By James M Dorsey Increasingly, compliance with US sanctions against Iran could emerge as a litmus test of the United Arab Emirates’ close ties to the United States. At the sharp edge of a potential rift between the allies is a reportedly recently concluded agreement by a private UAE company to build gas-fired thermal, solar, and wind power plants with a total capacity of 300 megawatts in Iran’s hydrocarbon-rich […]
By James M. Dorsey The times they are a changin’. Iranian leaders may not be Bob Dylan fans, but his words are likely to resonate as they contemplate their next steps in Iraq, Iraqi Kurdistan, Lebanon, and Azerbaijan. The same is true for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The president’s shine as a fierce defender of Muslim causes, except for when there is an economic price tag […]
James M. Dorsey A recent analysis of Middle Eastern states’ interventionist policies suggests that misguided big power approaches have fueled a vicious cycle of interference and instability over the last decade. Those approaches are abetted, if not encouraged by US and Chinese strategies that are similar, if not essentially the same, just labelled differently. The United States has long opted for regime stability in the Middle East rather than […]
James M. Dorsey The clashes sparked by a crackdown on cross border fuel smuggling to neighbouring Pakistan achieved what past US and Saudi machinations failed to accomplish: ethnic unrest in a strategic, impoverished and long restive majority Sunni province in predominantly Shiite Iran.Recent clashes in the Iranian province of Sistan and Balochistan highlight Iran’s vulnerabilities as well as its inability to overcome trauma and control its demons. The […]
By James M. Dorsey Silent about rising sectarian violence in Pakistan, Gulf states vying for religious soft power risk exposing the limitations of their concepts of an undefined ‘moderate’ Islam that is tolerant and endorses pluralism. Countries like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar have so far turned a blind eye to mounting sectarian sentiment in Karachi and Punjab province against Shiites and Ahmadis, sects […]
COUNTRY LATEST UPDATES Saudi Arabia Covid-19 pandemic latest: Total confirmed cases: 301,323 Recoveries: 272,911 Deaths: 3,470 Actions to slow the spread of Covid-19: 3 August: Pilgrims returning from Hajj must quarantine for 14 days and will be monitored using electronic bands to ensure compliance. 28 July: Health Ministry to assign a health leader for every 50 pilgrims at this year’s scaled-back […]
by James M. Dorsey The Middle East is at a crossroads. The coronavirus pandemic and its economic fallout confronts regional leaders with a stark choice: dial down tensions to open the door toward cooperation in tackling existential challenges or risk ever more aggravated political and economic threats enhanced by a potential wave of social protest. A second wave of the coronavirus pandemic is raising its ugly head. […]
by James M. Dorsey Rejiggering security arrangements in the Gulf may be a more pressing issue than meets the eye. That is not good news for the Gulf states. It is also bad news for China, which could see the rug pulled out from under its studious effort to remain on the sidelines of the Middle East’s myriad conflicts. China and the Gulf states are in the same […]
|By James M. Dorsey| A series of Gulf and Middle East-related developments suggest that resolving some of the Middle East’s most debilitating and devastating crises while ensuring that efforts to pressure Iran do not perpetuate the mayhem may be easier said than done. They also suggest that the same is true for keeping US and Saudi interests aligned. Optimists garner hope from the fact that the US Senate may […]
Over the years, although the government has remained broadly authoritarian, it has oscillated among degrees of democracy. Those fluctuations, while subtle, have often coincided with elections like Friday’s. Photo Ayatollah Khomeini, the leader of the Iranian revolution, returning to Tehran in 1979 after his exile in France. Credit Gabriel Duval/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Islamic Republic: Yes or No? After throwing off their government in 1979, Iranians […]
By Parisa Hafezi | ANKARA ANKARA Iranians vote for president on Friday in a contest likely to determine whether Tehran’s re-engagement with the world stalls or quickens, although whatever the outcome no change is expected to its revolutionary system of conservative clerical rule. Seeking a second term, pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani, 68, remains the narrow favourite, but hardline rivals have hammered him over his failure to boost […]
By Parisa Hafezi | ANKARA ANKARA President Hassan Rouhani will defend his efforts to open up Iran to the world on Friday in a final televised debate against the hardline challengers who aim to topple him in an increasingly acrimonious election next week. Rouhani, swept into office in a landslide four years ago on promises to reduce Iran’s international isolation, is seeking a second term after negotiating […]
