Iran's Javad Zarif Accuses Israel and US of Seeking War

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COM - Iran's foreign minister on Sunday accused Israel of looking for war and warned that its actions and those of the United States were increasing the chances of a clash in the region.

Addressing the Munich Security Conference, Mohammad Javad Zarif, also criticized the U.S. administration after Vice President Mike Pence this week called on European powers to pullout of the nuclear deal with Iran. Zarif urged France, Germany and Britain to do more to save that accord.

"Certainly, some people are looking for war... Israel," Zarif said. "The risk [of war] is great. The risk will be even greater if you continue to turn a blind eye to severe violations of international law."

Accusing Israel of violating international law after bombing campaigns in Syria, Zarif criticized European powers for not calling out Israel and the United States for their behavior in the region.

"Israeli behavior is putting international law on the shelf, U.S. behavior is putting international law on the shelf," he said.

Speaking to his Cabinet on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Iranian belligerence was the main destabilising factor in the entire Middle East.

"We must deny Iran nuclear weaponry and block its military entrenchment in Syria. We will continue taking constant action to ensure Israel's security," he said in remarks broadcast on Israeli media.

Europe falling short

Vice President Pence on Friday accused Iran of Nazi-like anti-Semitism, maintaining his harsh rhetoric against Tehran just a day he attacked European powers for trying to undermine U.S. sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

Zarif said the U.S. had an "unhealthy" and "pathological obsession" with Iran and accused Pence of trying to bully his allies.

"All in the name of containing Iran, the U.S. claims, and some blindly parrot, that it is Iran that is interfering in the region, but has it been asked whose region?" Zarif said.

"Look at the map, the U.S. military has traveled 10,000 kilometers to dot all our borders with its bases. There is a joke that it is Iran that put itself in the middle of U.S. bases."

Zarif, who said Iran was committed to the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers for now, also accused France, Britain and Germany of not doing enough to ensure Tehran received the economic benefits of that accord.

These three countries this month set up the Instrument In Support Of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX), a new channel for non-dollar trade with Iran to avoid U.S. sanctions. But diplomats say it is unlikely to allow the big transactions that Tehran says it needs to keep a nuclear deal afloat.

Washington's major European allies opposed last year's decision by U.S. President Donald Trump to abandon the deal, which also includes China and Russia, under which international sanctions on Iran were lifted in return for Tehran accepting curbs on its nuclear program.

"INSTEX falls short of commitments by the E3 [France, Germany, Britain] to save the nuclear deal," Zarif said. "Europe needs to be willing to get wet if it wants to swim against the dangerous tide of U.S. unilateralism." (VOA)

Iran Government Faces Angry Online Backlash Over Activists' Abuse Claims

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COm - In early January, labor activist Esmail Bakhshi posted a letter on Instagram saying he had been tortured in jail, attracting support from tens of thousands of Iranians online.

Bakhshi, who said he was still in pain, also challenged the intelligence minister, a cleric, to a public debate about the religious justification for torture. Late last month, Bakhshi was rearrested.

Sepideh Qoliyan, a journalist covering labor issues in the Ahvaz region, was also rearrested on the same day after saying on social media that she had been abused in jail.

Bakhshi's allegations of torture and the social media furor that followed led Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to call for an investigation, and the intelligence minister subsequently met with a parliamentary committee to discuss the case, a rare example of top officials being prompted to act by a public backlash online.

"Each sentence and description of torture from the mouths of #Sepideh_Qoliyan and #Esmail_Bakhshi should be remembered and not forgotten because they are now alone with the torturers and under pressure and defenseless. Let us not forget," a user named Atish posted on Twitter in Farsi on Feb. 11.

"When thousands of people share it on social media, the pressure for accountability goes up," said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director at the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran. "Sham investigations won't put it to rest. Social media is definitely becoming a major, major public square in Iran."

Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi said last month, without naming Bakhshi, that allegations of torture online constitute a crime.

His comments follow growing pressure from officials to close Instagram, which has about 24 million users in Iran. Iran last year shut down the Telegram messaging app, which had about 40 million users in the country, citing security concerns.

