The University of Pennsylvania’s Iran Media Project and ASL 19, a Canadian non-profit working against censorship in Iran, explain how sanctions are increasing the Iranian government’s censorship capabilities:
It is increasingly difficult for independent publishers of books and print newspapers in Iran: The problem this time is not strict censorship, [...]]]>
The University of Pennsylvania’s Iran Media Project and ASL 19, a Canadian non-profit working against censorship in Iran, explain how sanctions are increasing the Iranian government’s censorship capabilities:
It is increasingly difficult for independent publishers of books and print newspapers in Iran: The problem this time is not strict censorship, but the skyrocketing price of paper. Iran has reduced subsidies for imported paper, placing a stranglehold on an industry that relies heavily on paper’s import. The devaluation of almost 50% of the Iranian Rial compared to the US dollar and other major currencies has further made the import of paper from abroad exorbitant.
Under such conditions, President Ahmadinejad’s administration has been selective in financially supporting publishers and newspapers close to the government. Independent publishers and any publication that is critical of the government have been left to deal with this crisis on their own. As a result, some publishers have closed down, while some have reduced their circulation and publication schedules. Those with access to alternative sources of funding have decided to import paper, regardless of high prices, to keep their publication going.
Regardless of the cuts on subsidies for importing paper, the government continues to provide these publishers with subsidized paper and the administration has allocated major funds to purchase books from these publishers. Finally, the government helps these publishers by purchasing government-sponsored advertisements in their magazines and newspapers, and given this generous support from the government, this third of group of publishers has hardly been affected at all by the increased price of paper.
]]>Sweeping economic sanctions exact a deep toll from cultural heritage and the arts. As the United States and its allies continue to exert economic pressure on Iran, those of us who care about and work in the arts should be aware of the negative effects such actions have on cultural production and cultural preservation. The severe sanctions imposed on Cuba and Iran go beyond the interest of any government in their impact on people and their culture.
In a new report for the Oxford Research Group (first excerpted at PBS’s Tehran Bureau) author Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi explains why sanctions without compromise won’t change Iran’s hardline leaders’ stance on the nuclear program:
The key dilemma which Western policymakers should consider is that, rightly or wrongly, the [...]]]>
In a new report for the Oxford Research Group (first excerpted at PBS’s Tehran Bureau) author Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi explains why sanctions without compromise won’t change Iran’s hardline leaders’ stance on the nuclear program:
]]>The key dilemma which Western policymakers should consider is that, rightly or wrongly, the Supreme Leader and much of the governing elite have staked their legitimacy on the nuclear programme. This is one reason why Oxford Research Group in consultation with former policymakers and diplomats with direct experience of the Iranian nuclear file emphasized that in order to reach a diplomatic solution, Iran should be offered a package with integrated “face-saving” measures. This briefing has also sought to make the case that sanctions and defiance are no replacement for serious diplomacy, which ultimately means that both sides must show their readiness to depart from their opening positions.
If Iran’s total submission and relinquishment of all right to uranium enrichment is the endgame, then sanctions are highly unlikely to succeed as long as the present governing elite remains in power. A compromise solution, however, remains feasible and not beyond the realm of possibility.
Another factor which should be considered is that Iran does not believe the U.S. is prepared to offer a deal that would be palatable to it prior to Obama’s re-election. Similarly, it is doubtful that Ayatollah Khamenei, and Ahmadinejad’s domestic critics, would favour conclusion of a comprehensive deal with the P5+1 if it meant Ahmadinejad could claim it as a victory and capitalise on it domestically. The Iranians thus want to keep negotiations going, so that diplomatic contact is maintained until the arrival of the most apposite time to strike a deal. Iran’s economic turbulence of course impacts its plans in this regard, but nonetheless the aforementioned should be borne in mind.
If the objective is to curb and limit Iranian uranium enrichment activities, and ensure they remain peaceful, then the sequencing of any deal needs to be carefully weighted to promote a “balance of advantage” for both sides of the dispute. As we had previously laid out in “Iran’s Nuclear Impasse: Breaking the Deadlock,” it may be possible to exchange the demands made on Iran’s nuclear ambitions with the progressive lifting of nuclear related sanctions. It is still possible for the West to use the leverage provided by sanctions constructively. As yet however, there are few signs that the U.S., France, Germany and Israel will agree to any such scheme.
