Iran says US sanctions on Khamenei closed path to diplomacy - Aljazeera.com

Iran said on Tuesday that a decision by the United States to impose "hard-hitting" sanctions on the country's top leadership, including the supreme leader, has permanently closed the path to diplomacy between Tehran and Washington.

"Imposing useless sanctions on Iran's Supreme Leader (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the commander of Iran's diplomacy (Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif) is the permanent closure of the path of diplomacy," Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said in a tweet.

"Trump's desperate administration is destroying the established international mechanisms for maintaining world peace and security."

But the US National Security Adviser John Bolton said on Tuesday that President Donald Trump is open to negotiations and "all that Iran needs to do is walk through that open door".

Bolton said the US wants to hold talks to "verifiably eliminate Iran's nuclear weapons programme, its ballistic missile delivery systems, its support for international terrorism and other malign behaviour worldwide," Bolton said in Jerusalem.

190621103437644

He said US envoys have been in the region working to find a path to lowering tensions between the two countries, but that the silence of the Islamic Republic has been "deafening". 

Trump targeted Khamenei and other top Iranian officials with sanctions on Monday, in an unprecedented move to increase pressure on Iran after Tehran's downing of an unmanned US drone last week.

"He [Trump] has hired not diplomats but arsonists and has allowed them to run a very, very aggressive policy

Jarrett Blanc, former state department official

Washington said it will also impose sanctions on Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif this week.

The targets of the new sanctions include senior military figures in Iran, blocking their access to any financial assets under US jurisdiction. They also work to deny Khamenei's and his close aides' access to money and support.

'The face of the Islamic Republic'

Al Jazeera's Dorsa Jabbari, reporting from Tehran, said the decision to sanction the supreme leader would likely not have much effect.

"Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has not left Iran in over 30 years since he was president in 1989. The last time he left Iran was on a state visit to China in April 1989," she said.

The Al Jazeera correspondent said the announcement that Iranian foreign minister would be sanctioned has come as a surprise here in Iran.

"Zarif is a career diplomat who lived in the US. He was at the UN for many years. He is known as the face of the Islamic Republic on the international stage."

Tensions have escalated in the region in recent weeks following a series of attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf. The US and its regional allies - Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates (UAE) - have blamed Iran for the attacks - a charge Tehran has denied as "baseless".

The downing of the US surveillance drone last week almost brought the two foes to the brink of war, with Trump saying he initially approved attacks on Iran in retaliation of the drone shootdown but later pulled back.

Tehran said the drone violated its airspace but Washington insisted it was flying over international waters in the Gulf.

'Regime change policy'

The US president has said he is not seeking war with Iran, as he dispatched his top diplomats - US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Advisor John Bolton - to the Middle East to shore up support against Iran.

Pompeo said he was hoping that more than 20 countries, including the UAE and Saudi Arabia, would work together on building maritime security in the Gulf, which is a source of major oil supplies in the world.

But Jarrett Blanc from Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that while the new sanctions will be largely symbolic, the underlying message could escalate the situation even further.

"Sanctions on the supreme leader and his office are almost certainly to be read in Iran as a confirmation that this administration is pursuing a regime change policy," said Blanc who was a senior State Department official under President Barack Obama, who oversaw the implementation of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

Last year, Trump withdrew the US from the accord between Iran and world powers that curbed Tehran's nuclear programme in exchange for easing sanctions. Relations in the region have worsened significantly since then.

"Even if President Trump denies it and even if other officials do not use that phrase. What is the targeting of leaders of the regime other than regime change?" he asked.

Blanc said that the message this administration is sending is "more likely to lead to escalation than de-escalation".

"President Trump says, and I tend to believe, that he is not looking for war in the Middle East but he does not track the details of the situation, and he has hired not diplomats but arsonists and has allowed them to run a very, very aggressive policy."

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/06/iran-sanctions-khamenei-closed-path-diplomacy-190625045240290.html

2019-06-25 05:47:00Z
52780320488762

CNN's Fareed Zakaria: 'Thousands' could die because of Trump's sanctions on Iran - Fox News

CNN host Fareed Zakaria warned President Trump on Monday night that "thousands" could potentially die due to the new sanctions his administration has placed on Iran.

Following the president's last-minute decision last week to call off a military strike that he claimed would have killed about 150 people, the White House announced that Iran will face additional "hard-hitting" sanctions that will specifically target Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his associates.

TRUMP SIGNS EXECUTIVE ORDER DELIVERING 'HARD-HITTING' SANCTIONS AGAINST IRAN

Appearing on "CNN Tonight," Zakaria struggled to answer whether President Trump did the right thing by calling off the strike because of the apparent dangers of the sanctions.

