Eye on Iran: U.S. Says No Talk Now about Extending Iran Nuclear Negotiations

Join UANI           Top Stories Reuters: "A senior U.S. official said on Wednesday a deal on Iran's nuclear program was still possible by late next month and there were no talks now about extending the deadline, after Tehran and Moscow indicated more time may be needed. However, speaking ahead of a meeting between the top U.S., Iranian and European Union diplomats, the State Department official said there were still some significant gaps in negotiating positions on Iran's uranium enrichment program. 'We don't know if we'll be able to get to an agreement, we very well may not,' the official said, declining to be named... One of Iran's chief negotiators, Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, last week raised the possibility that the talks could be extended, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday said the deadline date was not 'sacred'. But the State Department official said: 'There is still time to get this done. There's enough time to get the technical work done, to get the political agreement ... if everybody can make the decisions they need to.' 'We keep chipping away ... In places gaps have narrowed, but the Iranians have some fundamental decisions to make,' the official said. 'We're not talking about an extension at the moment.' Asked whether Washington was ruling out accepting any extension, the official said: 'I'm not ruling it in or out.' ... Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the sides 'might need more time' to discuss the issues and potential solutions, Iran's ISNA news agency reported on Wednesday. 'The fact that there are eye-catching disputes, does not mean they cannot be resolved,' it quoted Zarif as saying after meeting Ashton in Vienna on Tuesday." http://t.uani.com/1CkIl6r AFP: "Negotiators from all six powers in the P5+1 group will on Thursday meet with Iranian representatives for fresh nuclear talks being held in Vienna, Russia's deputy foreign minister said. 'It has been agreed to hold what can be called a mini-round of negotiations on October 16,' Sergei Ryabkov told Russia's Interfax news agency on Tuesday. Iran's foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif arrived in the Austrian capital on Tuesday. Officials in his delegation held separate two- and three-way talks with US and EU negotiators. US Secretary of State John Kerry is due to go to Vienna on Wednesday for talks with Zarif. The Iranian foreign minister said the discussions included the 'vital issues' of 'uranium enrichment and the lifting of sanctions.'" http://t.uani.com/1vd6mw2 Trend: "Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said that the country's inflation will fall below 20 percent by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2015). 'Previously I had promised to decrease the inflation to below 25 percent in the current year, but now I say that the figure will drop below 20 percent,' he said. He went on to note that Iran's point-to-point inflation in previous year's calendar month of Tir (June 22-July 31) was 45 percent... 'We are containing the inflation, and simultaneously snapping economy out of recession,' he said, adding that the government's goal is to increase the country's economic growth up to 6 percent by the end of current year. Rouhani made the remarks at a live TV interview. The Central Bank of Iran announced on September 26 that the inflation rate for the 12-month period to the sixth Iranian calendar month (ended on September 22) hit 21.1 percent. The country's point-to-point inflation in the mentioned month was 14.4 percent, Iran's Mehr News Agency reported." http://t.uani.com/1yDk3qT     Sanctions Relief Trend: "Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said that Iran's economy is coming out of recession. 'Recession was a big obstacle from the beginning of the government's work last year. The inflation was also above 40 percent,' he said. 'Iran's economic growth was -6.8 percent in the [Iranian calendar] year of 1391 (ended March 20, 2013). The figure reached -2.9 previous year (ended March 20, 2014),' he said, explaining that oil industry was the first snapping out of recession. 'Iran's oil output faced a 13.7-percent increase previous winter,' Rouhani added. 'Iran's imports also rose by 22.2 percent last winter,' he said... Oil industry's growth increased by 6.1 percent in the first quarter of current year compared to same period previous year." http://t.uani.com/1w734ZI WSJ: "Italian oil giant Eni SpA took delivery of what is believed to be the first tanker of Iranian oil to Italy in two years in July as part of an existing exemption agreement, according to a person familiar with the matter Tuesday. The move underscores a slight easing in heavily restricted trade between Iran and the West following an interim nuclear agreement in November 2013.The person said the delivery was made as part of an exemption clause in the European Union's ban on Iranian oil that was granted to Eni as part of a debt repayment. In 2012, Iran owed $2-billion-worth of crude oil for services rendered on the development of an Iranian oil field. Eni had previously struggled to find tankers to take Iranian oil because of broader sanctions against the country. In its monthly oil market report, the International Energy Agency said Italy had imported 20,000 barrels a day of Iranian oil in July. The delivery is the first since June 2012-that came on the eve of an EU embargo which started the following month. Italy's refiners' association Unione Petrolifera confirmed the shipment-equivalent to a tanker of 600,000 barrels-in its latest report published on its website at an undisclosed date." http://t.uani.com/1xStgZi Bloomberg: "Iran's government is planning on a $2.8 billion expansion of Tehran's main international airport to quadruple passenger capacity, the head of the local consulting company on the proposal said. 