via Lobe Log
by Farideh Farhi
This Washington Post article about Iran and Hezbollah building networks in Syria in the event of Bashar al-Assad’s fall is certainly eye-catching. It’s also suggestive of Iranian shrewdness in trying to make the best out of every situation they face in the region.
Assad’s turmoil was supposed [...]
via Lobe Log
In an interview with BBC Persian, Treasury Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence David Cohen says that his department’s assessment is that reports published regarding serious and extensive shortages of medicine in Iran are exaggerated. He thinks the government of Iran is trying to portray a manageable problem as [...]
via Sanctions Law
Last Thursday, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) announced the removal of two parties designated under the Iraq Stabilization and Insurgency Sanctions program (“Iraq Sanctions”). These sanctions were put into law by Executive Orders 13303, 13315, 13350, 13364, and 13438. They target specific individuals and entities associated with [...]
By Erich Ferrari
via Sanctions Law
This was a big year for sanctions. Although 2012 isn’t over yet and there is some pending legislation threatening to impose more sanctions against Iran and a forthcoming set of regulations from OFAC on some of the additional Iran sanctions we saw in the late summer/early fall, [...]
via Lobe Log
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has updated its Iran Sanctions page to include more individuals and entities, including Iran’s Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance (Ershad), its Press Supervisory Board and several Iranian universities and related institutions. No reasoning is provided in the official US
via Lobe Log
The US-led sanctions regime isn’t directly targeting Iran’s healthcare system but reports continue to suggest that critically-ill Iranians are being affected. The Al Jazeera English clip above squares with Najmeh Bozorgmehr’s Financial Times article from September about how sanctions on Iran’s Central Bank are preventing critically-ill patients from getting crucial medical aid:
via Lobe Log
The US and EU are touting Iran’s currency woes as proof that sanctions are working, though it’s not clear to what end. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Western powers “are working on new coordinated measures intended to accelerate the recent plunge of Iran’s currency and drain its foreign-exchange reserves”:
The first [...]
via Lobe Log
Shadow banks may control about 25 to 30 percent of the word’s financial system. They may be about 50 percent of all banking assets in the world. I say may in both of those sentences because it is hard to tell how big this financial sector is. The United States may [...]
via Lobe Log
Benoit Faucon reports for Dow Jones News Service on measures that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps — which is subject to US sanctions under the Treasury Department’s “Designated IRGC Affiliates and Designated Iran-Linked Financial Institutions” list — has taken to tighten its economic control in Iran:
The withdrawal of Western [...]
En Español
The Latest
From IPS News
- WHO Calls for More Data on Violence Against Older Women and Women With Disabilities
- Why Farmers in India and Pakistan Are Shifting to Natural or Regenerative Farming
- The Impact of Climate Change on a Biodiversity Hot Spot
- Revival of Hope: How a Remote Indian Village Overcame Water Scarcity
- Ahead of UN Summit of the Future, Mobilizing Youth for Change
- The Kids of the Islamic State: A Childhood Stolen
- The Gambia Must Not Repeal FGM Ban
- Global Governance: Time for Reform
- Abandoned Children Growing Problem in Northern Syria
- IMF Urges Non-alignment in Second Cold War
- Online fundraising for IPS Inter Press Service at Razoo
Hawks Warn that Iran hyperinflation no cause for US celebration (yet)
via Lobe Log
Commentary magazine’s Jonathan Tobin warns the Obama Administration that it should not chalk up Iranian hyperinflation (the rial fell to 35,000:1 against the US dollar this week) and the outbreak of bazaar protests over the situation as a sign of success in forcing the Islamic Republic to abandon its [...]