Iran News Round Up

A selection of the latest news stories and editorials published in Iranian news outlets, compiled by Ali Alfoneh, Ahmad Majidyar and Michael Rubin.  To receive this daily newsletter, please subscribe online.
 
(E) = Article in English 

Politics

• Parliamentary Speaker Ali Larijani says the budgetary committee’s plan to reject the government’s budget bill was not in the interest of the nation.
  • Najib Hosseini, parliamentarian, says Larijani's intervention and decision to pass the government's budget bill was influenced by the 5+1 negotiations.
• Fararu's readers comment on an article about the late Amir-Abbas Hoveyda, the Shah's longest serving prime minister who was executed by the revolutionary leadership in 1979:
  • "There is a friend who asks why he [Hoveyda] is being compared with the current officials… The current authorities who claim social justice have made inequalities so great and have engaged in such a degree of embezzlement that there is no comparison between them."
  • "Whatever he did, he did not betray his country and he did not flee; not even at the last day [of the regime of the Shah]."
  • "Just see what path we are following as even those executed in the past have become respectable."
  • "Time has finally shown who was right."
  • "In his era, people had a much better life with $7 per barrel oil price... May he rest in peace!"
  • "He would always send a signed card to the best university graduates..."
  • "Those who claim Hoveyda was a criminal should publish the list of his crimes so we too can discover them..."
  • "God bless him, during his premiership we had no idea what inflation meant..."
  • "Praise to Ahmadinejad for making the people say God bless Hoveyda!"
  • "The authorities should pay attention to why those executed have become so much admirable in the public mind."

Diplomacy

• Hojjat al-Eslam Rasoul Montajabnia comments on the attacks against Rafsanjani:
  • "What is at stake is the weakening of Mr. Hashemi [Rafsanjani's] position. In my opinion, social capital of the nation should not be attacked in such a way... The policy of the Islamic Republic is no to East and no to West. It does not mean that if we have not become Westerner, then we should become Easterner – meaning that if we do not want to be with the United States we should seek refuge in Russia and China... China is devouring our national capital and is exporting its worthless products to our country. We should choose a policy which makes us independent of the powers, but which is not adventurous. We should not seek war until our death."        
• Zohreh Elahian, parliamentarian, allegedly quoting Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi, says the wife and daughter of the Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan told Supreme Leader Khamenei in a meeting that Khamenei reminded them of the "Prophet of Islam." According to Salehi, Erdogan also told Khamenei: "I have not come here as a state authority, but as a student seeking his master."
  • Mashregh News reports that Erdogan's wife and daughter were so affected by the "spiritual personality" of Khamenei that they "cried for minutes" following their meeting.

Military and Security

• The Intelligence Ministry reports it has dissolved a large armed "Israeli terrorist ring" in Iran. 
• Mashregh News releases a short biography of the late Sadeq Ganji, the head of the Islamic Republic's Cultural Institute in Lahore, Pakistan. According to Mashregh News, Ganji was engaged in "exporting the Islamic revolution to Pakistan" but was assassinated by a terrorist group called "Sipah-e Sahaba".  
• Mashregh News commemorates the anniversary of the passing of Morteza Aviny, who had produced a movie on the Pakistani Shi'a.

Nuclear Issue

• Kayhan's editorial urges the 5+1 Group to make Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's fatwa [religious edict] against nuclear weapons the center of their negotiations with the Islamic Republic.

Economy

• According to Mehr News, Central Bank director Mahmoud Bahmani had resigned in protest against the government's withdrawal of funds from the banking system, but the government had not accepted Bahmani's resignation.
• Hadaf-e Eqtesad's economic panel concludes that the capital market in Iran is awaiting the result of the negotiations with the 5+1 Group.
• [E] Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Qassemi said the West's decades-long sanctions have failed to trouble Iran's up- or downstream oil industries since the country has grown self-sufficient and no one should think of sanctions any more.

Trade

• [E] Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Qassemi on Tuesday confirmed that the country has halted oil supplies to Greece.

Photo of the Day

• The youth in Bandar Abbas welcomes Ahmadinejad: "We are the unemployed youth!"