PT Report Islamabad, January 25: Chief Minister of Gilgit – Baltistan, Syed Mehdi Shah, called on the Iranian envoy here in the capital city. Matters related to investment opportunities in the region were discussed. According to the Embassy’s website, the Chief Minister of while welcoming the Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and referring to [...]

India has reportedly agreed to pay Tehran in gold for the oil it
buys, in a move aimed at protecting Delhi from US-sanctions targeting
countries who trade with Iran. China, another buyer of Iranian oil, may
follow Delhi’s lead.

The report, by the Israeli-based news website DEBKAfile, states that
Iran and India are negotiating backup alternatives with China and
Russia, should the US and EU find a way to block the gold payment
mechanism.

Delhi’s move is seen as surprising, as earlier India
and Iran said they would switch to yen and rupees. China, another major
importer of Iranian oil, may follow Delhi’s lead, the report adds.

India
and China need to switch from the dollar in bilateral trade, since the
US and EU have issued unilateral sanctions against the Iranian oil
industry and financial institutions. The sanctions would ban any bank
involved in oil trade with Iran from dealing with American and European
counterparts.

Both India and China, two major buyers of Iranian
oil accounting for 22 and 13 percent of its total export respectively,
have refused to join such sanctions. This means they have to establish a
reliable way of paying for crude, independently of the parts of the
global financial system controlled by New York and London.

Delhi’s
current plan is to effect payments through two state-owned banks,
India’s UCO Bank and Turkey’s Halk Bankasi, Turkey being another country
refusing to join the sanction spree.

The US issued sanctions
against Iran in December, aiming to put pressure on the Islamic Republic
and make its controversial nuclear program more transparent. The EU
joined the initiative on Monday, banning new oil contracts with Iran,
but allowing current ones to be fulfilled.

Australia on Tuesday
became the latest country to voice plans for such an embargo, although
the move would be more symbolic than practical, considering the
country’s small share in Iran’s oil export.

READ MORE

If you’re an Irani banking with Iran’s state owned Bank Tejarat and happen to own stocks in US markets, hey guess what, you’re SCREWED. The worlds greatest democracy – you know the one that spent 10 years and 4 trillion USD allegedly looking for ONE man – has decided to impose sanctions on Bank Tejarat [...]

Worlds Greatest Democracy Screws Anti-Nuclear Irani’s is a post from: PakMediaBlog All Rights Reserved.

Guest Contribution by Reza Marashi

The following piece was written by Reza Marashi in Foreign Policy Magazine on January 19, 2012. Mr. Marashi is Director of Research at National Iranian American Council (NIAC) and a former Iran Desk Officer at the U.S. Department of State.  The image in this piece, however, is a choice of FPA.
____________________________________________

by Reza Marashi

An eerily familiar drumbeat of war is intensifying across Washington, just as the United States ends its decade-long adventure in Iraq. The ghosts of America’s neoconservative past have dusted off their Iraq playbook to make the case for war with Iran. Their formula is simple but effective: Portray the Iranian government and its nuclear program as existential threats, insist that a chain of catastrophic events will result from inaction, and minimize the costs and risks of war.

If one looks back, however, neoconservative officials in the U.S. government weren’t alone in their push for war with Iraq. A crucial aspect of selling the war to the U.S. public was support within the Iraqi-American community. Iraqi dissidents living abroad, such as Ahmed Chalabi and Kanan Makiya, as well as supposed whistle-blowers turned known fabricators like the infamous “Curveball,” led a contingent of vocal Iraqis who pushed for steadily more aggressive actions to topple Saddam Hussein’s regime. Their promise that the invasion would be a cakewalk and that U.S. soldiers would be greeted with flowers and candy didn’t quite pan out. Now, the fruits of their labor are clear for all to see — a broken country, devastated by war and sectarian strife, with no discernible end in sight.

