Iranian Affairs

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OIC flays ‘terror backer, sectarian Iran’ | Arab News

 

[JulianWilliams]

So, now that the sanctions have largely been lifted what can we expect from Iran? Are they going to flood the market with cheap oil? Are they likely to go on a large scale modernization of their armed forces to keep up technologically with the western armed Saudi Arabia?

 

[BLACKEAGLE]

Can Iran Change?
By ADEL BIN AHMED AL-JUBEIRJAN. 19, 2016

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia — THE world is watching Iran for signs of change, hoping it will evolve from a rogue revolutionary state into a respectable member of the international community. But Iran, rather than confronting the isolation it has created for itself, opts to obscure its dangerous sectarian and expansionist policies, as well as its support for terrorism, by leveling unsubstantiated charges against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

It is important to understand why Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies are committed to resisting Iranian expansion and responding forcefully to Iran’s acts of aggression.

Superficially, Iran may appear to have changed. We acknowledge Iran’s initial actions regarding the agreement to suspend its program to develop a nuclear weapon. Certainly, we know that a large segment of the Iranian population wants greater openness internally and better relations with neighboring countries and the world. But the government does not.

The Iranian government’s behavior has been consistent since the 1979 revolution. The constitution that Iran adopted states the objective of exporting the revolution. As a consequence, Iran has supported violent extremist groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen and sectarian militias in Iraq. Iran or its proxies have been blamed for terrorist attacks around the world, including the bombings of the United States Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 and the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1996, and the assassinations in the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin in 1992. And by some estimates Iranian-backed forces have killed over 1,100 American troops in Iraq since 2003.

Photo

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran. Credit via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Iran uses attacks on diplomatic sites as an instrument of its foreign policy. The 1979 takeover of the American Embassy in Tehran was only the beginning. Since then, embassies of Britain, Denmark, Kuwait, France, Russia and Saudi Arabia have been attacked in Iran or abroad by Iranian proxies. Foreign diplomats and domestic political opponents have been assassinated around the world.

Hezbollah, Iran’s surrogate, tries to control Lebanon and wages war against the Syrian opposition — and in the process helps the Islamic State flourish. It is clear why Iran wants Bashar al-Assad of Syria to remain in power: In its 2014 report on terrorism, the State Department wrote that Iran views Syria “as a crucial causeway to its weapons supply route to Hezbollah.” The report also noted, citing United Nations data, that Iran provided arms, financing and training “to support the Assad regime’s brutal crackdown that has resulted in the deaths of at least 191,000 people.” The same report for 2012 noted that there was “a marked resurgence of Iran’s state sponsorship of terrorism,” with Iranian and Hezbollah’s terrorist activity “reaching a tempo unseen since the 1990s.”

In Yemen, Iran’s support for the takeover of the country by the Houthi militia helped cause the war that has killed thousands.

While Iran claims its top foreign policy priority is friendship, its behavior shows the opposite is true. Iran is the single-most-belligerent-actor in the region, and its actions display both a commitment to regional hegemony and a deeply held view that conciliatory gestures signal weakness either on Iran’s part or on the part of its adversaries.

In that vein, Iran tested a ballistic missile on Oct. 10, just months after reaching an agreement on its nuclear program, in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions. In December, an Iranian military ship fired a missile near American and French vessels in international waters. Even since signing the nuclear accord, the supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has defended the country’s ubiquitous slogan “Death to America.”

Saudi Arabia will not allow Iran to undermine our security or the security of our allies. We will push back against attempts to do so.

In an outlandish lie, Iran maligns and offends all Saudis by saying that my nation, home of the two holy mosques, brainwashes people to spread extremism. We are not the country designated a state sponsor of terrorism; Iran is. We are not the nation under international sanctions for supporting terrorism; Iran is. We are not the nation whose officials are on terrorism lists; Iran is. We don’t have an agent sentenced to jail for 25 years by a New York federal court for plotting to assassinate an ambassador in Washington in 2011; Iran does.

Saudi Arabia has been a victim of terrorism, often at the hands of Iran’s allies. Our country is on the front line of fighting terrorism, working closely with our allies. Saudi Arabia has arrested thousands of terrorism suspects and prosecuted hundreds. Our fight against terrorism is continuing as we lead multinational efforts to pursue those who participate in terrorist activities, those who fund them and those who foment the mind-set that promotes extremism.

The real question is whether Iran wants to live by the rules of the international system, or remain a revolutionary state committed to expansion and to defiance of international law. In the end, we want an Iran that works to solve problems in a way that allows people to live in peace. But that will require major changes in Iran’s policy and behavior. We have yet to see that.

