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

(E) = Article in English

Politics

Regional Developments

Diplomacy

Military and Security

  • Head of the Armed Forces General Staff MG Hassan Firouzabadi said that the United States fights in al-Qaeda’s favor in Syria and vaguely threatened regional countries supporting a Syrian strike:
  • Representative of the Supreme Leader in Gilan Province Ayatollah Zeinel Abedin Ghorbani threatened an attack against Israel following a Syrian strike:
    • “The Islamic Republic possesses very high deterrence ability in the region and the world.”
    • “With American and Western military instigation in the region, we will witness Israel’s erasure and [its] strategic points will be eliminated.”
      “With a war against Syria, the Middle East will be in flames.”
    • If America moves to attack Syria, Haifa and Tel Aviv will be wiped out.
    • “Jihad is not only in the path of fighting external enemies, rather it should be the Islamic government’s agenda in the path of combating social issues, the smuggling of goods and society’s instigators.”
  • ISNA reports that Law Enforcement Forces have intensified their crackdown on clothing morality law offenders in Tehran over the past few days.
  • Resalat Newspaper Editor in Chief stated, “Media are free in speech, unless they disrupt the Islamic system.” 
  • Fars News Agency Managing Director Nezamoddin Mousavi stated, “The media’s role in our society is amr-e be maroof va nahy az monkar [Islamic duty; Commanding good and forbidding evil].”
  • Representative of the Supreme Leader in the Martyr and Self-Sacrificers Affairs Foundation Hojjat al-Eslam Mohammad Hassan Rahimian reaffirmed Syria’s position in Iranian regional strategy:
    • “In Syria, they are seeking to eliminate the Axis of Resistance, but resistance against Israel will never end and Syria is an inseparable member of this axis.”
    • “According to the narrative of the Infallibles [12 Shi’a Imams], the world’s future belongs to Islam and this Islam is neither the American nor the Salafist Islam, rather it is the pure Mohammadean Islam that will be dominant in the world.”
    • “While the terrorists were defeated in confronting the Syrian Army, [now] their supporters seek to directly intervene and this demonstrates the obstacle for terrorists who commit crimes in the name of Islam.”
    • “In the course of history, the Iranian people have supported global freedom movements, and Syria is one of Iran’s friends and a member of the Axis of Resistance supported by the revolutionary and free Islamic Iran people.”
  • Artesh Khatam al-Anbia Air Defense Base Commander BG Amir Farzad Esmaili announced that the “base is always 100% ready” in case of a war in Syria

Nuclear Issue

Economy

  • Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh announced a reform in the “new generation of oil contracts” to attract foreign investment:
    • “Completion and coordination between the exploration chain, expansion and operationalization, increasing incentives for domestic and foreign investors and even the possibility of competition between Iranian and foreign contractors, in order to export technical and engineering services, will be the most important characteristics of Iranian oil contracts.”
    • Zanganeh acknowledged that these new contract conditions are not attractive for contractors in the current oil market, and that “we will use the capacities of a new generation of contracts to increase capital absorption of large global oil and gas companies and the domestic private sector.”
  • Chief of Staff to the President Mohammad Nahavandian announced that strengthening the private sector is one of the administration’s priorities and added, “If each economic institution creates an occupation opportunity in the second half of the year, a major spike in job creation will occur.”
  • Former Pars Oil and Gas Company Managing Director Mousa Souri considered the politicization of Southern Pars gas fields phase 11, lack of Chinese contractor CNPC technical capability, Chinese outlook toward sanctions, weakness of management in the Oil Minister and issues in monetary resources as causes for the delay of expansion in this phase. 
  • Tax Affairs Agency Direct Taxes Deputy Hossein Vakili announced that production institutions will be tax exempt until 2017, in order to increase capital and spur growth.  

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