Iranian-Americans, in stark contrast with the Iraqi diaspora, have largely opposed a rush to war. This is a fact that I have observed up close, while working in the State Department’s Office of Iranian Affairs and now at the National Iranian American Council, where I maintain close and continuing contact with Iranian-Americans to ensure we accurately represent their views. Together, these two vantage points have crystallized one key takeaway: Iranian-Americans deeply resent the Iranian regime, but prefer U.S. policies that emphasize engagement and de-escalation.

Why have Iraqis and Iranians living abroad reached such drastically different conclusions? For more than three decades, the Iranian-American community has grappled with the paradox of wanting to make Iran a better place — but fearing success as much as defeat. Some worry that contributing to positive changes inside Iran will only strengthen a draconian system, extending its lease on life.

For many Iranian-Americans, this dilemma was resolved by their disastrous historical experience with revolutionary upheaval. Rather than laying the groundwork for democracy, Iran’s 1979 revolution simply replaced one dictatorship with another. As a result, Iranian-Americans strongly prefer to use the rule of law to alter not only the Iranian government’s behavior, but also the thinking of Iranians inside Iran.

Efforts by the Iranian-American community to promote engagement and oppose military intervention have been consistent and cohesive. The University of California, Berkeley, conducted a scientifically sound opinion survey that found that roughly 70 percent of Iranian-American respondents favored dialogue and negotiations between the United States and Iran. In 2008, the Iranian-American community mobilized this majority into a successful campaign to defeat a congressional resolution that would have taken a decisive step toward war.

The Iranian-American community’s overwhelming support for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign is also a telling indicator of its political attitudes. For every dollar raised by Republican nominee John McCain from Iranian-Americans, Obama — who was running on a platform that promoted engagement with Iran — raised five.

Iranian-Americans understand from personal experience that abrupt political change is unlikely to produce the desired result. Retired ambassador John Limbert, the deputy assistant secretary of state for Iran during my tenure in Foggy Bottom, reflected poignantly on this understanding in a 1999 speech. “Our liberal-minded Iranian friends,­ whom we counted on to contain the [1979] revolution’s excesses, proved to be helpless in political turmoil,” he said. “They were too much like us: They could write penetrating analyses and biting editorials, but lacked the stomach for the brutality that wins revolutions.”

Despite the fact that a majority of Iranian-Americans favor a more tolerant, pluralistic, and democratic system in Iran, they see little evidence that U.S. efforts to topple the current regime would bring Iranian democrats to power. Within Iran, rampant popular dissatisfaction has yet to evolve into a sustainable and coherent challenge to the system. The Iranian government’s monopoly on violence has prevented such challenges, but has not ended the desire for change. Even the original leaders of Iran’s Green Movement, which emerged from the country’s contested 2009 presidential election, were attempting to push for peaceful change through the ballot box.

The ongoing death and destruction in Iraq and Afghanistan has made the Iranian-American community even warier about foreign efforts to “liberate” their ancestral homeland. Right or wrong, many in the Iranian diaspora see the U.S. invasion of Iraq as less about nuclear programs or democracy, and more as a gambit to seize oil resources. These conspiracy theories may seem absurd, but behind them lies a deeper reality that is very powerful in the minds of Iranian-Americans.

Few Iranian-Americans would welcome the prospects of a U.S. intervention under the auspices of democracy promotion that, in turn, shattered any semblance of stability and ignited a destructive cycle of conflict. Iran’s contested 2009 presidential election and the ongoing human rights abuses have left Iranian-Americans searching for new ways to help foster peaceful, indigenous change. Their ideas remain diverse, but there is near-unanimous consent that change should occur without bloodshed.