"Today you see in cyberspace that with the posting of a film or lie or rumor the situation in the country can fall apart," Dolatabadi said, according to the Iranian Students' News Agency.

"You saw in recent days that they spread a rumor and announced the rape of an individual or claimed suicide and recently you even saw claims of torture and all the powers in the country get drawn in. Today cyberspace has been transformed into a very broad platform for committing crimes."

Arab population

The arrests of Bakhshi and Qoliyan are part of a crackdown in Ahvaz, center of Iran's Arab population. Hundreds of activists there pushing for workers' and minority rights, two of the most contentious issues in Iran, have been detained in recent weeks.

The Arab minority in southwest Iran has long claimed that it faces discrimination from the central government. Frustration has occasionally turned into violence: in 2005 the city was struck by bomb attacks for which government sources blame Arab separatist groups.

Last autumn, gunmen killed 25 people, including 12 Revolutionary Guards, in Ahvaz. Islamic State and an Arab separatist group both claimed responsibility. Officials vowed revenge and hundreds of people were arrested.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber killed 27 Revolutionary Guards in southeast Iran, where the Baluch minority shares the same grievances as the Arab community: government neglect and discrimination.

"The general situation with regard to human rights in Iran is reaching a crisis point," said Mansoureh Mills, Iran researcher for Amnesty International. "This wave of arrests of Ahvazi Arabs is one part of the Iranian authorities waging a year-long campaign to completely crush dissent."

Two of Abbas Zahiri's brothers were among many people arrested on the day of the Ahvaz attack. They were accused of taking video footage on their phones near the scene and are currently in jail, in poor health, according to Zahiri.

"They are under pressure to confess their links to those who carried out the attack," Zahiri, 18, told Reuters from Ahvaz.

In recent weeks, several activists in Ahvaz have been sentenced to death on security charges, according to their families and human rights groups.

Abdollah Marmazi, an Arab rights activist, was arrested last autumn on security charges after the Ahvaz attack. He was not allowed to see his lawyer or contact his family for months, his sister Amal said in an interview from London. Last month, he was sentenced to death.

Their brother Hatam, also an Arab rights activist, was killed in jail after being arrested last summer, according to Amal. "My family has no hope of seeing him again," she said.

"They believe he is dead."

Judiciary offices in Ahvaz and Tehran said nobody was available to comment.

Human rights

Amnesty documented the arrest in 2018 of more than 7,000 "protesters, students, journalists, environmental activists, workers and human rights defenders, including lawyers, women's rights activists, minority rights activists and trade unionists."

Bakhshi and Qoliyan were initially arrested last November after attending a gathering of workers from the Haft Tapeh sugar cane factory who were demanding unpaid wages.

Hundreds of workers from an Ahvaz steel mill were protesting about unpaid wages at the same time. Authorities feared that the labor protests could dovetail with grievances of minority rights activists and cause further unrest, analysts and activists said.

Labour activists elsewhere in the country went online to support the protesting Ahvaz workers.

Both Bakhshi and Qoliyan turned to social media to detail the abuse they said they faced in custody after they were released in December. Bakshi wrote in Jan. 4 on Instagram that security agents beat him "to the edge of death."

"Today, after the passing of approximately two months from that difficult day I still feel pain in my broken ribs, kidneys, left ear and testicles," Bakshi wrote. The post was shared thousands of times on social media.

After Rouhani's call for an investigation, parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy commission met Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi on Jan. 8. Alavi denied Bakhshi had been tortured, the spokesman for the parliamentary committee, Ali Najafi Khoshroodi, told the Tasnim news agency.

The government did not announce any further investigation of Bakhshi's allegations, an indication that the meeting may have been largely symbolic, analysts say.

Iranian state TV aired a report on Jan. 19 in which Bakhshi and Qoliyan admitted having ties with individuals and groups outside the country planning to overthrow the Islamic Republic.

