Are we heading for a War in the Middle East? Well read some the articles that I have put together and you can decide, and will oil skyrocket sending our fragiles economies to a global double dip Recession?
Strait of Hormuz powder keg: US-Israel to meet Great Prophet?
A Nour missile is test fired off Iran's first domestically made destroyer, Jamaran, on the southern shores of Iran in the Persian Gulf March 9, 2010 (Reuters / Ebrahim Noroozi / IIPA)With tensions around the Strait of Hormuz sky-high, Iranian plans to conduct the country's "greatest naval war games” could coincide with joint US-Israeli exercises in the Persian Gulf. With both sides taking positions, could a real battle be looming?
Hopefully the massive exercises will remain just that. But with three armies on the playing board, one spark could be enough to ignite an all-out war.
Iran, which recently held a 10-day naval exercise near the Strait of Hormuz to demonstrate its military prowess, is now planning new, ‘massive’ naval drills codenamed The Great Prophet.
The drills will be carried out by the country’s elite Revolutionary Guard, which has its own air, naval and ground forces separate from those of the regular military.
On Thursday, the semiofficial Fars news agency quoted the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's naval commander, Admiral Ali Fadavi, as saying the next round of war games would be "different" from previous ones, AP reports.However, on the same day, an Israeli military spokesman speaking under condition of anonymity said his country was gearing up for the largest joint missile defense exercise ever held with the United States.
The drill, called "Austere Challenge 12," is scheduled to take place in the upcoming weeks. Its primary purpose is to test multiple Israeli and US air defense systems, especially the “Arrow” system, which the country specifically developed with help from the US to intercept Iranian missiles.Perhaps more alarmingly to the Iranian leadership, thousands of US troops will be deployed to Israel in support of the drill.While the Israeli military claims the latest exercises are unconnected with recent events, Martin Van Creveld, a military historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said the drill would be used to gain leverage over Iran."Defending against an attack is not something that you improvise from today to tomorrow. It's something you have to prepare, you have to rehearse… This, among other things, is an exercise to show Iran, the people in Tehran, that Israel and the United States are ready to counterattack," AP cites him as saying.But Jamal Abdi of the National Iranian American Council in Washington told RT the actions of America and Israel are not merely preventative.
“We’re getting closer and closer to war with Iran. Anybody who argues that this extraordinary confluence of events – the planned exercises by the US and Israel, the exercises that Iran was doing in the Persian Gulf, we have sanctions in place with no diplomacy – the only way that that ends is through confrontation,” he said. Tensions in the region have soared since the Islamic Republic threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz – through which one sixth of the world’s oil passes – in response to Western plans to ban oil imports from Iran.And following Washington's decision Saturday to approve sanctions targeting the country’s oil Industry over Tehran’s alleged secret nuclear weapons program, the game of brinkmanship being played by all sides could push the entire region over the edge.
A Nour missile is test fired off Iran's first domestically made destroyer, Jamaran, on the southern shores of Iran in the Persian Gulf March 9, 2010 (Reuters / Ebrahim Noroozi / IIPA)
With tensions around the Strait of Hormuz sky-high, Iranian plans to conduct the country's "greatest naval war games” could coincide with joint US-Israeli exercises in the Persian Gulf. With both sides taking positions, could a real battle be looming?
Hopefully the massive exercises will remain just that. But with three armies on the playing board, one spark could be enough to ignite an all-out war.Iran, which recently held a 10-day naval exercise near the Strait of Hormuz to demonstrate its military prowess, is now planning new, ‘massive’ naval drills codenamed The Great Prophet.The drills will be carried out by the country’s elite Revolutionary Guard, which has its own air, naval and ground forces separate from those of the regular military.
On Thursday, the semiofficial Fars news agency quoted the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's naval commander, Admiral Ali Fadavi, as saying the next round of war games would be "different" from previous ones, AP reports.
However, on the same day, an Israeli military spokesman speaking under condition of anonymity said his country was gearing up for the largest joint missile defense exercise ever held with the United States.The drill, called "Austere Challenge 12," is scheduled to take place in the upcoming weeks. Its primary purpose is to test multiple Israeli and US air defense systems, especially the “Arrow” system, which the country specifically developed with help from the US to intercept Iranian missiles.