'The project at hand is for a new terminal with the capacity to handle 20 million' additional travelers, Mohammad Kiaie, chairman and chief executive officer of Tehran-based Rah Shahr International Group, said in a phone interview from London yesterday. Imam Khomeini International Airport, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of the Iranian capital, has capacity to serve 6 million air travelers a year. Once the expansion is complete, possibly in five years, the existing terminal will be used for domestic flights, Kiaie said. Companies from France, China and Malaysia have expressed an interest in taking part in the project, Kiaie said. They include Paris-based Bouygues SA and Aeroports de Paris's ADPI unit, which are in talks with Iranian officials, he said. A tender for the project could take place as soon as two months from now, he said." http://t.uani.com/1ttr7Fi Reuters: "India's oil imports from Iran rose 38 percent in the first nine months of the year as shipments surged with an easing of Western sanctions over Tehran's suspected nuclear activities, tanker arrival data obtained from trade sources shows... India, Iran's top oil client after China, imported about 267,800 barrels per day (bpd) of crude from Tehran, the tanker data showed, partly due to a big surge in the first quarter as the initial deal easing Western sanctions went into effect. Growth in Iranian oil imports this year was also due to a bounce off the low base of last year, when shipments were hit hard due to insurance problems triggered by the sanctions, particularly over the April-August period. India's monthly Iranian oil imports fell in September for the first time since June, with the intake dropping to 241,400 bpd, down 11.7 percent from the previous month and 18.5 percent from a year ago, the data showed... State-run Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemical Ltd was the biggest buyer of Iranian oil in September followed by Essar Oil Ltd, the data showed. MRPL and Essar are India's only two regular monthly importers of Iranian crude. State run Indian Oil Corp, the country's biggest refiner, imported a million barrels of Iranian oil during the month, the data also showed... HPCL-Mittal Energy has resumed purchases this month after restarting operations at its 180,000 bpd Bathinda refinery." http://t.uani.com/1xSvpE5 Reuters: "South Korea's imports of Iranian crude in the first nine months were below last year's average, as required under international sanctions, and it imported 48,000 tonnes of condensate from the United States in September after a U.S. export ban was eased. Preliminary customs data on Wednesday from the world's fifth-largest crude importer showed that Seoul bought 558,357 tonnes of crude oil from Tehran last month, or 136,425 barrels per day (bpd), compared with 571,909 tonnes a year before. Shipments of Iranian crude in January-September this year into Asia's fourth-largest economy stood at 4.8 million tonnes, or 128,876 bpd, down 7 percent from a year before and 4 percent below the 2013 average at 134,000 bpd, according to the data and Reuters calculations." http://t.uani.com/1CkKhfk Human Rights ICHRI: "Impact Iran, a coalition of human rights organizations, in partnership with the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, today launched a new video, "Promises Made, Promises Broken." The video is part of a series aimed at drawing attention to Iran's second Universal Periodic Review (UPR) at the UN Human Rights Council on October 31, 2014. A new video will be released each week leading up to the review. The first video features nine persecuted Iranians who powerfully tell their stories of repression, harassment, detainment and torture in their own words. While these activists, bloggers, lawyers and students put a face to Iran's human rights abuses, their stories are shared by many Iranians whose rights are violated every day. "'Promises Made, Promises Broken' tells the story of Iran's human rights abuses through the compelling personal accounts of those who have experienced firsthand what it is like to live with this level of repression,' said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. 'These individuals were targeted because of their religious beliefs, their peaceful rights advocacy, their sexual orientation, and their ethnicity, which goes against all of Iran's human rights commitments.'" http://t.uani.com/1sLLOeG     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 United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a non-partisan, broad-based coalition that is united in a commitment to prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons.  UANI is an issue-based coalition in which each coalition member will have its own interests as well as the collective goal of advancing an Iran free of nuclear weapons.