Rights groups say the videos were false confessions recorded under duress. Bakhshi and Qoliyan were rearrested a day after the broadcast.

Their arrests demonstrate Rouhani's inability to rein in the intelligence ministry, where Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has the final say.

Still, the ministry's role in arrests in Ahvaz and elsewhere has dented Rouhani's pragmatic reputation, analysts say.

"People are not going to look to Rouhani as an alternative to the more hardline elements like the Revolutionary Guards or the people who control the judiciary," Ghaemi said. "This is going to put Rouhani and his administration squarely in the camp of hardliners that he has tried so hard to distinguish himself from." (Reuters/VOA)

Iranian Defense Minister Claims Tehran Tested a New Long-Range Ballistic Missile

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COM - Iran is claiming to have fired a new long-range ballistic missile - dubbed the Hoveiseh - capable of hitting a target 1,300km away. Tehran claims that its ballistic missile program is intended solely for defensive purposes. A U.N. Security Council resolution called on Iran to stop work on ballistic missiles capable of carrying a nuclear warhead for a period of up to 8 years.

Iranian state TV showed Defense Minister Amir Hatami unveiling what he says is a new 1,300km long-range ballistic missile at a ceremony, which was part of celebrations to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The TV channel also showed video of missiles being fired to support the defense minister's claim that the new longer-range Hoveiseh missile had been successfully test-fired. VOA could not independently confirm if the video represented the missile's actual test-firing.

Reuter's news agency quoted Amirali Hajizadeh, head of Iran's Revolutionary Guard's aerospace division, as saying that Iranian engineers had surmounted initial obstacles in building engines for its cruise missiles, and can now produce a complete range of such missiles. Western experts have frequently accused Iran of exaggerating claims about its military capabilities.

U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran in May of last year, accusing Tehran, among other things, of working to develop its long-range ballistic missile program. Iran insists that its ballistic missile program was not part of the 2015 deal with the U.S., France, Britain, Germany, China and Russia.

A separate U.N. Security Council resolution did, however, call on Iran to halt work on ballistic missiles designed to carry a nuclear payload for up to eight years. Tehran insists that its missile program is purely defensive and not designed to launch nuclear weapons.

Hilal Khashan, who teaches political science at the American University of Beirut, tells VOA that the just-announced Iranian missile launch comes in the wake of a European announcement to put together a mechanism to circumvent U.S. economic sanctions on Iran, which went into effect on November 4. Khashan thinks the new missile is simply a "negotiating ploy."

"Knowing how they operate, I think they want to negotiate. On the one hand they tell their people that 'we are sovereign and independent and don't accept foreign dictates,' and on the other hand this (appears to be) an invitation to the Europeans to negotiate with them."

Professor Khashan argues that Iran may be looking for a face-saving way to "reach an understanding" over its missile program. Iran, he points out, has indicated that it "would not allow the range of its missiles to exceed a range of 2,000km."

"I think," he says, "that they want to negotiate with the Europeans." The new Hoveiseh missile has a stated range of 1,300km.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani recently admitted that his country was under serious economic pressure due to the November 2018 economic sanctions imposed by the US. (VOA)

Prosecutor: American Held in Iran on Security-Related Charges

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.CO - A U.S. Navy veteran detained in Iran in July is being held in connection to a “private complaint,” the semi-official Mehr news agency reported Friday.

Michael White, 46, has been held since July, and is the first known American to have been detained in Iran since Donald Trump became president. His family says he traveled to Iran to visit his girlfriend, whom he met online, and was arbitrarily detained.

The Friday report quoted prosecutor Gholamali Sadeghi as saying the case is still “under investigation,” without elaborating. He did not confirm reports that the man faces security charges. Under Iranian law, a private complaint would refer to allegations made by a citizen, not the state.

Trump has pursued a maximalist campaign against Tehran that includes pulling out of its nuclear deal with world powers. Iran in the past has detained Westerners and dual nationals to use them as leverage in negotiations.

Navy veteran

Joanne White, the detainee’s mother, issued a statement earlier this month calling on the Trump administration to secure his release. She said he was undergoing cancer treatment and feared he would not survive prolonged detention.

