Iran demands lifting sanctions

Indirect talks between Iran and the United States on salvaging the 2015 Iran nuclear deal resumed with Tehran focusing on one side of the original bargain, lifting sanctions against it, despite scant progress on reining in its atomic activities.

The seventh round of talks, the first under Iran's new hard-line President Ebrahim Raisi, ended after adding some new Iranian demands to a working text. Western powers said progress was too slow and negotiators had ‘weeks not months’ left before the 2015 deal becomes meaningless.

Little remains of that deal, which lifted sanctions against Tehran in exchange for restrictions on its atomic activities. Then-President Donald Trump pulled Washington out of it in 2018, re-imposing US sanctions, and Iran later breached many of the deal's nuclear restrictions and kept pushing well beyond them.

"If we work hard in the days and weeks ahead we should have a positive result.... It's going to be very difficult; it's going to be very hard. Difficult political decisions have to be taken both in Tehran and in Washington," the talks' coordinator, European Union envoy Enrique Mora, told a news conference.

He was speaking shortly after a meeting of the remaining parties to the deal - Iran, Russia, China, France, Britain, Germany and the European Union - formally kicked off the round.

"There is a sense of urgency in all delegations that this negotiation has to be finished in a relatively reasonable period of time. Again, I wouldn't put limits but we are talking about weeks, not about months," Mora said.

Iran refuses to meet directly with US officials, meaning that other parties must shuttle between the two sides. The United States has repeatedly expressed frustration at this format, saying it slows down the process, and Western officials still suspect Iran is simply playing for time.

The 2015 deal extended the time Iran would need to obtain enough fissile material for a nuclear bomb, if it chose to, to at least a year from around two to three months. Most experts say that time is now less than before the deal; though Iran says it only wants to master nuclear technology for civil uses.

"The most important issue for us is to reach a point where, firstly, Iranian oil can be sold easily and without hindrance," Iranian media quoted Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian as saying.

Iran insists all US sanctions must be lifted before steps are taken on the nuclear side, while Western negotiators say nuclear and sanctions steps must be balanced.

US sanctions have slashed Iran's oil exports, its main revenue source. Tehran does not disclose data, but assessments based on shipping and other sources suggest a fall from about 2.8 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2018 to as low as 200,000 bpd.

Mora said he decided to reconvene the talks during many officials' holidays between Christmas and the New Year so as not to lose time, but he added that talks would stop for three days as of Friday "because the facilities will not be available", referring to the luxury hotel hosting most meetings.

When the seventh round wrapped up, incorporating some Iranian demands, negotiators from France, Britain and Germany said in a statement: "This only takes us back nearer to where the talks stood in June", when the previous round ended.

"We are rapidly reaching the end of the road for this negotiation," they added.

 

OPEC Plus to add 400,000 bpd oil production in February

OPEC Plus decided on Tuesday to add another 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) to its total oil production in February. The move was widely expected by the market, but oil prices rose 1% just after the meeting concluded

At the end of a very short ministerial meeting, the cartel did not deviate from its current plan to ease the production cuts by 400,000 bpd each month until it unwinds all the supply curbs. The move was widely expected by the market, and oil prices were up by around 1% just after news of the decision broke.

Before the meeting started, Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, officially closed the previous meeting from December 2, which OPEC Plus had left in session, signaling it could revisit last month’s decision to raise production by 400,000 bpd in January if Omicron hits global oil demand hard.

At 33 days, the meeting that opened on December 2 was the longest ever, at least on paper, in the history of OPEC and OPEC Plus.

The meeting opened and closed and didn’t produce any surprises about the OPEC+ group’s immediate oil supply policy. The cartel is anticipated to continue to raise production by 400,000 bpd in February and extend the compensation period until June 2022.

During the meeting, non-OPEC producer Kazakhstan was called out for its low compliance with the cuts, and was pressured to improve its conformity level, Amena Bakr, Deputy Bureau Chief and Chief OPEC Correspondent at Energy Intelligence, reported, citing delegates.

Days before Tuesday’s meeting, the general market sentiment, and expectations were that the cartel would likely proceed with its oil production policy of the past few months by deciding to add another 400,000 bpd to production quotas in February.

The next meeting of OPEC Plus is scheduled to be held on February 2, 2022 when the group is expected to decide production levels for March. 