Perhaps more alarmingly to the Iranian leadership, thousands of US troops will be deployed to Israel in support of the drill.
While the Israeli military claims the latest exercises are unconnected with recent events, Martin Van Creveld, a military historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said the drill would be used to gain leverage over Iran.
"Defending against an attack is not something that you improvise from today to tomorrow. It's something you have to prepare, you have to rehearse… This, among other things, is an exercise to show Iran, the people in Tehran, that Israel and the United States are ready to counterattack," AP cites him as saying.
But Jamal Abdi of the National Iranian American Council in Washington told RT the actions of America and Israel are not merely preventative.
“We’re getting closer and closer to war with Iran. Anybody who argues that this extraordinary confluence of events – the planned exercises by the US and Israel, the exercises that Iran was doing in the Persian Gulf, we have sanctions in place with no diplomacy – the only way that that ends is through confrontation,” he said. Tensions in the region have soared since the Islamic Republic threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz – through which one sixth of the world’s oil passes – in response to Western plans to ban oil imports from Iran.
And following Washington's decision Saturday to approve sanctions targeting the country’s oil Industry over Tehran’s alleged secret nuclear weapons program, the game of brinkmanship being played by all sides could push the entire region over the edge.
Iran says it will close Strait of Hormuz if crude exports blocked
Published: 08 January, 2012, 15:49
Edited: 10 January, 2012, 11:55
http://rt.com/news/iran-ready-block-strait-hormuz-361/
An Iranian war-boat fires a missile during the "Velayat-90" navy exercises in the Strait of Hormuz in southern Iran (AFP Photo / ALI MOHAMMADI)
An Iranian war-boat fires a missile during the "Velayat-90" navy exercises in the Strait of Hormuz in southern Iran (AFP Photo / ALI MOHAMMADI)
Tehran’s leadership has decided to order a blockade of the strategic Strait of Hormuz if the country’s oil exports are blocked, a senior Revolutionary Guard Commander said as reported by Iranian press.
The strategic decision was made by Iran's top authorities, Ali Ashraf Nouri said, as cited by the Iranian Khorasan daily.
"The supreme authorities … have insisted that if enemies block the export of our oil, we won't allow a drop of oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. This is the strategy of the Islamic Republic in countering such threats," Nouri said.
Until now, there had been no official confirmation of Iran’s military having direct orders to block the Strait. However, Tehran has been threatening to block the strategic waterway – one of the world's most important oil routes – if the West slapped more sanctions on its oil exports or risked hostile military act of any kind.
Meanwhile, Iran is planning a new round of “massive” naval drills codenamed The Great Prophet, which will be carried out by the country’s elite Revolutionary Guard with its own air, naval and ground forces, separate from those of the regular military.
On Thursday, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's naval commander, Admiral Ali Fadavi, said the next round of war games would be "different” from previous ones.
Iran recently held a 10-day naval exercise near the Strait of Hormuz, demonstrating its military prowess and ability to take full control of the waters if necessary.
Tensions spiraled after the US introduced the latest round of sanctions against Iran targeting its financial and banking sector, effectively hampering Iran’s ability to settle transactions with the international consumers of its oil. The legislation already caused the Iranian currency to plunge to a historic low.
Iran is under UN sanctions for refusing to stop its uranium enrichment program, which is – as Iranian officials claim – aimed at developing a complex civilian nuclear industry. The international community believes, though, that Iran’s nuclear program is merely a front for its ambitions to create a nuclear weapon.
Meanwhile the EU may delay its embargo on Iranian crude oil imports, a measure aimed at complementing the US sanctions. EU members most dependent on oil imports are seeking to push back the embargo and have called for “grace periods” on existing contracts. But diplomats from different countries differed on the exact length of these grace periods. Diplomats from Greece, which is most dependent on Iranian oil imports, have called for a delay of 12 months, while the UK, France and the Netherlands want a maximum of 3 months.
EU foreign ministers are set to meet in Brussels on January 30 to decide on how the embargo will be imposed.
