasemi's nomination next week, the commander, who is targeted by US, EU and Australian sanctions, will be automatically appointed as head of Opec, giving the revolutionary guards access to an influential international platform. Under Iran's constitution the president is in charge of appointing cabinet ministers, who take office after the approval of parliament. Iran took the Opec presidency in October last year, its first time at the head of the oil exporters' cartel since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Unrest in the Middle East, especially the ongoing war in Libya, has given Opec a crucial role in determining the current oil price. Iran is the second-largest crude oil exporter in Opec. The nomination follows an extraordinary power struggle between Ahmadinejad and Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Ahmadinejad attempted to take over the oil ministry as its temporary head in May but his move was blocked by parliament. He then appointed Mohammad Aliabadi, a close ally, as a caretaker." http://t.uani.com/roXJ8v
Reuters: "International sanctions designed to stop Iran's disputed nuclear programme would only really bite if its other big Asian buyers follow India's lead and bow to U.S. pressure to cut the flow of oil money to Tehran. The Islamic Republic will forego around $45 million a day or a total of $1.4 billion in August -- if it halts around 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude exports to India -- where refiners have run up a $5 billion debt since India's central bank blocked payments to Iran after pressure from Washington. With Iranian heavy crude selling for around $40 more a barrel than a year ago, Iran's 2 million bpd plus sales to other customers should make up for the Indian export dip -- especially as Iran is likely to store the oil and to sell it later. But some in the Iranian government fear other buyers could also yield to pressure from Washington to stop helping Tehran's nuclear plans indirectly through state-controlled oil sales." http://t.uani.com/qWD7xR
UPI: "The U.N. nuclear energy chief Wednesday singled out Iran, North Korea and Syria for not complying with a nuclear weapons non-proliferation treaty. 'My approach to nuclear verification since taking up office in December 2009 has been very straightforward,' Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said in a release. 'All safeguards agreements between [member countries] and the agency, and other relevant obligations such as U.N. Security Council resolutions, should be implemented fully.' Iran was not cooperating with IAEA officials in providing 'credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities' and that nuclear material in Iran was used for peaceful purposes, Amano said during the 23rd U.N. Conference on Disarmament Issues in Matsumoto, Japan." http://t.uani.com/qejwQX
Nuclear Program & Sanctions
Reuters: "Dutch bancassurer ING Group NV repeated that it could face "significant" fines due to a U.S. investigation of operations in countries which are under sanctions by U.S. authorities, such as Iran and Cuba. The United States imposes economic sanctions and export controls on Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, viewing them as state sponsors of terrorism and limiting the scope for companies to do business there... A U.S. judge last August approved a $298 million settlement by British bank Barclays Plc over charges that it had violated U.S. trade sanctions by doing deals in Cuba, Iran, Libya, Sudan and Myanmar." http://t.uani.com/qJeit6
Reuters: "If U.S. plans to deploy a missile shield to protect Europe against a possible attack by Iran are realized, it will spark a new nuclear arms race, North Korea's U.N. ambassador said Wednesday. The U.S. plan, which is being developed in consultation with NATO, calls for the gradual deployment of interceptor missiles, based on land and sea, by 2020. 'The MDS (missile defense system) being pushed under the pretext of responding to so-called ballistic missile developments by what they call rogue states is far from carrying logic,' North Korea's U.N. Ambassador Sin Son-ho told a U.N. General Assembly meeting on disarmament." http://t.uani.com/oJqoNU Human Rights
AP: "Germany's international radio station Deutsche Welle says a dissident Iranian actress who is one of its bloggers has been released on euro58,000 ($84,000) bail in Iran. The head of the radio station's Persian-language department, Jamsheed Faroughi, said Pegah Ahangarani was released from Teheran's Evin prison Wednesday. He says her relatives told the station it remains unclear what the 27-year-old is accused of and authorities have warned her not to speak to the media. Ahangarani was arrested earlier this month when she was about to leave for Germany to write a blog for Deutsche Welle about the women's football World Cup." http://t.uani.com/p4pZuZ
Foreign Affairs
