Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Eye on Iran: Kerry Expects 'Deep' Engagement with Congress on Iran Talks








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Reuters
: "U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on a visit to Berlin on Wednesday that the Obama administration planned to fully consult Congress about ongoing negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program.' I personally believe, as does the president, that Congress has an extremely important role to play in this and Congress will play a role in this,' Kerry said in response to a question about whether U.S. lawmakers might be shut out of the decision-making process. Kerry said a possible suspension of sanctions against Iran in any nuclear deal 'does not in any way write Congress out of the process or suggest that in the end Congress isn't going to have a vote.'" t.uani.com/1wty1ZY

Reuters: "Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei blamed Western powers on Tuesday for the rise of Islamic State (IS) insurgents in Iraq and Syria and said they had no business tampering with the region's geopolitics. Iran and the United States have been arch-foes for decades but now share a strategic interest in reversing the territorial gains of IS that threaten to remake the Middle East map. But cooperation has been blocked in part by the fact Tehran and Washington back opposing sides in Syria's civil war, where Islamic State is among rebel forces fighting President Bashar al-Assad. While Washington opposes Assad, it sees IS as a bigger threat and is staging air strikes to try to neutralise the al Qaeda offshoot with the support of Western and Gulf Arab allies". t.uani.com/1wo7efV

FP: "Demanding a bigger role in the Iran nuclear negotiations, key Democrats are beginning to openly criticize the Obama administration for its plans to avoid an immediate vote on a deal aimed at reining in Tehran's nuclear program. 'I disagree with the administration's reported assertion that it does not need to come to Congress at this point during negotiations with Iran,' said New York's Eliot Engel, the House Foreign Affairs Committee's top Democrat, in a statement on Tuesday. 'As negotiations continue on a deal to prevent a nuclear Iran, Congress cannot be circumvented,' New York's Steve Israel, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told Foreign Policy". t.uani.com/1CVz4SE

   
Nuclear Program & Negotiations

Trend
: "Iranian president Hassan Rouhani believes that Iran has already won the nuclear talks with the P5+1 countries, the Iranian state IRINN TV reported Oct. 21. 'The fact that our representatives bargain the six world powers, argue with them and reject their ideas indicates the political power of Iranian people,' Rouhani said. Rouhani went on to stress that 'it is a victory for Iranian people.' Rouhani previously said that Tehran and the P5+1 group of countries will reach a win-win agreement in nuclear talks.' There is no doubt in Iran's right to enrich uranium. The whole world has accepted the fact. But we just have disagreements on details,' Rouhani had said." t.uani.com/1wm2LdI

Trend: "The Head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI) Ali Akbar Salehi said that the country needs 20 new nuclear power plants like the Bushehr plant.' Bushehr power plant currently produces 7 billion kilowatt hours of electricity per year,' Salehi said, Iran's ISNA News Agency reported on October 20.'Some countries have declared their readiness to construct new nuclear power plants in Iran,' he explained. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran's Deputy Director for International Affairs Behrouz Kamalvandi said on Sept. 15 that Iran plans to start construction of two new nuclear power plants by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21)". t.uani.com/1sL02tG

AFP: "Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon said Tuesday he shared with his US counterpart his country's concerns about the direction of talks between world powers and Iran on its nuclear programme.In an audio message released by Yaalon's office after his meeting with Chuck Hagel at the Pentagon, Yaalon said they also talked about the conflicts in Iraq and Syria and the US-Israel defence partnership. 'The Iranian issue indeed worries us,' he said in Hebrew. 'The question of if there will be an agreement and what kind of agreement worries us. I'm talking about that here and behind closed doors we express our concerns.' Expert-level talks between Iran and world powers are to be held in Vienna on Wednesday and Thursday, according to an Iranian official". t.uani.com/1woekks

Sanctions Relief

Just Auto
: "Swedish automotive companies need to act faster to take opportunities of business in Iran says one association with interests in both countries. Iran has long been regarded as a renegade State, but a thaw in relations is becoming more evident as talks between Tehran and the so-called 5+1 group including the US, UK, France, European Union, Russia and China, continue to look for a solution to the nuclear question. This week will see yet more talks in Vienna aimed at finding a way through the impasse and securing the continuation of slight relief to automotive suppliers to Iran that has given optimism for new business opportunities".
t.uani.com/1yWzmLv

