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 subscribe to this daily newsletter, e-mail [email protected].

(E) = Article in English

Iranian officials accuse U.S., Israel of assassinating Iranian nuclear scientist; Rafsanjani condemns assassination of Mohammadi, but makes no allegations against foreign countries; Syria to increase import of natural gas from Iran; Mottaki in Tripoli for bilateral talks; Turkey voices opposition to likely new sanctions against Iran

Politics

• Office of Supreme Leader Khamenei releases a book on "the discord of 2009."

• Parleman News, referring to the late General Secretary of the Tudeh Communist Party's memoirs, reports that Kayhan editor Shariatmadari was an interrogator at Evin Prison prior to his appointment as editor.

Military and Security

• Intelligence Minister Moslehi says Iranian citizens have "spontaneously sent us video footage and photos from the Ashura unrest so we can identify those behind it."

• Arash Torabi, former employee at the President's Office, is condemned to ten years in prison for espionage.

• More reactions to assassination of nuclear physicist Ali Mohammadi:

  • Rafsanjani condemns, but does not make allegations against foreign enemies as perpetrators of the crime, warns instead against "a new round of conspiracies."

  • President Mohammad Khatami condemns "the evil hand which has perpetrated this crime," but fails to make mention of foreign enemies.

  • Speaker of the Parliament Ali Larijani says it is the Mossad and the CIA and not the Monarchist Association who are behind the assassination.

  • [E] Ahmadinejad says Israel was behind the assassination of the Iranian nuclear physics scientist in Tehran.

  • Despite the Revolutionary Guards' attempt to depict the late scientist Ali Mohamamdi as a regime supporter, JARAS documents that Mohammadi had signed an open letter criticizing the Revolutionary Guards and Law Enforcement Forces attack against Tehran University dormitory.

• The Foreign Ministry announces that contact with the 62 NGOs with which the Intelligence Ministry has prohibited contact is not forbidden.

• [E] An Iranian Foreign Ministry official says there is a hidden agenda behind the recent destabilizing measures on Iran's eastern borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Trade

• Syria to import more natural gas from Iran.

• [E] The National Iranian Gas Export Company (NIGEC) has signed a short-term agreement to import natural gas from neighboring Azerbaijan. "During the three-month period of the contract, the two sides will discuss another long-term agreement to import natural gas from Azerbaijan, up to 2 billion cubic meters per year," said NIGEC managing director Seyed Reza Kasaeizadeh.

• [E] Iran has urged Russia to make use of the two countries' national currencies instead of dollar in settling accounts for their joint projects, adding this measure would accelerate the implementation of giant projects.  

Religion, Society and Culture

• Ayatollah Bayat Zanjani answering one of his followers about whether it is heretical to refute the principle of the Guardianship of the Jurist: "The principle of the Guardianship of the Jurist is neither a pillar of the faith and nor a heresy to refute. Those claiming otherwise are innovators, and one must stop them...should a religious scholar make such a claim he will no longer be just and one can't follow his example at prayer."

• Following Ahmadinejad's Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei's statements about the Prophet Noah's "lack of ability to establish a just rule," Ayatollah Sadeghi Tehrani issues a fatwa announcing that appointing Mashaei to serve "in any position is haram."

Diplomacy

• [E] Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki arrived in Tripoli, Libya for a three-day visit to discuss ways to improve mutual cooperation between the two countries in different fields. Mottaki is heading a high-ranking politico-economic delegation in the visit made on the official invitation of his Libyan counterpart Musa Kusa.

Media

• Hemmat weekly banned by the Tehran judiciary for "spreading lies and disturbing the public opinion."

• According to JARAS, Mohammad Reza Heydari, second secretary at the Islamic Republic Embassy in Norway, is brother of TV anchor Morteza Heydari, who has vanished from Islamic Republic of Iran Voice and Vision.

Nuclear

• [E] The chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), Lieutenant General Ronald Burgess, says there is no evidence that Iran is planning to build nuclear weapons.

• [E] Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has voiced support for Iran’s nuclear program. "We do not want nuclear weapons in our region. But it would be unfair to ask one country not to obtain nuclear weapons while another country in the region already has them," the Turkish 'Zaman' daily quoted Erdogan as saying.

  • [E] Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Ankara is against imposing further sanctions on Iran over the country's nuclear program. "Every country has the right to pursue nuclear power for peaceful purposes," Davutoglu told the British daily Guardian during his recent visit to London. "We also don't want more sanctions [on Iran]. Sanctions hurt ordinary people and neighboring countries," he added, repeating a former Turkish offer to mediate negotiations between Tehran and the West. "We don't forget the very bad experience in Iraq. We would advise intensified negotiations through diplomacy. An absence of mutual trust is the problem," he said.

Photos of the Day

• Freed political prisoners pray with former President Mohammad Khatami.