Michael White worked as a cook for the Navy and left the service about a decade ago, according to a spokesman for the family, who insisted White was not a spy and had never been one. The spokesman, Jonathan Franks, said White had recently worked as a janitor.

Others detained

There are at least four other known American citizens being held in Iran.

Iranian-American Siamak Namazi and his 82-year-old father Baquer are both serving 10-year sentences on espionage charges. Iranian-American art dealer Karan Vafadari and his Iranian wife, Afarin Neyssari, received 27-year and 16-year prison sentences, respectively. Chinese-American graduate student Xiyue Wang was sentenced to 10 years in prison for allegedly “infiltrating” the country while doing doctoral research on Iran’s Qajar dynasty.

Iranian-American Robin Shahini was released on bail in 2017 after staging a hunger strike while serving an 18-year prison sentence for “collaboration with a hostile government.” Shahini is believed to still be in Iran.

Also in an Iranian prison is Nizar Zakka, a U.S. permanent resident from Lebanon who advocated for internet freedom and has done work for the U.S. government. He was sentenced to 10 years on espionage-related charges.

Former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who vanished in Iran in 2007 while on an unauthorized CIA mission, remains missing as well. Iran says that Levinson is not in the country and that it has no further information about him, but his family holds Tehran responsible for his disappearance. (VOA)

Iran Summons Swiss Envoy Over Detention of US-Born TV Anchor

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COM - Iran's Foreign Ministry has summoned the Swiss envoy in Tehran over the "illegal" detention of an American-born anchorwoman on Iranian state television.

The Tuesday report by the official IRNA news agency quotes Bahram Ghasemi, ministry spokesman, as saying Tehran lodged a "strong protest" over the detention of Marzieh Hashemi in a meeting with the Swiss ambassador. The Embassy of Switzerland looks after Washington's interests in Tehran.

Ghasemi said Iran also demanded Hashemi's "unconditional" release.

Hashemi has been detained as a material witness, though it's unclear for which case, and has appeared twice before a U.S. District Court judge.

Hashemi has been in custody since last week. Officials said she was expected to be released immediately after her testimony is completed, but it's not clear when that would be. (VOA)

US: Upcoming Mideast Conference Not Aimed at Demonizing Iran

WASHINGTON, LELEMUKU.COM - The United States said Tuesday an international conference next month to promote peace and stability in the Middle East is not aimed at demonizing Iran.

U.S. deputy ambassador Jonathan Cohen told the Security Council that the conference in Warsaw on Feb. 13-14 sponsored by the United States and Poland is also not aimed at discussing the merits of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal known as the JCPOA, which U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018.

Cohen's comments followed a tweet by Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif who denounced the upcoming conference as America's anti-Iran "circus." Poland's foreign minister Jacek Czaputowicz said in remarks published Monday that Iran wasn't invited and Russia would not attend.

Cohen called the ministerial meeting a brainstorming session to "develop the outline of a stronger security architecture" in the Mideast with sessions on the humanitarian crises in Syria and Yemen, missile development, extremism and cybersecurity.

"It's also important to state clearly what this ministerial is not: It is not a forum to re-litigate the merits of the JCPOA. While we've made our concerns with the JCPOA clear, we respect other states' decisions to support it," he said. "It is also not a venue to demonize or attack Iran."

Cohen said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo "has outlined a clear strategy to reach a new comprehensive deal with Iran built on the shared global understanding that Iran must cease its destabilizing activities."

But the U.S. envoy said the conference will acknowledge the need for action against Iran's missile program, Iranian proxy Hezbollah's tunnels from Lebanon into Israel, and the "unacceptably provocative act by the Iranian and Syrian regimes" in launching a rocket from Syria at Israel over the weekend.

Cohen said these activities, among others, are "drivers of instability in the Middle East, but the scope of the discussion will be much broader than any one country or set of issues."

"As a testament to this, countries from around the world have been invited to participate," he said.