Like their Iraqi brethren, Iranian expatriates want to change their government — it is their methods that differ. A majority of Iranian-Americans would welcome an improvement of relations between Washington and Tehran because it increases the prospects for positive, peaceful change from within. The watershed event of the Islamic Republic’s nearly 33-year history — widespread protests in 2009 — occurred at the height of Obama’s “mutual interests and mutual respect” initiative. Many of the West’s Iran analysts and experts, both Iranian and American, assert that the regime needs a U.S. enemy for its survival. If true, wouldn’t sustained offers of friendship — which would put the Iranian regime’s domestic agenda at the forefront — provide the biggest threat to the regime?

Engagement with the Iranian government understandably spurs many moral dilemmas for Iranian-Americans. Most, however, understand the alternatives — particularly when juxtaposed with Iraq, where war has resulted in nearly 200,000 Iraqis dead (based on conservative estimates), 1.3 million Iraqis displaced, and decades’ worth of destroyed lives for those still living in a perpetual war zone.

Let’s not kid ourselves: There are Iranian-Americans who support U.S.-sponsored regime change in Iran — and in due time, American neoconservatives will find their kindred spirits. We undoubtedly have our Chalabis and Makiyas — some long-established, some coming of age. But it’s clear that most Iranian-Americans distrust anyone who welcomes foreign armies into the motherland.

There is no arguing that Iran must change. The Iranian government’s human rights record is appalling, people lack basic freedoms, and economic disarray prevents Iranians from managing the present or planning for the future. Few Iranian-Americans are calling for sitting idly by and waiting for the situation in Iran to improve on its own. But it’s a rare voice indeed that is calling for war.

There’s a lot of rhetoric out there concerning Iran, so I wanted to draw attention to a few ideas that should better allow us to analyze Iran’s foreign policy in respect to the US and its nuclear program. First, I recommend that everyone reads the Non-Proliferation Treaty – it’s pretty short, but it lays out the principles that signatories to the treaty are supposed to adhere to and, hence, allows one to see arguments for or against the idea that Iran’s behavior has not been in keeping with the treaty.

Second, I recommend that anyone interested in Iran definitely follows FRONTLINE’s Tehran Bureau because of its many insightful pieces on Iran, especially discord surrounding its nuclear program. One of the Tehran Bureau’s recent pieces is a solid re-cap of the covert war that has been persisting against Iran – once you read it, you’ll be reminded of how lucky we are things haven’t really spiraled out of control much earlier.

A third point I would like to draw attention to is the recent conviction of Amir Mirzaei Hekmati for attempting to conduct espionage in Iran on behalf of the CIA. Hekmati’s case has received a great deal of attention in the press, so I will not discuss its merit – it’s most likely entirely baseless, though. Rather, what I find interesting is Iran’s policy towards using Iranian-Americans, or other Iranian diaspora, in its war with the West. (Evidently, I won’t be visiting Iran anytime soon). Contrary to most popular narratives, Iran is very calculative about national or international-level steps that it takes. We definitely can assume that the decisions to utilize Hekmati and countless others as pawns in Iran’s tug-of-war with the West have received continual sign-off from Khamenei and the Pasdaran. My question, however, is how does Iran’s intelligence ministry – the MOIS – feel about it?

Any seasoned intelligence professional can look at Iran’s behavior in respect to its diaspora and certify that it greatly damages Iran’s ability to recruit diaspora as intelligence sources. Lastly, while Iran arguably perceives that it benefits greater than it suffers in light of this behavior, how has Iranian foreign policy and intelligence become isolated because of the disdain and mistrust the regime has fostered?

In some sense, one could say Evin Prison has served as Iran’s proving-ground for failed policies.

In his NYT op-ed today entitled ‘Don’t Do It, Bibi,’ Roger Cohen issued another stern warning to his favorite target, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. In his piece, he warns about the grave repercussions if Israel were to attack Iran without political support from the United States.

This article is the latest installment in Cohen’s crusade against Netanyahu and the Likud-led governing coalition in Israel. Cohen solemnly recites all the ways in which Netanyahu has mistreated President Obama before he settles down and proceeds with his analysis of Iran’s nuclear threat.