Iran is the second-largest oil producer after Saudi Arabia, among the 12 countries in OPEC, making around 3.5 million barrels a day. EU countries buy around 500,000 barrels per day, the largest share of Iran’s total 2.6 million barrel a day oil export.
During an interview on CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the United States would not tolerate the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, added that the US would take action to reopen the Strait in the event Iran does block it.
“They've invested in capabilities that could, in fact, for a period of time block the Strait of Hormuz. We've invested in capabilities to ensure that if that happens, we can defeat that,” Dempsey said.
Panetta also said he did not believe Iran was developing a nuclear weapon but indicated that Iran’s nuclear capabilities are what concern the US and its allies.
Panetta and Dempsey stressed the need to continue putting diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran but also said that the US did not intend to “take any option off the table.”
Asked about what the United States would do if Israel were to take out Iran’s nuclear capability on its own, Leon Panetta said the main goal would be to protect US forces in the region.
Iran drives Europe into a corner
http://english.pravda.ru/world/asia/25-01-2012/120326-iran_europe-0/
The European Union has decided to impose new sanctions on Iran designed to force the country to curtail its nuclear program. The most painful point is the rejection of the supply of Iranian oil, which will result in irreparable damage to oil exports, as it accounts for half of the budget revenues of Tehran. How would Ayatollah respond to the West?The list of sanctions consists of twenty items, the most painful of which will be the rejection of the supply of Iranian oil. According to the authors of the sanctions, it will force the regime of Ayatollah to either accept the West's nuclear program, or make suggestions that would suit the Western leaders. However, it is doubtful that would happen.First, it appears that in spite of their desire to punish Ayatollah, the European officials punished the Greeks, Spaniards and Italians - nearly all of the unfortunate quartet PIGS, whose stupidity and greed initiated the current economic crisis in Europe. These countries consume the lion's share of Iranian oil flowing to the EU. No wonder Greece, third of whose energy demand is covered by Iranian oil, until recently, sought to delay the embargo at least by a year.
For Tehran this decision, though unpleasant, is not fatal. One does not have to be a great military strategist to predict the actions of the Western politicians in the event of deterioration of the situation. The oil embargo had already happened in the history of this conflict, and this time the Iranians had time to prepare for it. Despite the fact that the country is really dependent on oil, energy exports are diversified among customers, who sometimes have very different interests.The EU uses approximately 600,000 barrels of oil (20 percent of the Iranian exports), but China alone imports nearly as much (550 thousand barrels per day). Other large consumers of Iranian oil are Japan, India, South Korea, and they are not going to abandon the supply. Who should Iran bet on at a time when the West has virtually no industry left and the raging economic crisis, while Asia, if not increasing, then, at least, is keeping its growth at a steady pace?
The Ministry of Petroleum Industry of Iran has already declared that the embargo did not come as a shock and that they have developed alternative solutions in preparation for this outcome. A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry Ramin Mehmanparast advised the European countries and those under American pressure to think about their own interests. The importers that remove themselves from Iran's energy market will soon see that their place was taken by others. The EU gave Tehran six months (the embargo fully takes effect only on July 1, and until then the EU will be choosing the energy supplier from previous contracts), so the Iranian oil industry has time to find a replacement for the unruly customers.
Would Tehran be willing to use these six months? The Iranian elite already heard some suggestions to give an immediate answer to the embargo by shutting off oil and petroleum products to Europe, which will not make the Greeks and Italians happy. Even considering the "soft" option of imposing sanctions it will be difficult to recover the economies of these countries that would have to contend with an increase in oil prices, while searching for alternative suppliers. The latter, in turn, are unlikely to not take advantage of the situation. However, EU officials, apparently, decided to sacrifice the future bankrupts, placing an additional burden on them.Meanwhile, the rise in price of oil has become a reality as early as Monday: a barrel of Brent crude jumped to $100, and some experts believe it will reach $200 if the confrontation escalates. There is another sad scenario in which Iran fulfills its threat to obstruct the Strait of Hormuz used to transport up to forty percent of world exports of petroleum and petroleum products. This is the second consequence of the EU's decision that would affect not only the Europeans.