Israel made efforts to derail Pakistan nuclear program

Reportedly, Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad is suspected of detonating bombs and issuing threats to German and Swiss companies in the 1980s that helped Pakistan in its nascent nuclear weapons program.

Lately, the prominent Swiss daily Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) reported on the findings. According to the paper, “The suspicion that the Mossad might be behind the attacks and threats soon arose. For Israel, the prospect that Pakistan, for the first time, could become an Islamic state with an atomic bomb posed an existential threat.”

The paper reported that Pakistan and Iran worked closely together in the 1980s on the construction of nuclear weapons devices. According to the NZZ, the intensive work of companies from Germany and Switzerland in aiding Iran’s nuclear program “has been relatively well researched.”

The paper quoted the Swiss historian Adrian Hänni who said the Mossad was likely involved in the bomb attacks of Swiss and German companies added, there was no “smoking gun” to prove the Mossad carried out the attacks.

The Organization for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in South Asia, a previously unknown entity, claimed credit for the explosions in Switzerland and Germany.

The NZZ reports on the role of the late Pakistani nuclear scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan’s atomic weapons program. He crisscrossed Europe during the 1980s to secure technology and blueprints from Western institutions and companies. The paper wrote that Khan met in a Zurich hotel with a delegation of Iran’s Organization for Atomic Energy in 1987.  The Iranian delegation was led by the engineer Masud Naraghi, the chief of Iran’s nuclear energy commission.

Two German engineers, Gotthard Lerch and Heinz Mebus, along with Naraghi, who earned his PhD in the USA, met with Khan’s group in Switzerland. Additional meetings took place in Dubai.

With the fast-moving efforts by Pakistan to jumpstart its nuclear weapons program, the US government sought, without success, to get the German and Swiss governments to crack down on companies in their countries that were aiding Pakistan. Suspected Mossad agents allegedly took action in Switzerland and Germany against the companies and engineers involved in aiding Pakistan.

According to the NZZ, “A few months after the unsuccessful intervention of the US State Department in Bonn and Bern, unknown perpetrators carried out explosive attacks on three of these companies: on February 20, 1981 on the house of a leading employee of Cora Engineering Chur; on May 18, 1981  on the factory building of the Wälischmiller company in Markdorf;  and finally, on November 06, 1981, on the engineering office of Heinz Mebus in Erlangen. All three attacks resulted in only property damage, only Mebus's dog was killed.”

The paper highlighted, “The explosives attacks were accompanied by several phone calls in which strangers threatened other delivery companies in English or broken German. Sometimes the caller would order the threats to be taped. ‘The attack that we carried out against the Wälischmiller company could happen to you too’ - this is how the Leybold-Heraeus administration office was intimidated.

Siegfried Schertler, the owner of VAT at the time, and his head salesman Tinner were called several times on their private lines. Schertler also reported to the Swiss Federal Police that the Israeli secret service had contacted him. This emerges from the investigation files, which the NZZ was able to see for the first time.”

Schertler said an employee of the Israeli embassy in Germany named David, contacted the VAT executive. The company head said that David urged him to stop ‘these businesses’ regarding nuclear weapons and switch to the textile business.

Swiss and German companies derived significant profits from their business with the Khan nuclear weapons network. The NZZ reported “Many of these suppliers, mainly from Germany and Switzerland, soon entered into business worth millions with Pakistan. Leybold-Heraeus, Wälischmiller, Cora Engineering Chur, Vakuum-Apparate-Technik (VAT, with the chief buyer Friedrich Tinner) or the Buchs metal works, to name a few. They benefited from an important circumstance. The German and Swiss authorities interpreted their dual-use provisions very generously. Most of the components that are required for uranium enrichment, for example, high-precision vacuum valves, are primarily used for civil purposes.”

The NZZ reported that recently the National Security Archive in Washington published diplomatic correspondence from the US State Department from Bonn and Bern in 1980.

“This shows how the US resented the two countries' casual handling of the delicate deliveries to Pakistan. In a note from an employee, Bern's behavior was described as a ‘hands-off approach’ - the local authorities were accordingly accused of turning a blind eye. In the now released dispatches, which were previously classified as secret, those companies are listed for the first time that the US has accused of supporting the Pakistani nuclear weapons program with their deliveries. The list included around half a dozen companies each from Germany and Switzerland.”

 

 

Who hacked The Jerusalem Post website?