Adel bin Ahmed Al-Jubeir is the foreign minister of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/19/opinion/saudi-arabia-can-iran-change.html?_r=1

 

[Redheart]

The international community shouldn't expect Iran to change because it's the Ayatollahs who determines Iran's foreign policy though they claim it's based on Islam. When the Ayatollahs no longer wield as much power as they do now Iran will change. Before then it's not likely.

 

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Iran apology meaningless unless it stops fanning terror in Gulf: Riyadh

Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir

ARAB NEWS
Published — Saturday 23 January 2016
Last update 23 January 2016 1:20 am

RIYADH: Instead of apologizing for the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions, Iran’s leaders must change their government’s policies, become good neighbors, stop supporting militant groups, desist from assassinating people and not harbor terrorists, said Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir in an interview published Friday.

Al-Jubeir said Iran has behaved in this manner for more than 35 years. “The message has been sent to Tehran clearly by the GCC countries, Arab League and now from the Islamic community that this is enough,” he said.

“The Muslim world will never accept such actions. If it continues to do so, then Muslim states would have no option but to take more measures against Iran,” Al-Jubeir was quoted as saying.

Al-Jubeir said the OIC foreign ministers’ meeting barring Lebanon unanimously condemned Iran’s actions on Thursday.
“The resolution was very clear, condemning what had happened at the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad. It held Iran responsible and condemned its support for terrorism. The position of these countries was clear and strong against Iran’s aggression ...”

Al-Jubeir elaborated: “If Iran wants to be a respectable state in Muslim society and the world in general, it must work to improve its image, not interfere in the affairs of the region and foment sectarian strife ...”

However, Al-Jubeir made it clear that Haj and Umrah would not be affected by the tension between the two countries. “Iranians are welcome in the Kingdom because it is the right of every Muslim. This is a religious issue and it has nothing to do with politics.”

He said the Kingdom was seeking advice from fellow Arab and Muslim countries on what steps it should now take after severing diplomatic ties with Iran.
Iran apology meaningless unless it stops fanning terror in Gulf: Riyadh | Arab News

 

[Scorpion]

Iran apology meaningless unless it stops fanning terror in Gulf: Riyadh

Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir

ARAB NEWS
Published — Saturday 23 January 2016
Last update 23 January 2016 1:20 am

RIYADH: Instead of apologizing for the attacks on Saudi diplomatic missions, Iran’s leaders must change their government’s policies, become good neighbors, stop supporting militant groups, desist from assassinating people and not harbor terrorists, said Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir in an interview published Friday.

Al-Jubeir said Iran has behaved in this manner for more than 35 years. “The message has been sent to Tehran clearly by the GCC countries, Arab League and now from the Islamic community that this is enough,” he said.

“The Muslim world will never accept such actions. If it continues to do so, then Muslim states would have no option but to take more measures against Iran,” Al-Jubeir was quoted as saying.

Al-Jubeir said the OIC foreign ministers’ meeting barring Lebanon unanimously condemned Iran’s actions on Thursday.
“The resolution was very clear, condemning what had happened at the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and its consulate in Mashhad. It held Iran responsible and condemned its support for terrorism. The position of these countries was clear and strong against Iran’s aggression ...”

Al-Jubeir elaborated: “If Iran wants to be a respectable state in Muslim society and the world in general, it must work to improve its image, not interfere in the affairs of the region and foment sectarian strife ...”

However, Al-Jubeir made it clear that Haj and Umrah would not be affected by the tension between the two countries. “Iranians are welcome in the Kingdom because it is the right of every Muslim. This is a religious issue and it has nothing to do with politics.”

He said the Kingdom was seeking advice from fellow Arab and Muslim countries on what steps it should now take after severing diplomatic ties with Iran.
Iran apology meaningless unless it stops fanning terror in Gulf: Riyadh | Arab News

Indeed its meaningless. Doesn't Iran feel ashamed of itself and its people for interfering in the affairs of sovereign countries as if they won them. I would like myself if I acted this way one day. I will just burry my head in the sand.

 

[JulianWilliams]

@Scorpion
Yeah, let's pretend other countries don't do the exact same thing. Saudi Arabia is funding armed groups in Syria trying to take down the local government. How is that any different to what Iran is doing?

 

[tasha]

oil prices will drop drastically with this and then how do our economies do as the dollar falls and so does the other currencies, is this a ploy to ruin the economy

 

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Iran Still a Leading Executioner of Minors, Report Says
By RICK GLADSTONEJAN. 25, 2016

Iran is one of the leading executioners of juvenile offenders, despite its improved legal protections for children and a pledge more than two decades ago to end the death penalty for convicts younger than 18, Amnesty International said Monday.