Third, the sanctions are the response to their ideological inspiration in the USA. Under a threat of blocking transactions of its Central Bank, Tehran is transferring to transactions in Rial and the national currencies of the counterparties. Such agreements have been already reached with India and Turkey, with Russia to follow. The process of replacing the US dollar as a reserve currency for transactions has been ongoing for a while and was not started by Iran. However, the Americans are unlikely to be thankful to their allies for the acceleration of the issue.
Brussels sanctions did achieve certain results. In spite of all assurances of the Western politicians of love to the Iranian people, ordinary people have already felt its effects. Rial has been crushed by speculators, and on Tuesday prices for basic necessities increased, and even at higher prices they are difficult to get. This means that the situation is worsening for the ordinary people both in Iran and Greece, which is likely to be the only serious consequence of the embargo. No matter how good the rhetoric of Brussels, the results do not lead to anything other than further deterioration, including, first and foremost - for Brussels itself.Ilya NikonovBigness.Ru
The European Union has decided to impose new sanctions on Iran designed to force the country to curtail its nuclear program. The most painful point is the rejection of the supply of Iranian oil, which will result in irreparable damage to oil exports, as it accounts for half of the budget revenues of Tehran. How would Ayatollah respond to the West?The list of sanctions consists of twenty items, the most painful of which will be the rejection of the supply of Iranian oil. According to the authors of the sanctions, it will force the regime of Ayatollah to either accept the West's nuclear program, or make suggestions that would suit the Western leaders. However, it is doubtful that would happen.
First, it appears that in spite of their desire to punish Ayatollah, the European officials punished the Greeks, Spaniards and Italians - nearly all of the unfortunate quartet PIGS, whose stupidity and greed initiated the current economic crisis in Europe. These countries consume the lion's share of Iranian oil flowing to the EU. No wonder Greece, third of whose energy demand is covered by Iranian oil, until recently, sought to delay the embargo at least by a year.
For Tehran this decision, though unpleasant, is not fatal. One does not have to be a great military strategist to predict the actions of the Western politicians in the event of deterioration of the situation. The oil embargo had already happened in the history of this conflict, and this time the Iranians had time to prepare for it. Despite the fact that the country is really dependent on oil, energy exports are diversified among customers, who sometimes have very different interests.
The EU uses approximately 600,000 barrels of oil (20 percent of the Iranian exports), but China alone imports nearly as much (550 thousand barrels per day). Other large consumers of Iranian oil are Japan, India, South Korea, and they are not going to abandon the supply. Who should Iran bet on at a time when the West has virtually no industry left and the raging economic crisis, while Asia, if not increasing, then, at least, is keeping its growth at a steady pace?
The Ministry of Petroleum Industry of Iran has already declared that the embargo did not come as a shock and that they have developed alternative solutions in preparation for this outcome. A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry Ramin Mehmanparast advised the European countries and those under American pressure to think about their own interests. The importers that remove themselves from Iran's energy market will soon see that their place was taken by others. The EU gave Tehran six months (the embargo fully takes effect only on July 1, and until then the EU will be choosing the energy supplier from previous contracts), so the Iranian oil industry has time to find a replacement for the unruly customers.
Would Tehran be willing to use these six months? The Iranian elite already heard some suggestions to give an immediate answer to the embargo by shutting off oil and petroleum products to Europe, which will not make the Greeks and Italians happy. Even considering the "soft" option of imposing sanctions it will be difficult to recover the economies of these countries that would have to contend with an increase in oil prices, while searching for alternative suppliers. The latter, in turn, are unlikely to not take advantage of the situation. However, EU officials, apparently, decided to sacrifice the future bankrupts, placing an additional burden on them.
Meanwhile, the rise in price of oil has become a reality as early as Monday: a barrel of Brent crude jumped to $100, and some experts believe it will reach $200 if the confrontation escalates. There is another sad scenario in which Iran fulfills its threat to obstruct the Strait of Hormuz used to transport up to forty percent of world exports of petroleum and petroleum products. This is the second consequence of the EU's decision that would affect not only the Europeans.