According to a report by The Jerusalem Post, its website was hacked by pro-Iranian hackers in the early hours of Monday morning, with a photo of a model Dimona nuclear facility being blown up and the text "we are close to you where you do not think about it" in English and Hebrew placed on the Twitter and website. 

It is unclear if the hackers were from Iran or supporters from outside the country or if they were state-sponsored.

The photo also showed a ballistic missile falling from what appears to be a representation of the hand of Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani. Sunday night marked the second anniversary of the US assassination of Soleimani in Baghdad in 2020.

The tweet with the photo on Maariv's Twitter account has since been removed, as well as a retweet of an account with the handle @ShiaEagle including an illustration of Soleimani and Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis (who was assassinated alongside Soleimani). The @ShiaEagle account, created in the summer of 2021, has since been suspended as well.

From the inspect tool on Google Chrome, it appears the hackers managed to edit the SEO keywords of the Jerusalem Post website.

The newspaper wrote, “The Iranian people have more pressing issues at hand than the clumsy attempts at propaganda.”

This isn't the first time The Jerusalem Post has been targeted.

In May 2020, pro-Iranian hackers replaced the site's homepage with an illustration of Tel Aviv burning as then Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu swam for a life preserver with the words "Be ready for a big surprise." A number of additional Israeli websites were targeted in the attack then as well. 

Yemeni rebels seize UAE ship

According to an AP news, Yemen’s Houthi rebels seized an Emirati-flagged ship in the Red Sea on Monday. In another latest sign of Mideast turmoil hackers targeted a major Israeli newspaper’s website to mark the killing of a top Iranian general in 2020

The seizure of the Rwabee marks the latest assault in the Red Sea, a crucial route for international trade and energy shipments. The Iranian-backed Houthis acknowledged the incident off the coast of Hodeida, a long-contested prize of the grinding war in Yemen.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the hacking of The Jerusalem Post. The hackers replaced the Post’s homepage with an image depicting a missile coming down from a fist bearing a ring long associated with Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian general killed by a US drone strike in Iraq two years ago.

First word of the Rwabee’s seizure came from the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, which only said an attack targeted an unnamed vessel around midnight. The coordinates it offered corresponded to the Emirati-flagged landing craft Rwabee, which hadn’t given its location via satellite-tracking data for hours, according to the website MarineTraffic.com.

A statement from the Saudi-led coalition, carried by state media in the kingdom, acknowledged the attack hours later, saying the Houthis had committed an act of “armed piracy” involving the vessel. The coalition asserted the ship carried medical equipment from a dismantled Saudi field hospital in the distant island of Socotra, without offering evidence.

“The Houthi militia must immediately release the ship, otherwise the coalition forces shall take all necessary measures and procedures to deal with this violation, including the use of force,” Brig. Gen. Turki al-Malki said in a statement.

A Houthi military spokesman, Yahia Sarei, announced that rebel forces had seized what he described as an Emirati “military cargo ship” carrying equipment into Yemen’s territorial waters “without any license” to engage in “hostile acts” against Yemen’s stability. He said the rebels would offer more details on the seizure later.

An employee at the vessel’s owners, Abu Dhabi-based Liwa Marine Services, told The Associated Press that the Rwabee appeared to have been the target but said they had no other information and declined to comment further. The employee did not give her name and hung up.

A similar incident happened in 2016 involving the Emirati vessel SWIFT-1, which had been sailing back and forth in the Red Sea between an Emirati troop base in Eritrea and Yemen. The vessel came under attack by Houthi forces in 2016. The Emirati government asserted the SWIFT-1 had carried humanitarian aid; UN experts later said of the claim that they were ‘unconvinced of its veracity’.

In the attack targeting The Jerusalem Post’s website, the image posted by the hackers depicts an exploding target from a recent Iranian military drill designed to look like the Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center near the city of Dimona. The facility is already home to decades-old underground laboratories that reprocess the reactor’s spent rods to obtain weapons-grade plutonium for Israel’s nuclear bomb program.

Under its policy of nuclear ambiguity, Israel neither confirms nor denies having atomic weapons.

In a tweet, the Post acknowledged being the target of hackers.

“We are aware of the apparent hacking of our website, alongside a direct threat to Israel,” the English-language newspaper wrote. “We are working to resolve the issue & thank readers for your patience and understanding.”