FT: "Hassan Rouhani likes to compare Iran's galloping inflation rate to a wild horse, while reassuring long-suffering citizens that his government is making progress in taming the problem. Since taking over as president last year, Mr Rouhani has staked his political reputation on ending crippling international sanctions over Iran's nuclear programme and turning around the ailing economy after years of mismanagement by the previous government of Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad. Reducing spiralling price rises has been a significant achievement. Inflation has been cut from 40 per cent when he took office to 21 per cent today. 'The government has tamed the runaway horse of inflation ... There is no doubt the country has left behind the stagnation,' he told state television this month. Mr Rouhani has pledged to bring inflation below 20 per cent by the new fiscal year in March. Iran's economy also grew 4.6 per cent in the three months to August 22 compared with the same period of 2013, while the currency market has also been stabilised. But on the streets of the capital, Tehran, many ordinary Iranians are unconvinced. The worry for Mr Rouhani's government is that his economic improvements are not feeding through to the real economy." t.uani.com/1wtzu2v

Human Rights

AFP:
"Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh staged a protest Tuesday in Tehran against a three-year ban on her and to oppose what she said was a clampdown on her profession. Sotoudeh, who won the European parliament's prestigious Sakharov rights prize in 2012, was released from jail last year halfway through a six-year sentence for 'actions against national security and committing propaganda against the regime.' Last month, a court authorised her to return to work but she revealed Sunday that the decision had been overturned and the lengthy ban imposed". t.uani.com/1rf1EsF

Foreign Affairs

AFP
: "Shortly after midnight, when a curfew usually shrouds the Iraqi capital in silence, the thudding sounds of heavy machinegun fire ripped through the air and echoed across Baghdad. They were not the opening shots of the much-feared attack by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group, which has been battling government forces a few kilometres (miles) outside Baghdad for months. Instead, they were a reminder of another kind of threat hanging over Iraq -- a rapidly expanding galaxy of Shiite militias that, while playing a significant part in the fight against IS, challenge government authority and threaten to perpetuate the country's brutal sectarian violence". t.uani.com/1nyrZpg

WashPost: "In recent days, Tehran and Islamabad have summoned each others' envoys after reports of gunfights and incursions. On Oct. 17, Pakistani officials claimed that 30 Iranian guards in six vehicles started shooting at a vehicle carrying members of the Pakistani Frontier Corps, two miles inside Pakistan's border. One soldier was killed and three others were wounded. The alleged incident, which Tehran has not directly addressed, followed an angry warning on Thursday from the second-in-command of Iran's influential Revolutionary Guards after four of its soldiers were killed by unknown assailants at a post in Iran's eastern Sistan and Baluchestan province, which abuts Pakistani Baluchistan. The Iranians believed the attackers were operating from Pakistani territory. 'We are, in principle, against intervening in the affairs of any country,' said Brig. Gen. Hossein Salami, 'but if they fail to abide by their obligations we will have [no choice but] to act.' Pakistani officials dismissed Iran's allegations, with language similar to what Islamabad often trots out when accused by neighboring India of tacitly supporting terrorism there. 'If Iran has evidence that elements from Pakistan are involved in activities against Iran, they should share it with us,' said a Pakistani foreign ministry spokesman on Friday. 'Our information is that these incidents took place inside Iranian territory by Iranians and that is corroborated by their own accounts. It is not helpful to externalize problems.'" t.uani.com/1otDW0o

Opinion & Analysis

UANI Executive Director David Ibsen in The Jerusalem Post: "Last week, representatives from European and Iranian businesses, trade organizations and think tanks gathered in London to plan for the 'post-sanctions' era. Specifically, the 1st Europe-Iran Forum was convened to facilitate European commercial participation in the Iranian marketplace. Multi-nationals are no doubt eager to re-invest in the Iranian economy, and they are looking forward to the day when sanctions are permanently lifted and commerce may once again start to flow between Teheran and major European capitals. Yet it would be premature for European multi-nationals to begin planning for a post-sanctions Iran while significant European and US sanctions architecture remains in place and before a comprehensive and sustainable agreement that ensures the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program is reached." t.uani.com/1vML34X




    

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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