Category Archives: Iran

UN predicts ‘famine not seen in 40 years’ due to Pompeo’s Yemen policy

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Mike Pompeo’s designation of Houthis as foreign terror group will block food and other aid, senior humanitarian says

The US designation of the Houthi movement in Yemen as a terrorist organisation is likely to lead to a famine on a scale not seen for 40 years, the UN’s most senior humanitarian official has said.

Mark Lowcock, the director general of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, called for the decision to be reversed, saying the cost of food was likely to rise by as much as 400%, way beyond the reach of many aid agencies.

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The last days of Pompeo: secretary of state lashes out as reign comes to an end

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Trump’s foreign policy chief has pursued confrontation with Iran and other perceived enemies, but his efforts to disrupt diplomacy will end in failure

The finale of Mike Pompeo’s reign at the state department has been as controversial and clamorous as the rest of his 32-month tenure, but it is unclear what traces will remain after he has gone.

The last days of Pompeo have been played out in a blizzard of self-congratulatory tweets, at the rate of two dozen a day, as he seeks to write his own first draft of history.

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Nuclear stand-off: can Joe Biden avert a new arms race?

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Analysis: new president will face threats on multiple fronts, including from Russia and Iran, and must decide future of US arsenal

Joe Biden will have to make critical decisions on arms control in his first days in the White House that could determine whether a new nuclear arms race can be averted, and possibly reversed.

When the new president takes the oath of office on 20 January, there will be 16 days left before the 2010 New Start treaty with Russia expires, and with it the last binding limit on the world’s two biggest nuclear arsenals left standing in the wake of the Trump era.

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Iran bans importation of Covid vaccines from the US and UK

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Despite virus spread, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei forbids what he calls ‘untrustworthy’ jabs

Vaccines produced by the US and UK will be banned from entering Iran, its supreme leader has said, even though his country has suffered the worst virus outbreak in the Middle East.

“Imports of US and British vaccines into the country are forbidden ... They’re completely untrustworthy,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a live televised speech. “It’s not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations.

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Iraqi court issues arrest warrant for Trump over killing of paramilitary chief

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Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis died in drone strike ordered by US president

A Baghdad court has issued a warrant for the arrest of the US president, Donald Trump, as part of its investigation into the killing of a top Iraqi paramilitary commander.

Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy head of Iraq’s largely pro-Iran Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary network, died in the same US drone strike that killed the storied Iranian general Qassem Suleimani at Baghdad airport on 3 January last year.

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Arab states agree to end three-year boycott of Qatar

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Reconciliation with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the UAE includes a non-aggression pact

A three-year boycott of Qatar by four other Middle Eastern countries that disfigured Gulf cooperation and raised concerns in the west about a strengthened regional role for Iran and Turkey has come to a stuttering close.

“The kingdom is happy to welcome you,” Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman said as he greeted Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, on the tarmac of the airport in Al-Ula, north of Medina, on Tuesday.

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South Korean forces arrive in waters near strait of Hormuz amid Iran tensions

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Destroyer moves into region one day after Revolutionary Guards seize a South Korean tanker

South Korean forces have arrived in waters near the strait of Hormuz as pressure builds on Iran to free a South Korean tanker it seized along with its crew on Monday.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they had taken control of the South Korean vessel, the Hankuk Chemi, and its 20 crew because it was “polluting the Persian Gulf with chemicals”. The tanker is being held at Iran’s Bandar Abbas port city.

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Iran seizes South Korean tanker as tensions with US mount

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Move comes as Iran resumes enriching uranium to up to 20% purity in significant breach of 2015 nuclear accord

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have seized a South Korean vessel “for polluting the Persian Gulf with chemicals” amid rising tensions between Iran and the US during the final days of Donald Trump’s presidency.

Iranian news agencies published photos showing Revolutionary Guards speedboats escorting the tanker MT Hankuk Chemi and said the vessel’s crewmembers, including nationals of South Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam and Myanmar, had been detained. The tanker is being held at Iran’s Bandar Abbas port city.

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Iran steps up nuclear plans as tensions rise on anniversary of Suleimani’s killing

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As Tehran moves on uranium enrichment, Washington braces for retaliation a year after the Quds Force commander’s assassination

Iran has announced plans to enrich uranium up to 20% purity, just a step away from weapons-grade levels, as tensions with the US ratchet up during the final days of Donald Trump’s presidency.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed it had been notified of Iran’s decision to increase enrichment at the Fordow facility, buried in a mountainside to protect it from military strikes, although Tehran did not say when the process would begin.

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Iran vows to retaliate against any ‘enemy action’, one year after Suleimani killing

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Amid US tensions, Revolutionary Guards chief promises ‘reciprocal, decisive blow’ as he inspects forces on key island near Strait of Hormuz

The head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, General Hossein Salami, has vowed to respond to any “action the enemy takes” during a visit to a strategic Gulf island amid tensions with the US.

Salami was speaking on Saturday, on the eve of the first anniversary of the US killing of top Iranian military commander Qassem Suleimani in a Baghdad drone strike.

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Iran to enrich uranium to up to 20% purity, UN nuclear watchdog says

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Latest move was flagged in law passed last month after the assassination of country’s top nuclear scientist

Iran has told the United Nations nuclear watchdog it plans to enrich uranium to up to 20% purity, a level it achieved before its 2015 accord, at its Fordow site buried inside a mountain, the agency has said.

The move is the latest of several recent announcements by Iran to the International Atomic Energy Agency that it plans to further breach the deal, which it started violating in 2019 in retaliation for Washington’s withdrawal from the agreement and the reimposition of US sanctions against Tehran.