The newspaper later restored its website. It noted Iran-supporting hackers previously targeted its homepage in 2020 “with an illustration of Tel Aviv burning as then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu swam” with a life preserver.

There was no immediate response from the Israeli government. The hack comes after Israel’s former military intelligence chief in late December publicly acknowledged his country was involved in Soleimani’s killing. The US drone killed Soleimani as he was leaving Baghdad’s international airport.

In Iraq on Monday, troops shot down two ‘suicide drones at the Baghdad airport, American and Iraqi officials said. No group immediately claimed the attack, though one of the drones’ wings had words ‘Soleimani’s revenge’ painted on it in Arabic. Militias backed by Iran have been suspected in similar assaults. No injuries or damage were reported in the incident.

Iran also did not immediately acknowledge the hack. However, the country has in recent days stepped up its commemorations of the slain Revolutionary Guard general. Memorial services were scheduled to be held Monday for Soleimani.

As the head of the Quds, or Jerusalem, Force of the Revolutionary Guard, Soleimani led all of its expeditionary forces and frequently shuttled between Iraq, Lebanon and Syria. Quds Force members have deployed into Syria’s long war to support President Bashar Assad, as well as into Iraq in the wake of the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, a longtime foe of Tehran.

Soleimani rose to prominence by advising forces fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq and in Syria on behalf of the embattled Assad.

US officials say the Guard under Soleimani taught Iraqi militants how to manufacture and use especially deadly roadside bombs against US troops after the invasion of Iraq. Iran has denied that. Many Iranians to this day see Soleimani as a hero who fought Iran’s enemies abroad.

Tensions have been high in the region amid a shadow war between Iran and Israel, as well as the collapse of Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers after then-President Donald Trump in 2018 unilaterally withdrew America from the accord. Negotiations aimed at resuscitating the deal continue in Vienna.

 

Chinese claim over Indian territories

According to The Eurasian Times, Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs announced that it has granted “standardized” names for 15 locations in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, which will be featured on official Chinese maps.

India calls this Beijing’s motives of expanding its territory beyond the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the de facto border. It also says that the ongoing border standoff is unlikely to be over anytime soon.

India says, this is not the first time China has coined names for places in India’s Arunachal Pradesh state. A similar attempt was made in April 2017, in the backdrop of the Doklam crisis that erupted at the tri-junction between China, India and Bhutan.

“We have seen similar reports,” said Arindam Bagchi, the spokesperson for India’s External Affairs Ministry, referring to China’s move to rename places in Arunachal Pradesh. “Arunachal Pradesh has always been and will always be a vital part of India,” Bagchi asserted, calling the Chinese names as ‘invented’.

Among the 15 locations renamed by China are eight residential areas, four mountains, two rivers and a mountain pass. On Chinese maps, Arunachal Pradesh is labeled ‘Zangnan’ or ‘South Tibet’, and in 2017, Beijing gave six official names for locations in the state, which was considered as a retaliatory measure when the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader, visited the state.

China has traditionally asserted its claim over the whole of Arunachal, a state that it considers the extension of its Tibetan region. This is essentially the reason behind China raising a hue and cry every time India asserts its sovereignty over Arunachal or when dignitaries from New Delhi visit this northeastern state.

India had strongly reacted, when reports about China’s new land border law appeared in October 2021. New Delhi said, “China’s unilateral move to bring out a legislation that can have ramifications on our existing bilateral arrangements on border control… is of concern to us.”

The law was presented in March 2021; almost a year after the LAC crisis began and was considered as an attempt to legitimize the Chinese military’s actions in eastern Ladakh. It calls on various Chinese civilian and military institutions to ‘safeguard’ Chinese territory.

Indian media reports had earlier revealed how China has been trying to build human settlements, enclaves and villages inside Arunachal Pradesh. It has also constructed settlements inside the Bhutanese territory, considered strategic to India’s own security.

Beijing passed a similar rule to protect its maritime borders earlier this year. Both pieces of legislation provide law enforcement officials the authority to shoot ‘intruders’ anywhere in the country, including the Himalayas and the South China Sea, Jayanta Kalita, Editor, The EurAsian Times wrote in an article.

The Chinese claim over Arunachal dates back to the Shimla Convention of 1914 which led to an agreement regarding the border between British India and Tibet.

Even though the McMahon line agreed as the boundary by both sides was not recognized by China, it led to significant loss of territory for Tibet including Tawang, according to another article written by Jayanta Kalita for EurAsian Times.