"The sanctions that are in place in Iran probably- I haven't done the calculations, but I think it's fair to say almost certainly will kill several hundred, maybe thousands of people over the next few months in terms of depriving people of medical supplies, food, nutrition," Zakaria said. "And when you do a military strike, the people you are killing will tend to be Iranian soldiers, military officers who are volunteering to take park in Iran's military struggle. The people you kill when you impose sanctions are the most vulnerable in society. These are the poorest people, the sickest people."

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

He continued, "So if that's his concern, he seems almost gleeful about the idea of imposing more and more sanctions on Iran. Has he thought about the human cost of this? I don't think so."

The CNN host went on to blast the "weird, impulse-driven policy" on Iran and questioned whether there were "any grownups in the White House" for naming the wrong ayatollah in their announcement of the new sanctions.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/cnns-fareed-zakaria-thousands-could-die-because-of-trumps-sanctions-on-iran

2019-06-25 05:15:01Z
52780320488762

Trump announces new sanctions against Iran - CNN

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWttgM2Vi6w

2019-06-24 17:09:36Z
52780320012497

Trump announces 'hard-hitting' new sanctions against Iran - CNN

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said he signed an executive order imposing "hard hitting" sanctions on Iran that will deny Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, his office "and many others" access to financial instruments.

"Today's actions follow a series of aggressive behaviors by the Iranian regime in recent weeks, including shooting down of US drones," Trump said, flanked by Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Vice President Mike Pence. "The supreme leader of Iran is one who ultimately is responsible of the hostile conduct of the regime. He's respected within his country. His office oversees the regime's most brutal instruments including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps."

Mnuchin told reporters in a briefing after Trump's announcement that "these sanctions are all very important for recent activities. The President has also instructed me that we will be designating Zarif later this week."

Trump said the sanctions "will deny the supreme leader and the supreme leaders office and those closely affiliated with him and the office access to key financial resources and support. The assets of Ayatollah Khomeini will not be spared from the sanctions."

Mnuchin said they would "lock up literally billions of dollars of assets."

While Trump called the sanctions a "strong and proportionate response," neither he nor Mnuchin would offer exact details about what the retaliation was for. Trump said, "this was something that was going to happen anyway."

Mnuchin said "some of this was in the works, some of this was a result of recent activities. I'm not going to identify which is which."

This story is breaking and will be updated.

CNN's Nikki Carvajal, Maegan Vasquez and Kevin Liptak in Washington and Shirzad Bozorgmehr and Fred Pleitgen in Tehran contributed to this story.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/24/politics/trump-iran-sanctions/index.html

2019-06-24 16:42:00Z
52780320012497

US military launched cyberattacks against Iran after drone shot down: officials - Fox News

The U.S. military carried out a cyberattack against Iran last Thursday even as President Trump nixed plans for airstrikes in response to the downing of an American drone, officials confirmed to Fox News.

Sources said U.S. Cyber Command launched the cyberattack targeting the Iranian intelligence and radar installations used to down the U.S. Navy drone last week.

TRUMP LIFTS CURTAIN ON CALL TO NIX IRAN MILITARY STRIKE

Fox News has learned Iran shut off some of its military radar sites around the time the U.S. was poised to launch retaliatory strikes. It's not clear if those radar sites were turned off by the cyberattack or if Iran shut them off deliberately in anticipation of this.

Yahoo! News first reported on the retaliatory cyber strike. It came as the White House and Pentagon were also considering military strikes, but President Trump revealed last Friday that he called them off after learning up to 150 Iranians could be killed.

“I stopped it, not ... proportionate to shooting down an unmanned drone,” he tweeted at the time.

Yet the administration has pushed back on any suggestions that the decision to do so could embolden Iran further. On a visit to Israel Sunday, Trump’s national security adviser had a blunt warning for the regime.

"Neither Iran nor any other hostile actor should mistake U.S. prudence and discretion for weakness,” John Bolton said. “No one has granted them a hunting license in the Middle East.”

With the U.S. having launched a cyberattack instead, tensions remain high even as Iranian forces were quiet over the weekend, officials told Fox News.

For its part, Tehran claimed no successful cyberattack against its assets was carried out.

Amid these tensions, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has arrived in Saudi Arabia--Iran's biggest rival—as part a hastily organized trip to meet Saudi King Salman.

2020 DEMS WON'T CREDIT TRUMP FOR BLOCKING IRAN STRIKE

The drone shoot-down was only the latest flare-up in the region tied to Iran.