Third, the sanctions are the response to their ideological inspiration in the USA. Under a threat of blocking transactions of its Central Bank, Tehran is transferring to transactions in Rial and the national currencies of the counterparties. Such agreements have been already reached with India and Turkey, with Russia to follow. The process of replacing the US dollar as a reserve currency for transactions has been ongoing for a while and was not started by Iran. However, the Americans are unlikely to be thankful to their allies for the acceleration of the issue.
Brussels sanctions did achieve certain results. In spite of all assurances of the Western politicians of love to the Iranian people, ordinary people have already felt its effects. Rial has been crushed by speculators, and on Tuesday prices for basic necessities increased, and even at higher prices they are difficult to get. This means that the situation is worsening for the ordinary people both in Iran and Greece, which is likely to be the only serious consequence of the embargo. No matter how good the rhetoric of Brussels, the results do not lead to anything other than further deterioration, including, first and foremost - for Brussels itself.
Ilya Nikonov
Bigness.Ru
Iran Decides to Close Hormuz if Oil Exports Blocked
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
January 8, 2012
Ali Ashraf Nouri, a senior commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, told Khorasan daily on Sunday that the Iranian government has decided to close the strategic Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Persian Gulf if the country’s oil exports are blocked.
Also on Sunday, Iranian Army Commander Brigadier General Habibollah Sayyari said Iran can block the Strait of Hormuz “easily.”
The threat comes as the European Union prepares to embargo Iranian oil at the end of the month in response to Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program.
It was reported last week EU foreign ministers will likely to agree to block Iranian oil imports at a meeting in Brussels on January 30. Working groups are negotiating the details of how the embargo will be imposed, said an official.
Following Nouri’s comments, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told CBS News that if Iran blocks the Strait of Hormuz the U.S. military will respond.
“We made very clear that the United States will not tolerate the blocking of the Straits of Hormuz,” Panetta told CBS television. “That’s another red line for us and that we will respond to them.”
General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Iran has the ability to close the waterway. “But we would take action and reopen the Straits,” he warned.
Panetta also said that Iran is laying the groundwork for making nuclear weapons. “We have common cause here” with Israel, he said. “And the better approach is for us to work together.”
Split thrust: Iran beefs up nuclear projects and bolsters alliances;
Iran has vowed to increase the capacity of its first nuclear power plant to maximum within a month, and launch a new nuclear facility, as President Ahmadinejad arrives in Latin America to gain support amid intense pressure from the West.
The nuclear pledge came amid a storm of harsh rhetoric between Tehran and the West, with Iran saying it is not pursuing a nuclear weapons program and refuting Western allegations that it is in breach of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
Fereidoun Abbasi was speaking at the opening of an exhibition displaying the country’s nuclear achievements in the port city of Bandar Abbas, in the southern province of Hormozgan.
In August 2011, the AEOI announced plans to transfer the production of uranium enriched to a purity level of 20 per cent from the Natanz nuclear site to the subterranean Fordo enrichment facility under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It also claimed it would triple the production of 20 per cent enriched uranium and eventually move the entire program to the new, secretly-built facility.
The Fordo enrichment facility is carved into a mountainside south of Tehran to protect it against possible attacks. It was top secret until 2009 and was only disclosed to the IAEA nuclear watchdog in September of that year after its existence was allegedly detected by Western intelligence.
Mr Abbasi says some centrifuges have already been moved, but they are taking their time in order to observe what he calls “technical standards”.
The first batch of 20 per cent enriched nuclear fuel will be loaded into the core of the Tehran research reactor within a month, reports The Tehran Times. Iran has reiterated that it needs 20 per cent enriched uranium to produce nuclear fuel plates for the Tehran research reactor, which produces radioisotopes for cancer treatment.
However, another Iranian daily, the Kayhan, which is rumored to be close to the ruling clerics, said Tehran has already begun injecting uranium gas into the centrifuges at the Fordo facility. It remains unclear which of the reports is actually correct.
"At present we are capable of exporting nuclear services to the friendly countries in Africa which own considerable uranium resources," he was quoted as saying by the country’s media.
Noting that Iran is already registered as an exporter of nuclear hardware to other countries, he also underlined Tehran's readiness to export heavy water byproducts.
