Free Republic

Nothing better showcases Washington’s confusion over foreign policy than the idea that – as part of a U.S.-Iran nuclear deal – Iran would ship much or all of its enriched uranium to Russia, and Russia would then process it for Iranian civilian usage. Were the U.S.-led “P5+1” negotiators (the five permanent U.N. Security Council members plus Germany) to reach a deal with Iran with this provision, the United States would subjugate its national security and that of its allies to two U.S. adversaries, both of which are undermining U.S. interests around the world. In addition, Washington would further legitimize Tehran...

One week to ‘finish the job’ in Iran nuclear talks ‘Failure would be a dangerous scenario for the entire world’ AFP Published: 14:30 November 16, 2014 Gulf News Vienna: Iran and six world powers begin a final round of talks in Vienna on Tuesday aiming to overcome significant remaining differences and agree a historic nuclear deal by a November 24 deadline. “There’s still a big gap. We may not be able to get there,” US President Barack Obama warned last Sunday. After 12 years of rising tensions, threats of war and failed diplomacy this accord would silence for good fears...

Two Iranian warships set sail Tuesday for the Atlantic Ocean on their navy's first-ever mission there, state TV reported. The voyage comes amid an ongoing push by Iran to demonstrate the ability to project power across the Middle East and beyond. The report said that the destroyer Sabalan and the logistic helicopter carrier Khark will be dispatched on a three-month voyage. "The warships will have task of securing shipping routes as well as training new personnel," the semi-official Fars news agency quoted Iran's navy chief Admiral Habibollah Sayyari as saying.

Complete Headline: Iran's Rouhani: "We Are Not Dismantling Our Nuclear Facilities; Iran Will Maintain Its Uranium Enrichment Programme" In case there was any confusion just how "historic" last week's agreement with Iran, loudly trumpeted by the Obama administration as the most "historic" since Syria in a, well, long time, truly was in terms of curbing Iran's nuclear ambitions, here is the explanation straight from the horse's mouth i.e., Iran president Hassan Rouhani who spoke today in an interview with the FT. "Mr Rouhani struck a tough line on Iran’s expectations over a comprehensive nuclear deal to be negotiated following...

Momentum appears to be building for a breakthrough deal on Iran's nuclear program, with top diplomats flocking to the site of ongoing talks and one Western official saying Friday a deal could be reached "as soon as tonight." U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and British Foreign Secretary William Hague will both be in Geneva on Saturday.

The Times Of Israel is reporting that a team of negotiators led by White House adviser Valerie Jarrett has been conducting secret talks with Iran about it's nuclear weapons program for the past year. The report states the deal submitted in Geneva earlier this month was a direct result of these secret year-long negotiations between teams headed by Jarrett and Iran's Ali Akbar Salehi. That deal was ultimately rejected when France and Israel raised strong objections,and talks are expected to resume this Wednesday. The White House was very quick to issue a categorical denial of the report. According to White...

With a fevered and frantic breathless pace, Obama via John Kerry has been pushing to sign a sell-out deal with Iran that would ease sanctions without shutting down Iran’s nuke program. Benjamin Netanyahu was furious when he found out that Kerry had misrepresented what the proposed agreement would be, not to mention Kerry running at the mouth to bash Israel on the talks with the Palestinians. Netanyahu was not alone. France was uncomfortable with the deal Kerry wanted to sign, even as Kerry huddled with the Iranians trying to get ‘er done.(VIDEO-AT-LINK) Thank you France for at least buying us...

Only a week after President Obama declared an end to the global war on terror, the State Department accused Iran of “a marked resurgence” in its global export of terrorism to “a tempo unseen since the 1990s.” Separately, a prosecutor in Argentina indicted top Iranian officials, including the country’s defense minister and a presidential candidate, in the bombing of a Buenos Aires Jewish center that killed 85 people and injured hundreds. The 502-page charging document named Iran as establishing terrorist networks in Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Chile, Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Suriname, among other countries. Additionally, the prosecutor...

Some commentators inside and outside Iran have interpreted Khamenei’s stance as further proof that he has lost touch with reality. A closer look at the context, however, might show that Khamenei’s stance is very much based on reality: his reality. Khamenei does not see Iran as a nation-state but as a vehicle for a revolution with global ambitions. “I am not a diplomat,” he said amid cheers from a crowd of supporters. “I am a revolutionary.” The regime that Khamenei heads is not meant to act in the interests of Iran as a nation-state, but in the interests of the...