Cohen argues that Netanyahu has stalled in his negotiations with the Palestinians because he foresees a rabidly pro-Israel Republican nominee beating Obama in the 2012 presidential elections. Yet in the next paragraph Cohen contends that Netanyahu is sorely tempted to bomb Iran before the elections because he and his advisors increasingly believe Obama can win in November.

Now, almost everybody following the Middle East understands that Netanyahu is a savvy politician who is not oblivious to American election cycles. Perhaps even more than most politicians, Netanyahu may be better characterized as “cynical” than “shrewd” in formulating his political agenda. And it may be true that Netanyahu indeed forecasts a Republican victory in 2012, but wants to hedge his bets by bombing Iran’s nuclear reactors while Obama courts the Jewish vote in the swing state of Florida.

However, Cohen makes the same mistakes in this article that he has consistently made throughout his analysis of the Iranian threat.

First, he implies that any attack by Israel would be a massive bombing campaign that would instantly and irreversibly unite all of Iran’s people under their oppressive regime and against the West. For starters, any aerial attack would be limited to the nuclear reactor sites and would probably result in few civilian casualties. With the possible tacit support of the US, in the last few years Israel has already attacked Iran’s nuclear program with a computer virus, assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists, and sabotaged missile bases in Iran that resulted in dozens of Iranian deaths. Meanwhile, less than three years ago Iran’s regime was strongly challenged by its populace. While the theocratic government may have suppressed the mass protests in 2009, there is still a strong anti-regime sentiment among Iranians. Moreover, the “regime” itself is an uneasy coalition between Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that is showing highly visible signs of strain. I’m not sure how Cohen can absorb these facts and compute that an attack by Israel “locks in the Iranian Republic for a generation.”

Second (and he is not alone in this truly bizarre line of argumentation), he reckons that Israel’s security is threatened more by the status of the occupied territories than by Iran. I fully agree that Israel must keep striving to find a way to ensure that Palestinians have a fully functioning state. While the on and off again courtship between Hamas and Fatah certainly complicates matters, it is also reasonable to argue that the Netanyahu administration has shown a distinct lack of urgency in its approach toward negotiations with the Palestinians. I am also gravely aware of the risks that any aerial attack by Israel on Iranian reactor sites would entail (although per above I disagree with Cohen about their nature.) However, I struggle to comprehend how the Israeli-Palestinian quagmire, which is grinding toward its 45th year of existence, can be compared to the existential threat posed by the nuclear program of a country whose stated intention is to destroy Israel.

Asghar Farhadi’s thrilling drama from Iran won the best foreign language film at the 69th Golden Globes on Sunday. In accepting the award, Mr. Asghar Farhadi, the director of the movie, dedicated the award to the people of Iran, whom he described as a “truly peace-loving people”.

Mossad is openly operating in Pakistan in funding and supporting Jundallah in Balochistan, Pakistan. Jundallah has been involved in various terrorist activities and with israeli and US (intensified under Cheney) backing has been particularly targeting Iran.

Mossad ‘posed as CIA to recruit fighters’

Mossad and other israeli setups have shown that they have neither morals nor any respect for international law. Bombings, assassinations and all sorts of terrorist activities are normal. Whenever anyone talks of israeli and indian RAW involvement in terrorist activities across Pakistan, they are dismissed as conspiracy theorists. But, seriously does anyone expect that these murderers are only funding Jundallah and not other terrorist groups? Funds, weapons and all sort of support flow from israel, india & USA to all sorts of shady and terrorist groups. Ironically, it is mostly these 3 countries who claim to be the biggest victims of foreign terrorism. Maybe if they looked in the mirror, they would see the blood of innocents on their own hands.

I remember when drone attacks first started. The right wing press and email forwards were filled with fantastical news about these American robot planes, unmanned, killing people from the sky in Pakistan’s border regions. Oh, how I laughed. Demented right wingers. American robot planes? Please stop.

