Iran Digest Week of April 30- May 7
/AIC’s Iran digest project covers the latest developments and news stories published in Iranian and international media outlets. This weekly digest is compiled by Communications Associate Elizabeth Kos. Please note that the news and views expressed in the articles below do not necessarily reflect those of AIC.
US-Iran Relations
US Denies Iran State Media Report Saying Prisoner Swap Agreed
The United States has immediately denied a report by Iran’s state-run broadcaster that deals had been reached between Tehran and Washington that would see prisoners swapped and Tehran receive billions of dollars.
An unnamed official quoted by Iranian state TV said earlier on Sunday that a deal made between the US and Tehran involved a prisoner swap in exchange for the release of $7bn in frozen Iranian funds.
The state TV report, quoting the unnamed Iranian official, also said British-Iranian national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe would be released once Britain had paid off a debt on military equipment owed to Tehran.
Nuclear Accord
Nuclear Talks With Iran Could Reach Agreement Within Weeks, U.S. Says
The United States and Iran could each come back into compliance with a 2015 nuclear deal within weeks, a senior State Department official said on Thursday, on the eve of what could be a final round of negotiations before an agreement is brokered.
The United States and Iran could each come back into compliance with a 2015 nuclear deal within weeks, a senior State Department official said on Thursday, on the eve of what could be a final round of negotiations before an agreement is brokered.
Briefing journalists on the condition of anonymity, the senior official described the likelihood of an agreement before Iran’s presidential elections in mid-June as both possible and doable. He did not rule out that it could come in the round of talks that begin on Friday in Vienna.
Iran’s Hard-Liners Set Up Attacks on Rouhani Government, Sowing Suspicion Over Nuclear Talks
In a bruising debate unfolding on television, in the media and within parliament, Iran’s competing political factions in recent weeks have wielded the nuclear talks like a cudgel. Hard-liners wary of engagement with the West have landed the harshest blows, leveraging their control of Iran’s airwaves to discredit President Hassan Rouhani’s government and the more moderate wing of Iranian politics it represents.
Analysts say the intensifying attacks by hard-liners could complicate, but not derail, negotiations currently underway in Vienna to revive the 2015 nuclear deal. But more critically, the offensive is a part of the politicking before Iran’s presidential election in June, starring a slate of candidates yet to be cast in a poll with potentially significant consequences for the United States.
COVID-19
Iran Completes First Clinical Trial Phase of Fakhra COVID-19 Jab: Project Manager
The first phase of the clinical trial of the Iranian COVID-19 vaccine, dubbed Fakhra, was completed, said the manager of the project to develop the vaccine.
In an address to a ceremony to mark the first phase’s completion, Ahmad Karimi said following the collection and final analysis of the data, the second phase will begin, IRNA reported.
Being developed by the Iranian Defense Ministry, the jab has been named after the former head of the ministry’s Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, who was assassinated near Tehran in November 2020 in an act of terror, according to Press TV.
Women of Iran
At Tehran Garage, Iranian Woman Polishes Cars and Her Dreams
It’s a men’s-only club in the tangle of auto repair shops on the traffic-clogged streets of Iran’s capital, Tehran. Among them, workers toil in dim garages, welding and wrenching, fabricating and painting.
That’s until Maryam Roohani, 34, pops up from under a car’s hood at a maintenance shop in northeastern Tehran, her dirt- and grease-stained uniform pulled over black jeans and long hair tucked into a baseball cap — which in her work, replaces Iran’s compulsory Islamic headscarf for women, or hijab.
“I have sort of broken taboos,” Roohani said at the garage, where she carefully coats cars with attention-getting gleams and scrapes sludge from their engines. “I faced opposition when I chose this path.”
Inside Iran
Iran’s Zarif Asks for ‘Forgiveness’ from Soleimani Family Following Audio Leak
Iran's foreign minister asked "forgiveness" from the family of assassinated Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani on Sunday, following an audio leak in which he was heard to criticise the disproportionate power the military leader held in the country.
An Iranian opposition media outlet published the three-hour recording of Mohammad Javad Zarif on 25 April, triggering a heated debate ahead of presidential elections and amid talks with world powers in Vienna to revive a nuclear deal.
Khamenei, speaking in a televised speech on Sunday, did not call Zarif out by name but said of his comments: "This was a big mistake that must not be made by an official of the Islamic Republic."
Swiss Diplomat in Iran Found Dead After Fall from High-Rise
A senior diplomat at the Swiss embassy in Tehran has been found dead after falling from a high-rise building where she lived in the north of the city, a spokesman for emergency services was quoted as saying by Iranian news agencies.
Iranian police announced an investigation into the death. “Specialised police units are in the process of examining” the circumstances around the death of a “52-year-old Swiss citizen employed by the Swiss embassy in Tehran,” the national police said in a brief online statement.
The Swiss foreign ministry (FDFA) said an employee at its embassy in Iran had died of an accident, without identifying the victim.
Regional Politics
Iraq Brokers Secret Saudi-Iran Talks as Biden Resets U.S. Policy
In recent weeks, Iraq convened indirect talks between its neighbors Saudi Arabia and Iran, with a focus on Yemen’s war, where the two countries back opposing sides. Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, a former intelligence chief experienced in regional security issues, is seen by Saudi Arabia and its ally the UAE as having a degree of autonomy from Iran. He’s thus been able to build up trust to make such engagement possible, four people briefed on the talks say.
Kadhimi has also kept open channels between Tehran and President Joseph Biden’s administration, which two people briefed on the Iraqi side say has welcomed the separate avenue to engage diplomatically with Iran. World powers are holding talks in Vienna to try to resurrect a 2015 deal with Iran to rein in its nuclear activity in exchange for sanctions relief.
Houthi Rebels Look to Take Marib, Prolonging Yemen’s War
Just two years ago, from the mountains to the east, forces loyal to the Yemeni government could see the capital, Sana’a. But now the government’s forces are on the defensive. They have been pushed back to Marib, the last big city in the north still held by the government (and seat of a province with the same name). The Houthis are within 4km of it (see map). Only air strikes by Saudi Arabia, which supports the government, slow their advance.
Marib had until recently been one of Yemen’s safer cities. Those displaced by fighting elsewhere took shelter there. The Saudis made it a base for operations. But the battle for it shows just how badly things have gone for the government and its backers. They would gladly accept the un’s call for a ceasefire. The Houthis, who control much of the country, ignore it. If they take the city, they will control the north’s only oil refinery and the gateway to oilfields in the east and south. “It will be a disaster,” says a Western diplomat who was in Marib last month.
Analysis
EU - Iran Relations: Toward a Diplomatic Confrontation?
By: Przemyslaw Osiewicz
When the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, Josep Borrell Fontelles, took office in December 2019, he emphasized the need to preserve the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and cooperate with Iran. At the same time, he criticized then-U.S. President Donald Trump for maintaining extended sanctions — which in practice prevented leading European firms from concluding large contracts with partners in Iran — and for the U.S.’s withdrawal from the provisions of the treaty. The recent decision of the Council of the European Union to extend punitive measures against Iran for a further year in response to the country’s human rights violations only confirmed that Borrell can count on its support, and the EU itself is not willing to compromise on the issue of human rights, even if there are parallel talks taking place that could bring huge profits for European companies.
The EU administration’s decision on Iran is good in substance, but very late or at least badly timed. It can be interpreted as an attempt to exert more pressure on Iran and to gain another bargaining chip for the bloc in the negotiations. For the time being, however, it has not affected the talks on compliance with the provisions of the JCPOA. This may be a testament to both the determination of the Iranian side to reach an agreement and the lack of serious alternatives.