AFP: "Iraq's Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari demanded on Wednesday that Iran stop shelling positions of Kurdish rebels inside Iraq, saying it damages ties between the neighbouring countries. 'We again demand that the Iranian government stop its continuing shelling' of the separatist Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) 'because this is not constructive for Iraq-Iranian relations and damages ties,' he told reporters. 'The shelling has continued (off-and-on) for five years, but this time the duration has been longer than previous instances,' he added. He said shelling was 'random' and damaged farmland in the rural region. On July 16, Iranian troops launched a major offensive against PJAK bases, losing at least eight Revolutionary Guards, including a senior officer, in clashes on the border. In Tehran, state-run media reported Wednesday that Revolutionary Guards had killed more than 50 PJAK rebels since beginning the assault, and will continue the operation until Iraq deploys forces along the frontier to prevent cross-border attacks by PJAK rebels." http://t.uani.com/po1F2C
AFP: "Iranian exiles Wednesday rejected a US plan to relocate thousands of outlawed regime opponents from Iraq's Camp Ashraf to another Iraqi site pending a transfer to nations willing to accept them. The fate of the 30-year-old camp, located near the border with Iran and home to some 3,400 people, has been in the spotlight since an Iraqi security raid in April left 34 dead and scores injured, triggering sharp condemnation. Speaking on behalf of its residents, the National Council of Resistance of Iran said Ashraf remained under threat from Iraqi troops, and called on UN assistance pending relocation of residents to third countries under a plan outlined by members of the European parliament. 'We ask the UN to establish a permanent monitoring team in Ashraf,' NCRI official Mohammad Mohaddesin said at a news conference. 'We ask all European Union countries and others to help and support the European parliament solution.'" http://t.uani.com/ojEuiu
JPost: "Arab attitudes towards Iran have worsened sharply in recent years, according to a new six-nation poll released by the Arab American Institute Wednesday. Since 2006, Iran's favorability has plummeted from the 70-90 percent range among Arab countries to a current range of 10-40%, with the average favorability rating at just 27.5%. Of the six countries surveyed - Morocco, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE - only Lebanon's, at 63%, has a majority favorability rating. Saudis' views are the worst, with only 6% viewing Iran favorably. 'Their quest for hegemony is one that is very disconcerting in the Arab world. There's not an interest in seeing Iran in the role that Iran seeks for itself, which is the main power in the Gulf region,' assessed AAI president James Zogby, who conducted the poll." http://t.uani.com/nRCjco
Opinion & Analysis
Marisa Cochrane Sullivan in WSJ: "Upon taking office in 2009, President Obama inherited a winning hand in Iraq-and yet his administration has played it like a losing one. I recently returned from three weeks in that country, where I had dozens of meetings with Iraqi officials from across the political spectrum. They agreed on very little, except that the Obama administration is dangerously disengaged from the situation in their country. 'U.S. influence is waning,' one senior official told me glumly. 'Iran and Turkey now have more influence and they are taking advantage of what the U.S. has sacrificed for in Iraq.' Another prominent leader joked that Iraq must have disappeared from every White House map... More simply, Iraqis recognize that the U.S. is the world's most powerful country and one whose fate is tied to their own. Why, Iraqi leaders asked me, would the U.S. not seek to exercise the leverage it still has? Why would it write off the substantial investment it has made in the country? Such questions are particularly pressing since U.S. disengagement means ceding ground to Iraq's interventionist neighbors, many of whom don't share the U.S. desire for a strong, stable and democratic Iraq. The most threatening of these neighbors is Iran. Vice President Joseph Biden and other U.S. officials have argued that Iran didn't play a large role in the formation of Iraq's government last year, but I heard the opposite from Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish politicians. They all described Iran as having played a central role in pressuring Shiite groups to fall in line behind Prime Minister Maliki. 'This government was formed in Iran,' said one senior Iraqi official whose view was shared by many others. Iran's hand is perhaps most visible in the work of its armed Iraqi proxies. These groups-Kataib Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al-Haq, and the Promised Day Brigade-are directly supported by the Qods Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. They continue to support terrorist and paramilitary groups throughout Iraq that target both Americans and Iraqis. These groups have stepped up their attacks in recent months. Fourteen U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq in June, the highest monthly total of combat-related deaths since June 2008, when there were nearly three times as many U.S. troops in Iraq. More than half of these deaths were caused by improvised rocket-assisted mortars that contain improvised explosive devices in their warheads. Such mortars first surfaced in 2007 and 2008, but they were used infrequently and were not constructed or employed well. This has since changed. 