In a new report, Amnesty International said that it had documented the execution of at least 73 juveniles in Iran from 2005 to 2015 and that 160 juvenile offenders are languishing on the country’s death row.

The report casts doubt on laws meant to improve children’s rights in Iran in the past few years, including new discretion by judges to impose alternative punishments on juveniles convicted of capital crimes. In reality, the report said, these changes are attempts by the authorities to “whitewash their continuing violations of children’s rights and deflect criticism of their appalling record as one of the world’s last executioners of juvenile offenders.”

Amnesty International, a leading global advocate for abolition of the death penalty, had also recorded the execution of juveniles in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, and there are juveniles on death row in the Maldives and Nigeria.

There is little doubt among rights groups that Iran has executed more people convicted of capital crimes committed as minors than any other country.

“Iran is almost certainly the world leader in executing juvenile offenders,” Michael G. Bochenek, senior counsel of the children’s rights division at Human Rights Watch, said in a post on its website in April.

Amnesty International has released its report as a United Nations committee is reviewing compliance with the Convention of the Rights of the Child. In 1994, Iran ratified that treaty, which prohibits capital punishment and life imprisonment without the possibility of release for offenses committed by people younger than 18.

“This report sheds light on Iran’s shameful disregard for the rights of children,” Said Boumedouha, deputy director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Program, said in a statement released with the report. “Despite some juvenile justice reforms, Iran continues to lag behind the rest of the world, maintaining laws that permit girls as young as 9 and boys as young as 15 to be sentenced to death.”

There was no immediate comment from Iranian officials on the Amnesty International report. Requests for a response from Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York were not returned. The Iranian judicial authorities have previously sought to impugn reporting by Amnesty International about Iran’s use of the death penalty as biased and lacking credibility.

Elise Auerbach, an Iran specialist in Amnesty International’s United States branch, said Iran had in the past sought to sidestep criticism of its juvenile death-penalty practices by saying that offenders were not executed until after they had reached adulthood.

“They have executed juvenile offenders,” she said. “If the person commits a crime at age 15 and is not executed until age 21, they’re still executed as juvenile offenders.”

Ms. Auerbach said the report, written by researchers at Amnesty International’s headquarters in London, was based on information received from death-penalty opponents and human rights defenders in Iran, as well as from lawyers and relatives of juveniles convicted of capital crimes in Iran.

Now that Iran is emerging from an era of international sanctions and is seeking broader acceptance, Ms. Auerbach said, rights groups are hoping that the Iranian authorities “realize they have to act in accordance with international human rights standards.”

For years, Iran has ranked among the world’s top executioners. In July, Amnesty International said the Iranian authorities were believed to have executed 694 people in the first seven months of 2015, the equivalent of more than three people a day.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/26/world/middleeast/iran-still-a-leading-executioner-of-minors-report-says.html

 

[Redheart]

Iran's Rouhani Seals $18B in Deals During European Tour - NBC News

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is in Europe as he tries to drum up trade and investment with European businesses after years of sanctions and economic and diplomatic isolation.

In his first visit to Europe since his 2013 election, Rouhani and his 120-strong entourage of business leaders and ministers began their continental tour Monday in Rome and are due to head to France Wednesday. Already deals worth up to $18.4 billion have been signed, according to Italian officials quoted by Reuters.

Among the deals struck Monday were a pipeline contract worth between $4 billion and $5 billion for oil services group Saipem, up to 5.7 billion euros in contracts for Italian steel firm Danieli and up to 4 billion euros of business for infrastructure firm Condotte d'Acqua, Reuters added.

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and Rouhani had held "held friendly and constructive talks geared towards enhancing bilateral cooperation and deepening consultation on the main regional and international issues," the Italian government statement said Monday.
Post-sanctions era

Ahead of the trip, the Iranian government stated on its website that Rouhani's aim was to "develop relations with European Union countries and the trip to Italy and France is aimed at growth and development, as well as job creation for the country."

"This trip is happening during a very important historic point and post-JCPOA (the "joint comprehensive plan of action" commonly known as the Iran deal on its nuclear program) and post-sanctions era and, therefore, it is significantly important," Rouhani told reporters as he left for Europe. The Iranian leader also tweeted that he was looking forward to exploring opportunities in Italy.

 

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Amnesty exposes ‘Iran’s hypocrisy’ over juveniles on death row

'The report debunks recent attempts by Iran’s authorities to whitewash their continuing violations of children’s rights'. (Photo: Amnesty)

Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Tuesday, 26 January 2016
An Amnesty International report released on Monday slammed Iran’s “hypocrisy” over scores of youths “languishing on death row for crimes committed under the age of 18.”

