OIAC Brief On Iran, July 14th 2014

Transfer of a journalist to the general ward of Evin prison for serving sentence

According to media reports on Wednesday 9 July 2014, Ms. Marzieh Rasouli, journalist, was transferred to Evin prison general ward to serve her sentence. She is the second journalist summoned to Evin prison in the past two weeks to serve their prison sentences. Prior to Rasouli, Ms. Reyhaneh Tabatabaei was also transferred to Evin Prison.

Former U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman on Tuesday called for Iran resistance fighters to be brought to the United States to protect them from a possible massacre at the hands of Iraqi government forces.

Nearly 3,000 members of the National Council of Resistance to Iran are stationed at Camp Liberty, a former U.S. base in Baghdad, Gen. Hugh Shelton, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Fox News.

The Times- In a reminder of the Middle East’s intertwined nature, the latest violence between Israel and Hamas has U.S. and Israeli officials lamenting the role of a key actor hundreds of miles east of Gaza: Iran.

“Who is the enabler for Hamas? Where do they get those rockets?” asked House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce Friday morning. “It’s Iran.”

ISTANBUL: Syrian National Coalition President Ahmad Jarba said that the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) represented a serious threat to the entire Arab region and called on the international community to provide the opposition with weapons.

In a sit-down interview with The Daily Star in the Turkish city of Istanbul, Jarba stressed that the SNC’s position on ISIS “has been clear since day one: This is a tool being used by the Iranians and the Syrian regime, and it does not hesitate to murder, slaughter, and terrorize.”

Preparation of the ground for massacre of Liberty residents

The Iranian clerical regime’s campaign to spread false information about the cooperation of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) and the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) with ISIS, which started since the early days of the recent Iraq crisis, continues.

The goal is clearly preparing the ground for a large scale massacre Iranian refugees, members of PMOI (MEK), in Camp Liberty.

I have known Maliki, or Abu Isra, as he is known to people close to him, for more than a decade. I have traveled across three continents with him. I know his family and his inner circle. When Maliki was an obscure member of parliament, I was among the very few Americans in Baghdad who took his phone calls.

VIENNA (AP) – Joint efforts by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and three other Western foreign ministers failed Sunday to advance faltering nuclear talks with Iran, with the target date for a deal only a week away.

“There has been no breakthrough today,” said British Foreign Secretary William Hague after meetings with Kerry and the foreign ministers of France, Germany and Iran.

INU- Iranian state media quoted a senior official on Thursday as threatening that Iran would immediately resume its previous activities if the P5+1 does not accept a deal reflecting Iranian demands on enrichment capacity. According to Tasnim News Agency, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the chairman of the Majlis’ National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, declared that among other ostensibly suspended activities, Iran would return to 20 percent uranium enrichment if the United States did not accept Tehran’s plans to increase is current supply of operational centrifuges by approximately 19 times.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday major differences persist between the Iranian regime and six world powers negotiating on Tehran’s nuclear program.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said on Sunday it was crucial for the Iranian regime “to be more realistic about what is necessary” to reach a nuclear deal with six major powers that would end sanctions against the regime in exchange for curbs on its atomic work.

The Iranian regime’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi delivered a similar message. He was quoted by the regime’s Arabic language al-Alam television as saying that “disputes over all major and important issues still remain. We have not been able to narrow the gaps on major issues and it is not clear whether we can do it.”

The Organization of Iranian-American communities works to promote human rights and democratic freedoms for the people of Iran. This includes advocating for a democratic secular government in Iran, founded on respect for human rights, religious tolerance, and equality among all citizens. Our goal is to organize Iranian-American communities in the United States to promote these values.