'They're getting more sophisticated, more lethal, more precise in targeting,' a U.S. military official told me. Iran has also increased the flow of weapons to Iraqi militants, with the Qods Force even crossing into Iraq to re-arm its surrogates. U.S. and Iraqi troops have discovered hundreds of weapons caches in the last six months. They have contained weapons of substantial size, range and lethality-and which could be traced directly back to Iran. Some of these arms were made as recently as 2010. The attacks by Iran's proxies are designed to make it more unappealing for U.S. forces to stay in Iraq after this year. They are also meant to create the illusion that militants are driving U.S. forces out, to pressure the U.S. in retaliation for its Syria policy, and to convey to Iraqis that Iran can stir trouble if it so desires... It is in U.S. interests to keep a meaningful troop presence in Iraq to continue the training and professionalization of Iraqi forces, to conduct counterterrorism missions alongside Iraqis, to counter malign Iranian influence, to contain ethnic strife in the disputed areas of northern Iraq, and to bolster Iraq's nascent democracy... Failing to sign a new U.S.-Iraqi security agreement would redound to Iran's great benefit. The Obama administration has a fleeting opportunity that it cannot afford to squander." http://t.uani.com/q1AhMB
Amb. Marc Ginsberg in HuffPo: "If the current trajectory of Syrian street protests continue at their current, bloody pace, last Friday (July 22) may be remembered as the epic day Syria's Assad dictatorial dynasty began a fateful, accelerating process of unraveling... Unfortunately, if Iran has its way, Assad won't be going anywhere anytime soon. Iran has reportedly provided an emergency financial lifeline to the regime in the amount of $5.6 billion as billions pour out of Syrian banks by nervous depositors seeking safe haven in Beirut or Istanbul-based banks. As I reported earlier, intelligence analysts have irrefutable proof that Iran has dispatched advisers from its domestic secret police forces (The Law Enforcement Service or LED) and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRCG) to take over direct supervision of anti protest suppression. The savage repression being committed by the joint Syrian-Iran strike forces is being directed by leadership elements of Iran's so-called volunteer marauders squad known as the Basij (those civilian clad thugs who roamed the streets of Tehran beating Iranians senseless and kidnapping protesters). Confirming the Iranian intervention, the European Union imposed sanctions against the leadership of the IRGC and certain Syrian security forces, charging IRGC commander Mohammad Al Jafari and Al-Quds Force commander Qassem Suleimani and IRGC deputy commander for intelligence Hussein Taeb for directly providing command and control as well as logistic and equipment support to aid the Syrian regime suppress demonstrations. Not too long thereafter, the U.S. Treasury Department slapped further sanctions on key Iranian commanders aiding and abetting the crackdown against Syrian civilians. In addition to its shock troops, Iran has also provided Syrian commanders with sophisticated road-side bombs to take out any defecting Syrian military vehicles (which Iran has also provided to Shiite militias in Iraq to be used against Americans), as well as Iranian-built sniper rifles. According to other Middle East media reports, Iran also constructed in Syria an advanced Nokia Siemens Network (NS) devices for disrupting internal internet communications which permit Syrian forces to identify activists using social media -- the same type of telecommunications interception equipment Nokia was forced to admit in 2008 that hit had sold to Iran. Given the magnitude of Iran's direct intervention in Syria and Assad's deference to his Iranian riot-control masters, it would not be too much of a stretch to assert that Iran, rather than Syria, is largely overseeing the repression given the extensive role Iranian forces now have in putting down the revolt. For good measure (and despite the usually untruthful protestations to the contrary), the free-for-all being directed against Syria's citizens also includes elements of Lebanon's terror group and Iran proxy, Hizbullah. This morning, Syrian/Iranian forces commenced a new, more massive crackdown on the eve of Ramadan, which the Assad regime fears will transform every day into a Friday of demonstrations. If the regime is not being pounded militarily into submission, like in Libya, what will trump its Iranian-funded rescue and cause it to erode and collapse from within?" http://t.uani.com/qzi9w9
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