The article is a look into the possible reasons that Israel has pushed back the nuclear timeline for Iran. I quote Tony Karon at length (which appears at TB) and list my own thoughts (some via Jim):
That notion — [...]]]>
The article is a look into the possible reasons that Israel has pushed back the nuclear timeline for Iran. I quote Tony Karon at length (which appears at TB) and list my own thoughts (some via Jim):
That notion — that you can’t whip up your own population into a fearful frenzy, then not do anything — tracks with comments made in the past by top Israeli officials casting aside the “existential threat” meme. Along with Barak, former Mossad chief Efraim Halevy sounded a confident note in late 2009: “It is not within the power of Iran to destroy the state of Israel — at best it can cause Israel grievous damage. Israel is indestructible.”
But there are other possibilities to consider, most of them speculative. Perhaps Israel was merely gloating about its covert actions against Iran. Many mainstream commentators suggest Israel is behind the Stuxnet computer worm that damaged Iranian centrifuges as well as a campaign of assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists. Maybe, as Jim Lobe suggested to me in a conversation, there was some kind of quid pro quo between the U.S. and Israel over the public extension of Israel’s nuclear clock.
There are certainly many pawns on the board to trade between Israel and the U.S. at the moment: an Israeli settlement freeze (whether including East Jerusalem or not), the fate of imprisoned Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard, a U.S. offer of an Israeli wish list of military hardware (as discussed in earlier failed talks on a freeze), or maybe even some sort of agreement for Israel to drop mounting preconditions for yet another round of direct talks. All are possibilities, though some quite unlikely.
It’s worth noting, that as a source close to high-ranking Israelis put it to LobeLog, Israel has shifted its focus from the threat of Iran to the threat of “delegitimizers.” The latter is an amorphous and misleading catchall phrase that the Israeli right and their Stateside defenders use to indict the motives of anyone who even comes near the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel.
I also add that Paul Pillar, writing on the website of the National Interest, has an interesting post listing some possibilities:
One is that they are more or less straightforward reflections of careful, straightforward analysis by Israeli experts of the actual state of the Iranian program. Not every statement by a public official needs to be a disingenuous manipulation of the facts in pursuit of a policy objective. Sometimes we need to resist the tendency to overanalyze someone else’s motives.
Given Israel’s track record, I’m skeptical of this lack of skepticism. But some of Pillar’s other possibilities track with the ones I enumerated, and all are well worth reading.
Matt Duss at The Wonk Room, meanwhile, picks up on an interesting Der Spiegel interview with new IAEA chief Yukiya Amano. Duss notes that Amano told the German daily, “Despite all unanswered questions, we cannot say that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapons program.”
You’ll recall, of course, that Amano told U.S. officials that “he was solidly in the U.S. court on every key strategic decision” — including Iran — according to U.S. diplomatic cables. As Duss points out, this aligns perfectly with the view Amano espoused in his Der Spiegel interview — because the “U.S. court” on this particular “key strategic issue” corresponds with a public acknowledgment by the CIA (PDF) that the U.S. does “not know whether Tehran will eventually decide to produce nuclear weapons.”
On the other hand, the Wall Street Journal‘s neoconservative editorial board recently declared (falsely) that Iran had already “announced its intention to build a nuclear bomb.”
As I wrote on Tehran Bureau, none of the recent developments seem to have had much impact on U.S.-based Iran hawks, who are perfectly content to keep beating the war drums. No matter what Iran does or how its nuclear program advances (if at all), the hawks want to attack it. No matter how effective sanctions are, they will never be enough.
