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Top Stories
NYT:
"Iran's president-elect, Hassan Rowhani, painted a bleak picture of
the country's economy on Monday, blaming the departing administration of
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for high inflation and unemployment, and
saying it "has left much work to be done." Mr. Rowhani said Mr.
Ahmadinejad's government had presented a far-too-optimistic picture of
the economy, which even according to official statistics is stumbling.
'We asked current officials about the situation of the country,' Mr.
Rowhani said, 'but their reports and those of our teams were very far
from each other.' Speaking in Parliament, Mr. Rowhani said the inflation
rate, officially listed as 32 percent, was 42 percent, the local news
media reported. Iran's economy actually contracted during the past two
years, he said, for the first time since the Iran-Iraq war in the
1980s... Mr. Rowhani's close aide Akbar Torkan, who acts as a liaison
with Mr. Ahmadinejad's government, told the local news media that the
economic state of the country was 'much worse than expected.'" http://t.uani.com/16Gnv1i
Reuters:
"A U.N. Security Council committee is split over whether Iran's
missile tests last year violated U.N. sanctions imposed on Tehran because
of its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, Australia's U.N. envoy
said on Monday. That division effectively rules out any expansion of
sanctions against Tehran over the tests for the time being, U.N. envoys
said on condition of anonymity. Diplomats said it was Russia, backed by
China, that refused to declare Tehran's missile launches a violation of
the U.N. restrictions, as a U.N. Panel of Experts on Iran said was the
case. The rift on the Iran sanctions committee, which consists of all 15
Security Council members, highlights the difficulties Western powers face
in persuading Russia and China to join them in keeping up the pressure on
Tehran to halt banned nuclear and missile work." http://t.uani.com/18iMzPd
AFP:
"The United States on Monday led western calls for tougher UN action
on Iran's arms supplies to Syria and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah. The
calls came as Russia blocked a UN panel's unanimous ruling that a
ballistic missile launch by Iran was a breach of international sanctions,
diplomats said. The US government called on the UN Security Council and
its sanctions committee to tackle Iran's alleged breach of UN measures
with 'increased vigor.' 'The committee should also address the steady of
flow of Iranian arms, military support, advisors and training to groups
in Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, Yemen, Iraq and beyond,' said US acting
ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo. Iran has long supplied weapons to President
Bashar al-Assad's government 'knowing they would be used to massacre the
Syrian people,' DiCarlo told a Security Council meeting. The seizure of
Iranian arms off the Yemen coast in January 'was more than just a
sanctions violation, it was an aggressive act to undermine Yemen's
transition,' said the US envoy." http://t.uani.com/12GwjBY
Nuclear Program
AP:
"Iran's foreign ministry is saying Israel's prime minister seeks to
damage relations between Iran and the world, referring to the Jewish
state as 'a warmonger regime.' The Tuesday remarks by ministry spokesman
Abbas Araghchi come two days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu urged the world to step up pressure on Tehran to halt its
disputed nuclear program with tougher sanctions and threats of military
action. Araghchi said Iran views Israel as 'angry' about moderate Hasan
Rouhani's victory in June presidential elections, claiming that Israel
appears concerned the world will ease pressure in order to engage the
Islamic Republic's next president." http://t.uani.com/12tUnZQ
Domestic
Politics
AP:
"Mock condolences arriving by text message in Iran announce the
political 'death' of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Memorial services,
the joke continues, are planned at the United Nations in tribute to his
swaggering style each year in New York. The satire may bring smirks from
the many foes Ahmadinejad has racked up over eight years in office,
stemming from several high-profile feuds with the ruling clerics and one
disputed re-election. But no one is truly counting Ahmadinejad out of
Iran's political future, which could face some bumpy times as he decides his
next moves and his opponents plot possible payback. One way or another,
the combative and polarizing aura of the soon-to-be former president is
not going to dissipate once his centrist successor, Hasan Rouhani, is
sworn in Aug. 4." http://t.uani.com/15JZI3y
Opinion &
Analysis
Justyna Pawlak in
Reuters: "In the years-long campaign to tie a web of
sanctions around Iran and stall its nuclear program, the European Union
may just have met its biggest obstacle: its own law courts. Fearing
Tehran is seeking the means to make bombs, Europe's governments have been
combing through Iran's political elites and businesses to find people and
companies linked to the financing and technical aspects of its nuclear
work. They have frozen their assets, refused visas and banned companies
in the European Union from doing business with them. But dozens of those
targeted have challenged the restrictions in court and some are beginning
to win, embarrassing Europe's policymakers and causing alarm in the
United States. None of the court judgments are yet final. But with Israel
brandishing threats against a nuclear program that Iran insists has no
military purpose, Washington worries that any weakening of sanctions may
raise the risk of war. At the heart of the issue is the refusal by EU
governments to disclose evidence linking their targets to Iran's nuclear
work. Doing so in court, they say, may expose confidential intelligence,
undermining efforts to combat the program. The courts have effectively
rejected that argument, saying that if a case is to be made, evidence
must be presented. Lawyers for the Iranians argue there simply is no
evidence that proves any link to the nuclear program - a view supported
by British judges who did review some secret material this year. 'It is
very clear there is no evidence,' said Sarosh Zaiwalla, senior partner at
Zaiwalla & Co, a London law firm which has successfully represented
Iran's Bank Mellat in litigation against sanctions imposed by the EU. The
bank, one of the biggest private lenders in Iran, won a case in January
in the European Union's Luxembourg-based second-highest court. It had
challenged an EU move in 2010 to freeze its assets, saying the EU had
failed to prove the bank provided banking services for the nuclear
program. The court agreed... The lifting of sanctions against Bank Mellat
is postponed for now, pending an appeal by EU governments to Europe's
highest court. But the case illustrates the dilemma facing the European
Union in its push to stop Iran from advancing the atom work. Government
lawyers are telling the courts to trust them and the courts are refusing.
To safeguard its sanctions policy and its economic pressure on Iran, the
EU may have to present evidence - including sensitive intelligence - in
court. But because of rules governing pan-European courts, all evidence
would then become public which may damage clandestine operations and
unravel the process of devising sanctions. 'There is nothing in the
current rules to enable us to consider sharing information without it becoming
public,' said one European diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.
'This is the crux of the issue. We cannot just be handing information
around.' In Washington, anxiety over court rulings is mounting. 'It's a
real concern of ours that the EU is having difficulties sustaining some
of its designations,' David Cohen, the U.S. Treasury Department's Under
Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, told Reuters... While
the net of sanctions may have only been cut in a few places at this stage,
dozens of other cases are in the pipeline. The concern among EU officials
is that if a few more knots are untied, the entire sanctions netting
could start to unravel. That may have consequences for security in the
Middle East, especially if it allows Iran to step up its nuclear
program." http://t.uani.com/15BTkZQ
David Albright
& Christina Walrond in ISIS: "Iran does not need
to operate the Arak reactor and doing so would heighten concerns that
Iran aims to build nuclear weapons. Its operation would needlessly
complicate negotiations and increase the risk of military strikes. As a
result, Iran should delay the reactor's fueling and operation. Delay may
be inevitable given the large amount of work still required to finish the
reactor and fuel it." http://t.uani.com/1bkicM4
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