Fereidoun Abbasi announced a few months ago that Iran was ready to export enriched uranium, as well as build uranium enrichment plants abroad and advise countries importing nuclear power plants on how to write contracts protecting their rights.
Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has left for a five-day Latin America trip. It will take in Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador and Nicaragua, countries which, “resist the oppression” of the United States and share “an anti-colonialist view,” he said just before flying out on Sunday, according to the country’s Fars news agency.
If the EU puts its plan to sanction Iranian oil exports into practice, there will be hard consequences on the European economy. But experts say the West's sanction policy is motivated purely by politics.
The sanctions could come into effect by the end of January, unless Iran backs down on its alleged nuclear weapons program.
Tehran has responded to the sanctions with its own threats to block oil trade through the crucial Strait of Hormuz, leading to a continued deadlock in the Persian Gulf.
American warships are also present in the region, with a mission to prevent any hindrances of passage.
RT talked to professor of political science Pierre Guerlain, from Paris West University Nanterre La Defense, who is certain that the standoff between the West and Iran is driven by politics, not economics.
“From the economic point of view, it [sanctions] is not wise” he says, but measures are “coming from leaders who are facing elections; Obama in the US. And Obama has to be very tough on Iran, because he is accused by the Republicans of being soft on Iran.”
Iranian leaders, Guerlain believes, also have strong political reasons to continue the standoff, making the current conflict a “game where everything is trying to benefit from the opposition of the other.”
“Being tough on Iran is good for Obama, being oppositional to the US is good for Iranian leaders, who are themselves quite discredited in their own country," Guerlain explains, adding that “everyone benefits politically though economically everyone could be hurt.”
“The war in Iraq was meant to give them a stable pro-Western, pro-business base for operations in the Middle East,” Rees told RT. “What they ended up doing is making Iran a greater regional power than it was before. This is what the sanctions are about.”
The conflict is not just about nuclear weapons in the Middle East, or the US would be bound to pick on Israel, which is the region's only nuclear power, continues Rees.
“The reason for this continued conflict is that the American administration simply cannot live with an Iran which has as much regional power as it has at the moment. They see its links with Syria, they see its links with Hamas, they see its links with Hezbollah. This is a challenge to the American power in an absolutely critical – economically and geopolitically – area of the globe."
http://www.tewealth.com/experts/samuel-ezerzer-b-sc/
samuel ezerzer
Samuel Ezerzer Bsc, Producer & Host of the Money & Business Show , Consultant at T.E.WEALTH
The nuclear pledge came amid a storm of harsh rhetoric between Tehran and the West, with Iran saying it is not pursuing a nuclear weapons program and refuting Western allegations that it is in breach of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
Tehran to launch subterranean nuclear site soon
“The Fordo facility will be launched soon and will be able to produce 20 per cent, 3.5 per cent, and 4 per cent enriched uranium,” the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) was quoted by Iranian media as saying on Sunday.Fereidoun Abbasi was speaking at the opening of an exhibition displaying the country’s nuclear achievements in the port city of Bandar Abbas, in the southern province of Hormozgan.
In August 2011, the AEOI announced plans to transfer the production of uranium enriched to a purity level of 20 per cent from the Natanz nuclear site to the subterranean Fordo enrichment facility under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It also claimed it would triple the production of 20 per cent enriched uranium and eventually move the entire program to the new, secretly-built facility.
The Fordo enrichment facility is carved into a mountainside south of Tehran to protect it against possible attacks. It was top secret until 2009 and was only disclosed to the IAEA nuclear watchdog in September of that year after its existence was allegedly detected by Western intelligence.
Mr Abbasi says some centrifuges have already been moved, but they are taking their time in order to observe what he calls “technical standards”.
The first batch of 20 per cent enriched nuclear fuel will be loaded into the core of the Tehran research reactor within a month, reports The Tehran Times. Iran has reiterated that it needs 20 per cent enriched uranium to produce nuclear fuel plates for the Tehran research reactor, which produces radioisotopes for cancer treatment.
However, another Iranian daily, the Kayhan, which is rumored to be close to the ruling clerics, said Tehran has already begun injecting uranium gas into the centrifuges at the Fordo facility. It remains unclear which of the reports is actually correct.