In recent weeks, six oil tankers have been attacked in the Gulf of Oman, which the U.S. and its Gulf allies blame on Iran. The Trump administration is expected to announce more sanctions on Iran later Monday.

At the Pentagon, new Acting Defense Secretary Mark Esper arrived for his first day on the job early Monday morning.  The former Army secretary took no questions.

Warships from the USS Abraham Lincoln strike group remain in the region, along with 70,000 U.S. troops including Air Force bombers and fighter jets.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/us-military-launched-cyberattacks-against-iran-after-drone-shot-down-officials

2019-06-24 14:58:30Z
52780320012497

Trump’s Mideast peace plan hinges on $50B investment, offers Palestinians deal of ‘the century’ - Fox News

President Trump’s plan for peace between the Israelis and Palestinians will be presented Tuesday in Bahrain, as part of what the White House calls an “opportunity of the century” nearly two years in the making.

The “Peace to Prosperity” venture, which was rolled out over the weekend and is being officially proposed in Manama during a two-day workshop, seeks to raise about $50 billion. The plan offers “an ambitious, achievable vision and framework for a prosperous future for the Palestinian people and the region,” according to a White House statement.

ISRAEL WELCOMES MIDEAST PEACE WORKSHOP

The administration’s team -- led by senior White House adviser Jared Kushner; Jason Greenblatt, U.S. envoy for international negotiations; and David Friedman, U.S. ambassador to Israel -- has developed a detailed portfolio of projects to stimulate economic growth with the aim of doubling the Palestinian GDP and creating more than 1 million new jobs as well as reducing poverty and unemployment rates, Fox News has learned.

The plan is being likened to a Marshall Plan for Palestinians and the broader region. The Marshall Plan invested billions of dollars to shore up the economies of Western Europe following the end of World War II.

A senior White House official, speaking on background, said the Bahrain workshop is an “opportunity of the century,” for the Palestinians and the region.

The $50 billion would be raised with $15 billion in grants, $25 billion in low-interest loans and $11 billion in private capital.

The U.S. will consider making a large investment to the funding, along with other countries, but everything is contingent on the agreement of a good governance mechanism. The hope is that the money can’t be siphoned off by corrupt politicians or be misappropriated and given to the families of terrorists – a tactic used openly by the Palestinians.

The money will be earmarked for major infrastructure projects in the hope of leading to a domino effect for the Palestinian economy and neighboring Arab states. Tourism, water and energy projects are also expected to be a major part of the investments.

A White House fact sheet released Saturday said the money would be invested over 10 years and also would lead to major investment, not just for the Palestinians but also the neighboring countries of Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon.

The growing number of workshop attendees may offer a clue that the world is ready to move on from years of stagnation and finally get some sort of agreement.

Still, problems remain. The Palestinians are boycotting the workshop and the Israeli government was not invited, though some Israeli business figures are expected to attend.

On Saturday, according to the Israeli news agency TPS, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the workshop saying, "As long as there is no political [solution], we do not deal with any economic [solution].”

Yet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was reported by the Times of Israel as saying he would that he would listen to the American plan and “hear it fairly and with openness.”

Fatah, the ruling group of the PA, has reportedly gone to great lengths to encourage protests and violence in the West Bank and Gaza on the days of the workshop -- even threatening fellow Palestinians who have shown an interest in going. Some Palestinians are undaunted and plan to attend.

But as the political climate of the region has changed, the Palestinians who had been trying to pressure Arab countries to sit out the Bahrain confab appear to have failed in having them boycott the event -- as senior officials from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and even Qatar are among those expected to attend.

“It’s a big victory that [Bahrain] is still happening,” said the senior White House official, who also wondered whether the strong attendance by influential Arab countries meant that the Palestinians still hold a pair of aces when it comes to having an automatic veto over the Arab world on the peace process.

The Palestinians at least can be happy that neither Lebanon nor Iraq will attend, and the European Union will only be sending a representative on the technical level. The United Nations is sending a deputy special coordinator for Mideast peace who also serves in a humanitarian role in the Palestinian controlled areas.

In an interview last month with Fox News, Jason Greenblatt, who was in New York for a U.N. Security Council meeting, said of the Palestinian boycott and dismissal of a plan they’d not even seen: “it was terribly frustrating for ordinary Palestinians.”

GREENBLATT: PEACE PLAN IS WEEKS AWAY

He continued, “I meet with them frequently, and this is the message they tell me. They understand they may not like aspects of the plan, but are upset that their leaders are saying they won’t even look at it. I feel terrible for the Palestinian people.”