Cohen said there will be "a dynamic discussion and collaborative thinking with the goal of contributing to a more peaceful, stable and prosperous Middle East," adding that this would be "a more productive approach" than the Security Council's monthly Mideast meetings focusing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. (VOA)

Germany Bans Iran's Mahan Air amid Security Concerns

BERLIN, LELEMUKU.COM - Germany has banned Iran's Mahan Air from landing in the country with immediate effect, citing security concerns and the airline's involvement in Syria, officials said Monday.

Mahan Air is on a U.S. sanctions list and Washington has long urged allies to ban the airline from their territory.

The decision to ban it came after consultations with European allies and the U.S., Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert told reporters.

"It cannot be ruled out that this airline carries out transports to Germany that affect our security concerns," he said.

"This is especially true against the backdrop of terrorist activities, intelligence on terrorist activities from the Iranian side and Iranian entities in Europe in the past."

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo welcomed the German decision.

"The airline transports weapons and fighters across the Middle East, supporting the Iranian regime's destructive ambitions around the region," he said in a tweet. "We encourage all our allies to follow suit."

The airline had several weekly flights between Tehran and German cities.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Christofer Burger said the decision was taken to safeguard Germany's "foreign and security policy interests," citing increasing evidence of Iranian intelligence activity in Europe.

In addition, he said the airline has ties to Iran's Revolutionary Guard and provides military transport flights to Syria. Iran has supported Syria's President Bashar Assad.

The move comes at a time of particularly sensitive relations with Iran. Germany plays a large role in trying to salvage the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran after U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to unilaterally pull out last year.

It was the latest of several issues, however, that have caused friction.

Among other things, German prosecutors said last week they had detained a 50-year-old German-Afghan dual citizen who had worked as a translator for the army on suspicion he had been spying for Iran.

Iran's Foreign Ministry dismissed the allegations on the weekend, saying that "enemies" were aiming to "sour relations" between Iran and Europe.

And last year, Germany's central bank changed its conditions allowing it to block transfers unless it receives assurances a transaction doesn't violate financial sanctions or money-laundering rules - prompting Iran to rescind a request to repatriate 300 million euros ($341 million) from a Hamburg-based bank. (VOA)

Islamic State Signals Re-Emergence in Parts of Iraq

BAGHDAD, LELEMUKU.COM - While this month marks the first anniversary of the Iraqi-proclaimed victory over the Islamic State (IS) terror group, U.S.-backed Iraqi forces are still trying to hunt down remaining IS militants as the extremist group returns to its insurgent roots.

In a televised address on December 9, 2017, former Iraqi prime minister Haider al-Abadi announced the defeat of IS and the end of Iraqi campaign to recapture its territory.

While many considered IS obliterated following the declaration, recent reports show the militant group is still active in parts of the country and increasingly has been assassinating important figures, bombing Iraqi forces and kidnapping civilians.

On Tuesday, security forces said IS militants disguised in Iraqi uniforms entered al-Amrini, 20 kilometers south of Mosul, and killed its "mukhtar," or leader, al-ShaeikhRaghib Abid al-Hadial-Badrani. His tribesmen protested the killing, saying the lack of Iraqi army patrols gave IS militants free mobility in Nineveh province villages.

AhmadHazmal-Badrani, a spokesman for the Sunni tribe, said the village head was sleeping when IS fighters broke into his home.

"They took him from his bedroom and walked him outside his house for 100 meters before shooting him," al-Badranisaid.

Sunni tribal force

During the Iraqi campaign to recapture Mosul last year, the al-Badranitribe had a local force of nearly 600 members fighting alongside the Sunni Tribal Mobilization Forces against IS. The Iraqi government later dismantled the force.

"We hold security forces of Nineveh accountable for the recent breaches in our area. We ask them to arm us if they are not able to contain the situation," the spokesman told VOA.

The killing of al-Badraniwas not an isolated attack. Iraqi village heads have found themselves the targets of IS militants for months.