Bushehr plant to work to full capacity within month
Iran's top nuclear official also said the Bushehr plant, located along the Persian Gulf coast, will reach its full capacity of 1,000 megawatts by February 1. The plant was connected to the country's national grid in September with a capacity of 60 megawatts. Once it reaches 1,000 megawatts, Bushehr will account for 2.5% of Iran's total electricity consumption.‘Tehran ready to export nuclear services to friendly countries’
Abbasi confirmed Tehran's readiness to export nuclear services to friendly countries, especially the African nations."At present we are capable of exporting nuclear services to the friendly countries in Africa which own considerable uranium resources," he was quoted as saying by the country’s media.
Noting that Iran is already registered as an exporter of nuclear hardware to other countries, he also underlined Tehran's readiness to export heavy water byproducts.
Fereidoun Abbasi announced a few months ago that Iran was ready to export enriched uranium, as well as build uranium enrichment plants abroad and advise countries importing nuclear power plants on how to write contracts protecting their rights.
Ahmadinejad off to Latin America for support against the West
Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has left for a five-day Latin America trip. It will take in Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador and Nicaragua, countries which, “resist the oppression” of the United States and share “an anti-colonialist view,” he said just before flying out on Sunday, according to the country’s Fars news agency.
Commenting on Ahmadinejad’s trip, the US State Department said that “as the regime feels increasing pressure, it is desperate for friends – and is flailing around in interesting places to find,” them.
Tensions continue to run high in the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran has announced it is planning to hold yet another round of naval drills following 10-days of manoeuvres.
The fresh round of drills – codenamed The Great Prophet – could coincide with joint US-Israeli exercises in the Persian Gulf, codenamed Austere Challenge 12.
Hopefully the show of strength will remain just that. But with three armies on the playing board, one spark could be enough to ignite an all-out war
Political theatre: Currents behind Iranian-Western standoff
Published: 05 January, 2012, 23:49
Edited: 06 January, 2012, 03:46
Edited: 06 January, 2012, 03:46
The sanctions could come into effect by the end of January, unless Iran backs down on its alleged nuclear weapons program.
Tehran has responded to the sanctions with its own threats to block oil trade through the crucial Strait of Hormuz, leading to a continued deadlock in the Persian Gulf.
American warships are also present in the region, with a mission to prevent any hindrances of passage.
RT talked to professor of political science Pierre Guerlain, from Paris West University Nanterre La Defense, who is certain that the standoff between the West and Iran is driven by politics, not economics.
“From the economic point of view, it [sanctions] is not wise” he says, but measures are “coming from leaders who are facing elections; Obama in the US. And Obama has to be very tough on Iran, because he is accused by the Republicans of being soft on Iran.”
Iranian leaders, Guerlain believes, also have strong political reasons to continue the standoff, making the current conflict a “game where everything is trying to benefit from the opposition of the other.”
“Being tough on Iran is good for Obama, being oppositional to the US is good for Iranian leaders, who are themselves quite discredited in their own country," Guerlain explains, adding that “everyone benefits politically though economically everyone could be hurt.”
US contributed into Iran’s geopolitical might
Washington’s intercourse with Iran is nothing but “a strategic foreign policy problem” acquired since their failure in Iraq, says John Rees, a political activist and national officer at the Stop the War Coalition.“The war in Iraq was meant to give them a stable pro-Western, pro-business base for operations in the Middle East,” Rees told RT. “What they ended up doing is making Iran a greater regional power than it was before. This is what the sanctions are about.”
The conflict is not just about nuclear weapons in the Middle East, or the US would be bound to pick on Israel, which is the region's only nuclear power, continues Rees.
“The reason for this continued conflict is that the American administration simply cannot live with an Iran which has as much regional power as it has at the moment. They see its links with Syria, they see its links with Hamas, they see its links with Hezbollah. This is a challenge to the American power in an absolutely critical – economically and geopolitically – area of the globe."
http://www.tewealth.com/experts/samuel-ezerzer-b-sc/
samuel ezerzer
Samuel Ezerzer Bsc, Producer & Host of the Money & Business Show , Consultant at T.E.WEALTH
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