At the same time as the Bahrain workshop begins, the United Nations is holding a donor conference in New York with the aim of raising $1.2 billion for UNRWA – its specialized agency for Palestinian refugees. The event is going to be attended by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and other high-ranking U.N. officials.

The goal, apart from supporting the status quo, is to financially sustain the agency in the face of the United States pulling its funding to the controversial agency last year. UNRWA has been littered with accusations of anti-Semitism, teaching extremism to students and perpetuating the refugee problem.

The Bahrain workshop lasts through Wednesday. Once the reviews are in, the pressure will be on the administration to release the political part of the plan to seize on any positive momentum they take from Bahrain, but that might not happen until after new Israeli elections take place in September.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trumps-mideast-peace-plan-hinges-on-50b-investment-offers-palestinians-deal-of-the-century

2019-06-24 14:01:21Z
52780318659196

Iran warns U.S. it could down more drones as Pompeo arrives in Persian Gulf - The Washington Post

DUBAI — Iran’s navy chief warned the United States on Monday that Iranian forces could shoot down more surveillance drones if they violate the country’s airspace, as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrived in Saudi Arabia for talks with Arab allies in the Persian Gulf.

 “The enemy dispatched its most sophisticated . . . and most complicated surveillance aircraft” to spy on Iran, and “everyone saw the downing of the drone,” Rear Adm. Hossein Khanzadi said Monday, referring to the U.S. Navy RQ-4A Global Hawk drone shot down by Iran last week. 

The incident capped a week of tensions following attacks on two commercial tankers near the Strait of Hormuz on June 13.The United States blamed the attacks on Iran, which has denied involvement.

[Can Trump put out the fire he started?]

Khanzadi said the downing of the drone last week could “always be repeated, and the enemy knows it,” the Tasnim News Agency reported.

The naval commander’s remarks came amid a diplomatic push by the Trump administration to rally regional and other allies around what Pompeo described Sunday as a “global coalition” to confront Iran. 

Pompeo met Monday with the Saudi leader, King Salman, “to discuss heightened tensions in the region and the need to promote maritime security in the Strait of Hormuz,” he said on Twitter. 

In two separate incidents in May and in June, a total of six commercial vessels near the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for global oil shipments, were targeted in attacks. 

[The Cybersecurity 202: U.S. businesses are preparing for Iranian hacks after American cyber attack]

The State Department’s Iran envoy, Brian Hook, was in Oman’s capital Muscat for meetings he also characterized as focused on building a multinational force to protect shipping lanes in the Persian Gulf, he said in a conference call with reporters. 

He has met with officials in Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia and was en route to Bahrain as part of the initiative, he said. 

Also Monday, President Trump lamented on Twitter that the United States was “protecting the shipping lanes” in the strait “for other countries . . . for zero compensation.” It was unclear whether his sentiments reflected the conversations that U.S. diplomats were having with allies in the region.

[Trump’s account of Iran attack plan faces scrutiny]

 “All of these countries should be protecting their own ships on what has always been . . . a dangerous journey,” he said, adding that China and Japan get most of their energy imports through the strait.

“We don’t even need to be there,” Trump said, citing energy production in the United States. “The U.S. request for Iran is very simple — No Nuclear Weapons and No Further Sponsoring of Terror!”

Trump said over the weekend that he would speak to Iran without preconditions and that his chief concern was preventing Iran’s government from acquiring a nuclear weapon. Trump abandoned a 2015 nuclear accord that was negotiated between Iran and six world powers, including the United States, and that set restrictions on the country’s atomic energy program. 

Trump last week said that he authorized a military strike against Iran in response to the downing of the drone but aborted the mission at the last minute to avoid Iranian casualties. 

His singular focus on the nuclear issue appeared at odds with his administration’s “maximum pressure campaign,” which seeks to roll back Iranian influence in the region and persuade it give up its ballistic missile program and support for proxy forces in places such as Iraq and Syria. 

In his conference call with reporters Monday, Hook said the United States was “looking for a deal [with Iran] that is truly comprehensive” and that addresses “the spectrum of threats to peace and security that Iran represents.”

He said such an agreement would include Iran’s nuclear program, its ballistic missiles, regional activities and the detention of dual nationals. 

“They know where to find us,” Hook said. 

Read more:

Trump approved cyberstrikes against Iran’s missile systems

After a tense week, Trump strikes an unusually friendly tone toward Iran

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news

Let's block ads! (Why?)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/iran-warns-us-it-could-down-more-drones-as-pompeo-arrives-in-persian-gulf/2019/06/24/c7d59330-967c-11e9-a027-c571fd3d394d_story.html

2019-06-24 13:41:01Z
52780320012497