Back in December, I posted about an American pastor, Saeed Abedini, imprisoned and abused in Iran. The Revolutionary Guard seized him and held him in one of Iran’s most notorious prisons, accusing him of unspecified “national security” crimes. Before becoming an American citizen, Pastor Saeed converted from Islam to Christianity and had participated in Tehran’s very small house-church movement. Ordered to stop his work with the hous- church movement, he moved to Idaho but continued humanitarian work in Iran — most recently by raising money to build an orphanage. Last September, Iranian authorities raided his family home, ransacked it, and...

For the umpteenth time, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Friday publicly declared that the primary foreign policy goal of his government is to see the Jewish state erased from the map of the Middle East. "The Zionist regime [is] a cancerous tumor," Ahmadinejad told millions who took to the streets of Tehran to mark Iran's Quds Day, an angry commemoration of Israel's sovereignty over Jerusalem. The Iranian leader continued: "Even if one cell of them is left in one inch of (Palestinian) land, in the future this story (of Israel’s existence) will repeat. The nations of the region will soon...

Reporting from Los Angeles and Washington— The radar-evading drone that crash-landed over the weekend in Iran was on a mission for the CIA, according to a senior U.S. official, raising fears that the aircraft's sophisticated technology could be exploited by Tehran or shared with other American rivals. It was unclear whether the drone's mission took it over Iran or whether it strayed there accidentally because of technical malfunctions, the official said. Though the drone flight was a CIA operation, U.S. military personnel were involved in flying the aircraft, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the...

<p>No sh*t Sherlock! New sanctions = buying time for the Iranians.</p>

News Conference about to begin. Reportedly about an Iranian-backed plot to attack U.S.

Energy giants Total, Shell, Statoil and Eni have pledged to end their investments in Iran. The pledges fall in line with tough new energy and financial measures the U.S. Congress imposed on Iran in June, which came atop U.N. Security Council sanctions imposed earlier the same month to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions.

NEW YORK – President Barack Obama condemned Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech Thursday at the United Nations, in which Ahmadinejad blamed the United States for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, calling it “offensive” and “hateful.” “And particularly for him to make the statement here in Manhattan, just a little north of Ground Zero, where families lost their loved ones, people of all faiths, all ethnicities who see this as the seminal tragedy of this generation, for him to make a statement like that was inexcusable,” Obama said in an interview Friday morning. "And it stands in contrast with the response...

<p>UNITED NATIONS — The U.S. and several European delegations walked out of the U.N. speech of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday after he said most people believe the U.S. government was behind the Sept. 11 terror attacks in order to assure Israel's survival.</p>

Anders Fogh Rasmussen claimed that a new defensive 'shield' could be set up in cooperation with Russia Anders Fogh Rasmussen told The Sunday Telegraph he has full American backing for a proposed €200 million (£165 million) defensive "shield", which he hopes will be agreed in November at a summit of members in Lisbon. He was speaking after weapons inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) warned last week that Iran had passed a crucial nuclear threshold which took it nearer to being able to arm ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads. "Based on their public statements we know that Iran...

Plans to free a US woman who has spent a year in an Iranian jail have suddenly been scrapped despite backing from the country's president. Iran Pulls President's Plan To Free US Woman Share Share Comments (14)11:48am UK, Saturday September 11, 2010 Tom Bonnett, Sky News Online Plans to free a US woman who has spent a year in an Iranian jail have suddenly been scrapped despite backing from the country's president. Sarah Shourd has been held in solitary confinement and denied medical treatment Mahmoud Ahmadinejad requested Sarah Shourd be set free as an act of clemency at the end...

Iran today effectively kick-starts opera tions of its Bushehr nuclear reactor -- a move hard-liners tout as defiance of President Obama's sanctions regime. This follows Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi's announcement yesterday that Iran has test-fired a new ballistic missile with advanced targeting capabilities. Yet despite it all, Washington reportedly has "assured" Israel that Iran is at least one year away from completing a "breakout" in uranium conversion into weapons-grade fissionable material. The point appears to be to delay pre-emptive Israeli military action against Iranian nuclear facilities until Obama can sweet-talk Tehran out of its bomb. Good luck with that --...