Michael Knights, an Iraq military analyst and senior fellow at the Washington Institute, told VOA his research showed that IS insurgents have killed an average of 8.4 village heads per month since January 2018.

“ISISfighters see villages as easier targets because they know big cities like Mosul are well-guarded by security forces, and residents, who are very disillusioned by IS destruction, will easily report them," Knights said, using an acronym for Islamic State.

Smaller communities feel less protected and are less keen on cooperating with security forces, he said.

"Village members knowISIScan walk into their village anytime, kill the most important person there and leave," Knights said.

Knights said the Iraqi government needs to recruit local community members to protect the safety of those isolated villages.

IS regrouping

Iraqi officials say the IS attempt to regroup in Iraq and resize areas is not a surprise and their forces are well-prepared to prevent such moves.

Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi in a press conference last month warned that hundreds of IS militants in Syria's eastern province of Deir el-Zourwere attempting to cross into Iraq.

"Iraqi forces are carrying out their duties to pre-empt any attempts by ISIS to infiltrate the border and cross into Iraq," Abdul-Mahdi told reporters.

There are no official data from the Iraqi government on IS remnants in the country. A recent report from Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said the group might still have 20,000 to 30,000 militants in Iraq and Syria, with an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 in Iraq.

According to the CSIS report, The Islamic State and the Persistent Threat of Extremism in Iraq, IS attacks against Iraqi government targets increased from 2017 to 2018. It said the group was still claiming an average of 78 attacks per month in Iraq — higher than the average for 2016 but lower than 2017.

Disputed territories

MaxwellMarkusen, the author of the report, told VOA his findings showed IS insurgency had been particularly sustained in disputed territories, with the number of attacks more than doubling in Kirkuk province from 2017 to 2018.

The vast disputed area, consisting of Kirkuk and parts of Nineveh, Saladin and Diyala provinces, has been a point of high contention between the central government and the Kurdistan Regional Government for decades. The Kurdish Peshmerga forces were forced out of the territories shortly after a Kurdish referendum for independence was held in September 2017. The two sides then stoppedjoint counter-IS operations.

"The ability of Iraqi forces to conduct targeted raids in disputed territories is in my opinion the most important element of the mission to press any IS activity,"Markusensaid."If you look at what's going on rightnow,there are very limited operations and the ability of the government to target IS has been significantly reduced. …Ifit's really to be attributed to one thing, it is likely the lack of joint patrols that haven't taken place since October 2017."

The role of Iranian-backed Shiite militias in exacerbating Shiite-Sunni tensions and the failure of the Iraqi government to address factors that contribute to instability, such as slow reconstruction of war-torn areas, economic stagnation and corruption, are also among useful recruiting tools for a sectarian-fueled IS insurgency, he said.

"I think that it is going to get worse if there is a failure to address the political issues in Kirkuk,” and the rebuilding inNineveh, Saladin and other parts ofIraq thathave been decimated will take longer, he said. (VOA)

Iran Vows to Close Key Strait if US Cuts Off Oil Exports

TEHRAN, LELEMUKU.COM - Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Tuesday repeated his threat to close the Strait of Hormuz, the passageway for nearly a third of all oil traded by sea, if the U.S. shuts off Iran's oil exports.

State TV quoted Rouhani as saying that “if someday, the United States decides to block Iran's oil (exports), no oil will be exported from the Persian Gulf.”

The strait at the mouth of the Persian Gulf is crucial to global energy supplies.

Rouhani also pledged that the United States would not be able to prevent Iran from exporting its crude.

Rouhani has made similar threats in the months since President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the 2015 nuclear deal and began restoring sanctions. Trump has vowed to eventually cut off all Iranian oil exports, but the administration has given waivers to several countries.

The tough talk from Rouhani, a relative moderate, has meanwhile been warmly received by his domestic hardline rivals.

Brian Hook, the U.S. representative for Iran policy, dismissed Rouhani's threat, noting that Iran does not control the Strait of Hormuz.

“The strait is an international waterway. The United States will continue to work with our partners to ensure freedom of navigation and the free flow of commerce in international waterways." (VOA)