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Iran says Trump is trying to fabricate pretext for war

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Tehran says it will defend itself forcefully as tensions rise ahead of anniversary of Suleimani killing

The Iranian foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, on Thursday accused Donald Trump of attempting to fabricate a pretext to attack Iran, and said Tehran would defend itself forcefully.

Separately, a military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader warned Trump “not to turn the New Year into mourning for Americans”.

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At least 10 climbers killed in avalanches in Iran’s Alborz mountains

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Several more mountaineers are unaccounted for and seven crew on a capsized ship are missing after wild weather across the region

At least 10 climbers have died and several more are missing after a blizzard triggered avalanches in mountains north of Iran’s capital, Tehran, state media reported on Saturday.

Several climbers have remained unaccounted for since Friday, when two deaths were reported, while the number reported as missing has increased as concerned families contact authorities, state television said.

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EU foreign ministers pave way for revival of Iran nuclear deal

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Step would allow Tehran to come back into compliance with deal, so long as US sanctions were lifted

EU foreign ministers have agreed not to set fresh preconditions on a revival of the Iran nuclear deal, believing Tehran and Washington should be able to come back into full compliance with the agreement without at this stage needing to accept to extend or strengthen it.

The step removes one of the potential roadblocks to Iran coming back into compliance with the existing deal, so long as the US lifts its sanctions and complies with UN resolutions.

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‘Trump is crazy’: Hezbollah sees threat in US president’s final days

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Leaders fear Donald Trump and Israel will act against Iran and Hezbollah before Joe Biden’s arrival

For the past four years, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has fought a war in Syria, supported Iraqi forces and stage-managed the politics of its homeland, all the while trying to avoid facing off with Israel. Yet its exhausted leaders fear the last gasps of Donald Trump’s presidency could deliver threats that eclipse everything else.

In the organisation’s heartland, Hezbollah members are watching the clock – and the skies. Israeli jets have been streaking overhead for more than a month, and over the past few weeks the frequency of flights has sharply increased, as has security in Beirut’s southern suburbs, the nerve centre of the region’s most powerful militant group.

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Trump’s flurry of dodgy deals will not bring the Middle East any peace

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The outgoing US president has his eyes on a Saudi Arabia-Israel accord – no matter who gets hurt

Peace deals that entrench injustice, punish the weak and are propelled by greed, blackmail and weapons sales have precious little to do with peace – and are unlikely to endure. Yet the Middle East has witnessed a recent spate of such dodgy deals. All concern Israel and all were hastily cobbled together by the White House. As his curtailed presidency grinds to an unlamented close, Donald Trump appears engaged in a frantic foreign policy fire sale.

Peace is always a welcome prospect – but never at any price. Trump’s horse-trading on Israel’s behalf has made a cruel mockery of Palestinian rights. By agreeing to normalise relations with Israel, the UAE and Bahrain broke with the 2002 Arab peace plan that makes recognition conditional on the creation of a viable, independent Palestinian state. The deal was sweetened with offers of advanced US weapons and money-spinning business and trade opportunities.

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‘Nazanin is a hostage: the government needs to be brave and call her that’

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In an exclusive interview as his wife faces her fifth Christmas as a prisoner, Richard Ratcliffe tells why he fears even the end of her sentence won’t see her freed

It was after they had decorated the Christmas tree that Gabriella Ratcliffe started crying herself to sleep again. “She has been quite tearful for a few nights now, asking me ‘when is Mummy coming back?’ – which she hadn’t been doing,” said her father Richard Ratcliffe. “It’s all the associations of Christmas and family.”

For the fifth year in a row, his wife Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe will spend Christmas Day – and her birthday, which is on Boxing Day – a prisoner in Iran. Only she isn’t merely a prisoner, Ratcliffe says; she’s a hostage. And it’s vital the government acknowledges that: “There has been a real reluctance on the part of the British government and the wider world to call out Iran’s hostage taking, which has enabled it.”

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‘If a smuggler says do it, you do’: refugees on trying to rescue their friends from the Channel

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Two Kurdish asylum seekers made frantic attempts to save lives of family whose boat capsized in rough conditions

Two asylum seekers who were in the same boat as a Kurdish Iranian family who drowned trying to cross the Channel have spoken out about their frantic attempts to save the family’s lives after the vessel capsized.

Rasul Iran Nezhad, his wife, Shiva Mohammad Panahi, both 35, and their children: Anita, nine, Armin, six, and 15-month-old Artin, were among 22 people who boarded the boat, a rigid polyester structure about 20ft long, in October.

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MPs say UK government strategy on Iran prisoners not working

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Report says Foreign Office should formally declare detention of foreign nationals as ‘hostage taking’

The UK should do more to constrain Iran by proscribing the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist group and formally describe the Iranian practice of detaining British dual nationals as state hostage taking, the all-party foreign affairs select committee has said.

The report finds that the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s current approach to seeking the release of detainees is not working. There are least four British-Iranian dual-nationals either in jail, on a tag in Tehran or sentenced to lengthy jail terms, including Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe.

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Iranian teenager who posted distorted pictures of herself is jailed for 10 years

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Instagram star Sahar Tabar says she is still hoping for a pardon after conviction for corrupting young people

An Iranian woman who posted heavily distorted images of herself online has been sentenced to 10 years in jail, her lawyer has said, a year after she was arrested over her social media activities.

Sahar Tabar, 19, whose real name is Fatemeh Khishvand, came to prominence after posting images of herself with a gaunt, zombie-like face. At one point she had 486,000 followers on Instagram.

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