]]>Arch-Islamophobe Frank Gaffney was booted from the Conservative Political Action Conference agenda. At Religion Dispatches, Sarah Posner spoke with Suhail Khan, a Muslim conservative and board member of the group that hosts the annual CPAC, who said:
“Frank has been [...]]]>
Arch-Islamophobe Frank Gaffney was booted from the Conservative Political Action Conference agenda. At Religion Dispatches, Sarah Posner spoke with Suhail Khan, a Muslim conservative and board member of the group that hosts the annual CPAC, who said:
“Frank has been frozen out of CPAC by his own hand, because of his antics. We need people who are credible on national security . . . but because of Frank’s just completely irresponsible assertions over the years, the organizers have decided to keep him out.” That, Khan added, is similar reaction to current and former members of Congress, including Bobby Jindal, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ), and the late Henry Hyde, who distanced themselves from Gaffney.
The conservative shunning of Gaffney, said Khan, is not “because of any pressure from Muslim activists but because they didn’t want to be associated with a crazy bigot.”
Naturally, Gaffney, the president of the defense industry-funded Center for Security Policy (CSP), said it was all the doing of the Muslim Brotherhood. Posner:
Frank Gaffney, the Islamophobic activist bent on getting Congress to investigate “creeping shari’ah,” talked to the conspiracy web site World Net Daily, claiming “that CPAC has come under the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is working to bring America under Saudi-style Shariah law.”
Gaffney has played this game of demagoguery about his critics before: When PBS delayed the airing of a documentary put together by Gaffney and requested editorial changes, he took the creative dispute public, charging that the Nation of Islam was taking over public broadcasting. (Don’t worry, the doc aired on Fox News.) He’s now, of course, brought his filmmaking prowess to the Clarion Fund, the well-funded producers of “Obsession,” and a forthcoming movie on Iran.
Gaffney’s CSP is involved in many efforts Islamophobic. The center’s COO, Christine Brim, has spoken at European far-right conferences as well as those of Pamela Geller.
CSP also released a report last year about ‘creeping sharia.’ But, as Matt Duss demonstrated at the Wonk Room, the authors didn’t bother to speak to any Muslims or Islamic scholars who might actually know something about Sharia. (Duss also noted the long, public record of Islamophobia from one of the report’s co-authors. One sample: “Islam was born in violence; it will die that way.”)
What substantiates Gaffney’s charge about ‘creeping sharia’ at CPAC is that CPAC is still hosting a panel on — you guessed it — ‘creeping sharia’! Ben Smith reports for Politico:
“The fact is that we will have a panel tentatively titled ‘Defining and Debating Shariah in America’ at this year’s CPAC moderated by Cliff May of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies,” emailed the American Conservative Union’s CPAC director Lisa DePasquale.
So the conservative fête retains its anti-Sharia credentials after all (despite, perhaps, Muslim Brotherhood infiltration). And FDD‘s Cliff May quietly takes a step up — and brings Gaffney down a notch — in the ongoing race to be America’s number one counter-Jihadi.
]]>At PBS/Frontline‘s Tehran Bureau, I laid out what I think is a pretty compelling case that the [...]]]>
At PBS/Frontline‘s Tehran Bureau, I laid out what I think is a pretty compelling case that the United States should put a confidence-building deal — specifically some new version of the long discussed fuel-swap arrangement — on the table.
From the Tehran Bureau piece:
If, in Istanbul next month, Iran balks at U.S. and P5+1 efforts to arrange a confidence-building fuel swap, the Islamic Republic’s intransigence will be put on full display. If, on the other hand, Iran agrees to such a deal, little harm will be done to the West’s longterm prospects of ending the nuclear standoff without drastic measures – and Iran will turn over a sizable chunk of its nuclear material. If the United States and the rest of the P5+1 make the Iranians an offer they can’t refuse, it could be a win-win situation.
John Limbert, a Naval Academy professor and distinguished former foreign service officer who was an Iranian hostage and later ran the Iran desk at Obama’s State Department, is fond of saying, “They always zig when we zag.” The inverse is also true and, at this moment, the United States seems to be the one doing the zigging. But a zigging line and a zagging line just might cross paths, and the Obama administration should take advantage if the opportunity arises in Istanbul. It may not work, but to do nothing, and to try nothing, is to passively slide down the path to confrontation.
Check out the whole thing here.
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