Iran News Round Up

A selection of the latest news stories and editorials published in Iranian news outlets, compiled by AEI Critical Threats Project Iran Analyst Will Fulton. To receive this daily newsletter, please subscribe online.

(E) = Article in English

Politics

• Tehran Mayor and potential presidential candidate Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf met with sources of emulation and senior clerics in Qom.
• Senior cleric Ayatollah Abdollah Javadi Amoli met with Qalibaf and said:
  • "The measures you have taken in the city of Tehran and the city's management were very gratifying."
  • "In this world we have no one more savage than the West who buried 70 million people in World War [II]. [We] cannot look upon them with respect, they started world wars with their intellectuals and killed millions of people in the shortest time. Today their hands are on the atomic bomb trigger and are beginning these wars in Myanmar, Iraq, and other countries. Who can be more savage than them?" 
  • "In World War I Iran surrendered because there was no religion. In World War II and the shameful [1953 coup] it surrendered because religion did not have a presence. But when Imam [Khomeini], the mosque, seminaries, and the people came to the field, they [the West] surrendered and whatever Islamic Iran said they [obeyed]."
• Qalibaf met with senior cleric Grand Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani and Qom Friday Prayer Leader Ayatollah Ebrahim Amini and received their endorsements. Hamedani said, "Candidates in future elections must be individuals who are courageous, cultured, and valor-creating and can resolve economic, inflation, unemployment, [rising prices], and international issues."
• Senior cleric Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi met with Qalibaf and said, "perhaps many of your measures were outside the mayoral gamut, but when you saw that there were works that did not have trustees or weren't addressed by their trustees you entered the field and took responsibility and this is a very good job."
• Tehran Interim Friday Prayer Leader Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami commented on presidential candidate qualifications and reacted to the Boston Marathon bombings:
  • "Western support of a candidate will [erase] his credibility with the people."
  • "Today we say to the clear and awake consciences in the world, Europe, and America...[after seeing] how bad insecurity is and how terrible killing innocent humans is, you [Westerners should] answer your consciences and request from your officials to halt the flow of arms to Syria."

Military and Security

• Chief of the Armed Forces General Staff MG Hassan Firouzabadi dismissed American and Israeli military threats against Iran:
  • "We have confidence in our forces. We can defend not just Iran but the entire region."
  • "In the Almaty negotiations, Iran spoke from a position of logic and reason but they [the West] did not have anything to say regarding these rational Iranian positions and this was a strategic defeat for them in these negotiations."
  • "After this, they came and spoke more boldly and said that the military option is on the table. But this does not mean that there is a military threat. They have this option alongside tens of other options so that  they can say that a war could take place, but we do not imagine this war [to happen] in the future. We know these matters to be curses that are said after backing down from a fight because they had nothing to say against Iran's logic during negotiations."
  • "The Islamic Republic of Iran will not send soldiers and equipment across the border. Our support of the resistance is political, technological, training, and formal."
• Senior Military Advisor and Assistant to the Supreme Leader MG Yahya Rahim Safavi said, "manager training in various capacities is one of the most important current needs of the country."
• Senior Adviser to the Supreme Leader Artesh MG Mohammad Salimi said, "The enemy will be defeated in its [measures] to weaken the Islamic revolution." 

Nuclear Issue

• A source close to the Iranian negotiation team told Press TV that Iran and the IAEA have not reached an agreement about a date for the next round of negotiations.

Economy

• Deputy Oil Minister Ali Reza Zeighami stated, "[Last year's] average daily gasoline and gas oil consumption, respectively, reached 63.4 and 96 million liters per day, which is approximately 2 million liters more than current oil refinery production capacity." He added, "It is predicted that the consumption of these two oil products will be managed [after] a price increase."
• National Gas Company CEO announced Iran will begin exporting gas to Iraq in July and, also, that a gas export contract with Switzerland has been finalized.

Photo of the Day

• Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf meets with sources of emulation in Qom.