They turned out to be right.

I remember when rumors about Blackwater agents in Pakistan first started. The right wing press and email forward were filled with breathless news about these 6’4″ American agents running around Pakistani cities, doing intelligence and security work for the CIA. Oh, how I laughed. Silly, silly right wingers. Blackwater in Pakistan? Please stop.

They turned out to be right.

And then there was the “terrorists in Pakistan are supported by the CIA and Mossad” conspiracy theory. Fools, I shouted. Why must we blame outsiders when the problem is staring us in the face?

Oops.

I now fully expect the following dominos to fall:

1. 9/11 was an inside job.

2. Asif Zardari really did ask Asifa to make that phone call to Benazir.

3. The floods were indeed caused by India.

4. NFP and Najam Sethi are CIA agents.

In all seriousness, stuff like this really does raise the question of how seemingly implausible and crazy scenarios actually come to fruition. It certainly gives me pause, that’s for sure.

Anyway, I urge you to go and read the story. It’s basically only tangentially relevant to Pakistan. But it’s very, very interesting for the following reasons:

1. You’re starting to see some real exasperation within the intelligence and security communities in the U.S. with its putative ally, Israel. I wonder if episodes like this, along with the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists, portend a rupture within the U.S. establishment on the question of Israel, with the Congress and media on one side and the defence and intelligence communities on the other. If you think I am exaggerating, just go ahead and read the story. I haven’t seen U.S. intelligence officials express that much angst since the last time I read a story on Pakistan. You’ve got quotes like

“It’s amazing what the Israelis thought they could get away with,” the intelligence officer said. “Their recruitment activities were nearly in the open. They apparently didn’t give a damn what we thought.”

and

“But while false-flag operations are hardly new, they’re extremely dangerous. You’re basically using your friendship with an ally for your own purposes. Israel is playing with fire. It gets us involved in their covert war, whether we want to be involved or not.”

and

This was stupid and dangerous,” the intelligence official who first told me about the operation said. “Israel is supposed to be working with us, not against us. If they want to shed blood, it would help a lot if it was their blood and not ours. You know, they’re supposed to be a strategic asset. Well, guess what? There are a lot of people now, important people, who just don’t think that’s true.”

2. I think it’s very, very plausible that Israel is trying to bait Iran into doing something stupid, such that the outbreak of hostilities can be blamed on them. It’s a bit like Thomas Schelling’s “last clear chance to avoid war” model, except in this case, Israel doesn’t want to avoid war. It just doesn’t want to “officially” start it.

3. Even if Israel is successful in drawing Iran (and the U.S.) into a war that purportedly compromises Iran’s nuclear program, what exactly happens afterward? As Elbridge Colby and Austin Long argue:

But perhaps the most important argument against attacking Iran has received less attention. That is that none of the attack proponents can give a sensible answer to the question General David Petraeus posed at the beginning of the Iraq war: “How does this end?” Kroenig and other advocates for war note, correctly, that a strike against Iran could do substantial damage to Iran’s program. But they fail to explain how the United States will prevent Iran from simply restarting its program, this time in deadly earnest. Moreover, they don’t explain why such strikes won’t contribute to the immediate rallying of the Iranian people around the otherwise reviled regime.

If I’m Iran, I go full-speed ahead on trying to develop full blown nuclear weapons capability (none of this latent capability stuff they’ve been toying with) at the same time as staying the hell away from any other provocative gestures that would give the Israelis (and Americans to an extent) the excuse they’re looking for.

Hanif Khalid Islamabad The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has opposed registration of non-customs paid vehicles. The Commerce Ministry has also maintained that it would not be appropriate to legalise thousands of smuggled large vehicles plying all over the country after securing tax equivalent to 30 percent of the deprecation value. This trend would lead [...]

The US has condemned the killing of an Iranian nuclear scientist in a car bomb attack in north Tehran. National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said the US “had absolutely nothing to do” with the attack. Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, who worked at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility, died along with the driver of the car. Several [...]