The human rights organization said its report, Growing Up on Death Row: The Death Penalty and Juvenile Offenders in Iran, has “debunked” attempts by Iran’s authorities to cover up such violations.

“The report debunks recent attempts by Iran’s authorities to whitewash their continuing violations of children’s rights and deflect criticism of their appalling record as one of the world’s last executioners of juvenile offenders.”

Said Boumedouha, deputy director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Program, spotlighted the legal sticking points.

'Shameful disregard'
“This report sheds light on Iran’s shameful disregard for the rights of children. Iran is one of the few countries that continues to execute juvenile offenders in blatant violation of the absolute legal prohibition on the use of the death penalty against people under the age of 18 years at the time of the crime,” Boumedouha said.

“Despite some juvenile justice reforms, Iran continues to lag behind the rest of the world, maintaining laws that permit girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15 to be sentenced to death.”

The report added that in recent years, Iranian authorities have “celebrated” changes to the country’s 2013 Islamic Penal Code that allow judges to replace the death penalty with an alternative punishment based on a discretionary assessment of juvenile offenders’ mental growth and maturity at the time of the crime.

'Legally obliged'
“However, these measures are far from a cause for celebration. In fact, they lay bare Iran’s ongoing failure to respect a pledge that it undertook over two decades ago, when it ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), to abolish the use of death penalty against juvenile offenders completely,” the report stated.

It states that Iran, as a state party to the CRC, is “legally obliged to treat everyone under the age of 18 as a child and ensure that they are never subject to the death penalty nor to life imprisonment without possibility of release.”

However, Amnesty International’s report lists 73 executions of juvenile offenders which took place between 2005 and 2015. According to the U.N. at least 160 juvenile offenders are currently on death row. The true numbers are likely to be much higher as information about the use of the death penalty in Iran is often shrouded in secrecy, the report added.


Last Update: Tuesday, 26 January 2016 KSA 11:22 - GMT 08:22
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/perspective/features/2016/01/26/Amnesty-exposes-Iran-s-hypocrisy-over-juveniles-on-death-row.html

 

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[Redheart]

Iran claims $100 billion windfall from sanctions relief -- double what White House estimated - Washington Times

The Obama administration is finding itself on the defensive amid rising charges that the U.S. and its allies lowballed the estimate of the billions of dollars Iran will reap from the deal that curbed Tehran’s nuclear programs in exchange for the lifting of punishing economic sanctions.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani just finished a shopping spree across Europe, and critics fear the nation’s military and hard-line security forces now have the funds to do the same, as Tehran claims to have secured access to “more than $100 billion” from sanctions relief — roughly twice what the Obama administration has long claimed would be the case.

Analysts say the bulk of the cash now freed up for Iran is linked to bank accounts in countries that were Iran’s top oil clients prior to the imposition of sanctions, including India, China, Japan, South Korea and Turkey.

How Iran planned to use its newly freed cash and its ability to cut deals internationally emerged as one of the key sticking points of the Iran deal. Administration officials such as Secretary of State John F. Kerry insisted that the deal’s critics were vastly overstating the boost to Iran’s economy and government coffers, and argued that Tehran would target any influx of cash first to its battered economy and crumbling infrastructure rather than to military hardware or the financing of proxies such as Hamas and Hezbollah abroad.

Political bickering over the exact dollar figure had appeared to fade recently in Washington. But it surged back into the limelight this week when Iranian media quoted Mohammad Bager Nobakht, a government spokesman, as saying the assets frozen by the sanctions “have fully been released and we can use them.”

While Iran’s state-run Press TV said the bulk of the money won’t actually be sent home to domestic banks but used for purchases and investments abroad, the figure cited in the report prompted a wave of hand-wringing in Washington.

By Monday night, sparks were flying between journalists and the Obama administration over just what the correct figures were.

Wall Street Journal reporter Jay Solomon sparked an online back-and-forth when he tweeted: “Iran claims it now has access to [$100 billion] in frozen oil revenues under #IranDeal; @WhiteHouse said it would be $50 billion.”

Less than three minutes later, Marie Harf, a senior adviser to Mr. Kerry, hit back with a tweet of her own: “Important clarification — it was experts at @USTreasury Dept who did the math & determined how much $ Iran would actually get.”

That prompted David Rothkopf, the CEO of the company that publishes Foreign Policy magazine, to jump into the fray, tweeting, “Is that really an important clarification? Isn’t Treasury part of the administration? Weird distinction.”