China has long claimed the strategically significant town, which is only 30 kilometers from the Line of Actual Control (LAC), as its own. Beijing claims the entire state of Arunachal and refers to it as ‘southern Tibet’.

Dai Bingguo, a former Chinese border negotiator with India, said in 2017 that the border conflict between the two nations can be resolved if New Delhi recognizes Beijing’s claim to Tawang. India, of course, wasted no time in refuting such assertions. However, this indicated the strategic importance that China places on Tawang. It also explains the reason behind the Chinese construction of settlements in Arunachal.

Tawang has a long history with Tibet. The Gaden Namgyal Lhatse (Tawang Monastery) is a three-century-old monastery on the Bhutan-China border. According to legend, the 5th Dalai Lama, Ngawang Lobsang Gyatso, wanted a monastery erected in Tawang, and it was built.

The Chinese have used the argument that “The 5th Dalai Lama belonged to Tawang and that means Tawang was historically a part of Tibet, which in turn means that it belongs to China,” said Kondapalli.

While these new Chinese assertions do not cause a major change on the ground, they hint at a permanent militarization of the LAC. As of now, all eyes would be on China to see if takes any unilateral action citing its new border law, and creates further troubles for India.

 

IDF strikes Gaza in retaliation

According to a report by The Jerusalem Post Palestinians fired surface-to-air missiles towards Israel Air Force helicopters during airstrikes against targets in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the two rockets that had been fired earlier towards central Israel earlier in the morning.

According to reports in the Hamas-run enclave, operatives fired SA-7 missiles as well as a number of test rockets towards the sea. Groups in the Strip have fired SAMs towards Israeli platforms during past operations over the Gaza Strip, none have caused any damage, including during the strikes on Saturday evening.

The IDF confirmed to The Jerusalem Post that missiles were fired at the helicopters.

The Soviet-designed SA-7 is a shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile (SAMs) that was designed to target aircraft flying at low altitudes. First used in combat by Egyptian troops during the War of Attrition with Israel in 1969, the system likely entered the Gaza Strip via smuggling routes from the Sinai Peninsula following the fall of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya in 2011.

The Israeli strikes targeted a Hamas site located west of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip and IDF artillery targeted sites in the northern Gaza Strip as well. The IDF Spokesperson's Unit said it had struck a number of targets in Hamas's rocket production complex. 

Two rockets launched from the Hamas-run Gaza Strip fell in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of central Israel, one off the coast of Tel Aviv and the other off the coast of Palmachim south of Rishon Letzion early on Saturday morning.

“Earlier this morning, two rocket launches were identified from the Gaza Strip toward the Mediterranean. The rockets fell off the coast of the Tel Aviv metropolitan area. According to protocol, no sirens were sounded and no interception took place,” the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said in a statement.

The rockets were heard in the cities of Tel Aviv, Holon, Bat Yam, and Rishon Lezion.

While Hamas claimed that the rocket fire on Saturday morning was triggered by bad weather, the military believes that the rocket fire was carried out by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Nevertheless, "the terrorist organization Hamas is responsible for what is happening in the Gaza Strip and bears the consequences of terrorist acts from the Gaza Strip," the IDF Spokesperson's Unit said.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, at the beginning of the cabinet meeting, said that such excuses would not be accepted by Israel.

“I want to clarify something here - all of Hamas’ of thunder and lightning, which repeat themselves winter after winter, are no longer relevant,” he said."Whoever directs missiles at the State of Israel - bears responsibility."

The rocket fire came just days after a civilian working on the Gaza border fence was shot and lightly wounded near the border with the northern Gaza Strip.

Shortly after the shooting, the IDF responded with artillery fire towards a number of Hamas posts in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian reports claimed that at least three Gazan farmers were wounded in the retaliatory strikes.

The rocket launches come as the Israeli military said that this had been the longest period of operational quiet in relation to the four most recent operations in the coastal enclave.

The spike in tensions around the Gaza Strip comes amid a wave of terror attacks in the West Bank and Jerusalem, as well as growing tensions in Israeli prisons. 

Additionally, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad has demanded the release of Hisham Abu Hawash, a Palestinian in administrative detention who has been on hunger strike for over 130 days. Hawash’s detention has reportedly been frozen in recent days, although he is continuing his hunger strike and is hospitalized.