Nuclear scientist killed in Tehran car blast

So, mossad and USA has full leeway to kill people by blowing up their cars. This terrorist cabal can launch stuxnet, but if some obscure hacker hacks israeli credit cards, oh that is “terrorism”. US & israel can kill with impunity, but USA foams at its mouth over THAT plot by the iranian cars dealer. OH wait, that turned out to be false and fell spectacularly on USA’s own face. Iran has no right to nuclear technology and yet on the other hand, you have USA which has actually killed people by the use of its nuclear weapons; whereas israel also possesses nukes, but not a word by its slave USA and their cronies about how the possession of such weapons by an illegal terrorist entity (aka the glorious israel) is a threat to humanity. The same zionist entity which is committing a genocide of Palestinians. So, USA & israel have a RIGHT to commit cyber-terrorism, assassinations and all sorts of foul deeds all over the world (all in the name of national security), but any other country, individual or group which might take a stand against them – oh that is an absolute NO-NO. A threat to world peace.

For the second time in days the U.S. Navy has saved Iranian fishermen. As you will recall, it was earlier this month that the Navy rescued Iranian fishermen being held by Somali pirates. That incident came amid rising tensions and threats from Iran that it would close the strategic Strait of Hormuz (through which 20 percent of the world’s oil flows) in retaliation for Western sanctions. This report from The Washington Post nicely contrasts the humanitarian U.S. actions with the recent threats from Iran:

A U.S. Coast Guard cutter, the Monomoy, picked up the Iranians off the coast of Oman about 3 a.m. Tuesday after their cargo dhow, the Ya-Hussayn, signalled with flares and flashlights that they were having engine trouble, Navy officials said [...] On Thursday, the Navy liberated 13 Iranian fishermen who had been hijacked and held hostage for several weeks by Somali pirates, also in the Arabian Gulf. In both cases, U.S. officials portrayed the Iranian sailors as extremely grateful for the emergency help — a sharp counterpoint to the Iranian government’s recent threat of war if U.S. forces don’t stay out of the nearby Persian Gulf. “Without your help, we were dead,” Hakim Hamid-Awi, the owner of the Ya-Hussayn, was quoted as saying by a U.S. Fifth Fleet account of the rescue. “Thank you for all that you did for us.” The Good Samaritan acts by U.S. forces also stood in contrast to the Iranian government’s harsh announcement Monday that it had sentenced an Iranian-American citizen to death, allegedly for spying.

This report from the Christian Science Monitor also does the same with this well-worded headline: Iran keeps issuing threats, US keeps saving Iranian sailors

Will the U.S. rescue operations have any impact on the crisis over Iran’s nuclear program? Not likely. We can hope that reports of these rescues will reach the ears of Iranian citizens and lead them to question the anti-American propaganda fed to them by their government. Even if that happened, recent events in Iran would make us question what role, if any, public opinion plays in shaping Iranian foreign policy. Just ask those democratic reform activists. Oh wait, you can’t, because they were imprisoned or executed.

The rescues at sea are in keeping with the finest traditions of the U.S. Navy. They are also an example of what political scientists call “international norms,” broadly accepted standards of international behavior. There’s not a navy in the world that would ignore a distress call. It’s clear that if Iran were to obtain a nuclear weapon the entire region would send out a distress call. Hopefully the U.S. Navy will still be on hand (budget permitting) to lead the rescue.

Image Credit: Christian Science Monitor/U.S. Navy/AP

By Parisa Hafezi TEHRAN | Sun Jan 8, 2012 12:06pm EST (Reuters) - Iran will in the “near future” start enriching uranium deep inside a mountain, a senior official said, a move likely to further antagonize Western powers which suspect Tehran is seeking nuclear weapons capability. A decision by the Islamic Republic to conduct sensitive atomic activities at an [...]