BEIRUT Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned on Wednesday that any attempts to disrupt the presidential election on May 19 would be dealt with harshly. The vote has shaped up to be primarily a contest between incumbent president Hassan Rouhani, a pragmatist who has campaigned on a platform of opening up the country to the West and easing social restrictions, and hardline rival Ebrahim Raisi, who […]
LONDON The head of the Iranian armed forces warned Islamabad on Monday that Tehran would hit bases inside Pakistan if the government does not confront Sunni militants who carry out cross-border attacks. Ten Iranian border guards were killed by militants last month. Iran said Jaish al Adl, a Sunni militant group, had shot the guards with long-range guns, fired from inside Pakistan. The border area has long […]
Photo A Boeing 737 MAX at Boeing Field in Seattle in January 2016. The company wants to sell up to 60 airliners to Iran. Credit Jason Redmond/Reuters The Boeing Company announced a tentative agreement on Tuesday to sell up to 60 737s to an Iranian airline, a transaction valued at $6 billion that appears very likely to test the Trump administration’s avowed hostility toward Iran. Boeing, the […]
BEIRUT An Iranian-American detained in Iran since last summer has been released on bail of approximately $60,000, the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported Sunday. Robin Reza Shahini was arrested by the Revolutionary Guards while visiting family in the northeastern city of Gorgan last July and subsequently sentenced to 18 years imprisonment on charges of threatening national security, according to HRANA. Shahini went on a hunger […]
Those risks have been amplified by President Trump, whose administration has said it is “putting Iran on notice.” The tough talk from Washington has given early movers like Total pause, raising concerns as to whether long-awaited opportunities will materialize, or if the Trump administration will take a harder line and tighten already-complex rules on doing business with Tehran. Continue reading the main story Some major global companies […]
ANKARA Iran’s hardline judiciary has sentenced the daughter of late Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani to jail for “anti-state propaganda, spreading lies against the judiciary and the Revolutionary Guards Corps”, the opposition website Kalemeh reported on Friday. The Islamic Republic has piled pressure on the pro-reform opposition ahead of a presidential election on May 19, when hardline rivals of pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani hope to regain control […]
“Every day that goes by, my concern for my father and Siamak increases,” Mr. Namazi said this week in a telephone interview from Dubai, where he lives. He expressed particular anxiety about his father, who has a heart ailment, saying that an Iranian prison cell was “no place for an aging old man.” Continue reading the main story Last month, on the anniversary of the elder Mr. […]
Bahrain said on Saturday it had uncovered a 54-member Iranian-linked militant group suspected of involvement in attacks on security forces, including organising a prison break in January, and seized automatic weapons. It was one of the biggest security operations against suspected militants Bahrain blames for an increase in armed attacks on security forces in the Western-allied kingdom, where the US Fifth Fleet is based. Tensions have been […]
For many of the Iranian director’s fans, the award was a source of pride: Iran mostly makes the news outside their country for missile tests or for orchestrated anti-Western rallies, they point out. Continue reading the main story At the heart of Mr. Farhadi’s films are the social struggles that many urban Iranians face daily: divorce, migration, domestic violence and the small but destructive lies that are […]
By John Walcott and Matt Spetalnick | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON A proposal the Trump administration is considering to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organisation has stalled over warnings from defence and intelligence officials that the move could backfire, according to officials familiar with the matter. “If you do that, there is no way to escalate, and you would foreclose any possibility of talking to the […]
The US on Friday imposed new sanctions on Iran as President Donald Trump followed up on his campaign pledge to take a tougher stance towards the Islamic republic. The Treasury department added 13 individuals and 12 companies — including Chinese, Lebanese and Emirati — to its sanctions list, freezing their assets under US control. Sean Spicer, White House spokesman, said the sanctions were a “very, very strong […]
A Foreign Ministry spokesman, Bahram Qassemi, said on Thursday, “It is a shame that the U.S. government, instead of thanking the Iranian nation for their continued fight against terrorism, keeps repeating unfounded claims and adopts unwise policies that are effectively helping terrorist groups.” Continue reading the main story Mr. Flynn also made clear that the challenge to Iran extended beyond the missile test, holding Tehran responsible for […]
