The Trump administration’s announcement Monday that it is ending waivers allowing several countries to keep importing Iranian crude is likely to push up oil prices and sour relations with U.S. friends and rivals alike that rely on Iranian energy, all while stoking more tensions in the waters around the Persian Gulf. Read Here – Foreign […]
Beyond support for armed militias which take orders more from Tehran than Baghdad, Sistani is also aware that Iraqis, including most Iraqi Shiites, resent more mundane issues such as Iran’s dumping of cheap manufactured goods on the Iraqi market, thereby undercutting struggling Iraqi businesses. The anti-Iranian sentiment is so widespread that when fertilizer run-off poisoned […]
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s recent landmark trip to Iraq was closely monitored and discussed from various aspects by the media and analysts around the world. Some observers put their focus on the bilateral aspect, talking about the importance of the visit in terms of Iran’s growing influence in Iraq, while others analysed it within the context of Iran’s plans […]
The 40th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution could have offered the West an opportunity to reflect on the failure of four decades of disengagement to bring the Islamic Republic any closer to collapse, or the region any closer to peace. Instead, the Trump administration has doubled down on hostility, with nothing to show for it. […]
February brings the most significant series of tests yet of whether President Trump can transform his disruptive U.S. foreign policy into concrete outcomes. The four to watch most closely are: negotiating a trade deal with China, denuclearising North Korea, rallying an international community to contain Iran, and democratising Venezuela. Read Here – CNBC
Having long criticised U.S. policy in the Middle East, President Donald Trump has outlined the contours of a fresh approach to the region…But these new plans don’t consider a critical challenge: the shifting alignments in the region, which have intensified following the killing of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Read Here […]
With Iran’s convening of its first “Regional Security Dialogue” summit in late September 2018 with deputy national security advisors from Russia, China, and India, Tehran has taken a significant step toward creating a multilateral framework for Eurasian security cooperation in the face of renewed U.S. sanctions. Ostensibly devoted to combatting terrorism in Afghanistan, the summit’s concluding declaration indicates a […]
President Donald Trump’s strategy to contain Iranian power in the Middle East by forging Arab allies into a U.S.-backed security alliance was in trouble even before the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Now, three U.S. sources said, the plan faces fresh complications. Read Here – Reuters
The United States snapped sanctions back in place to choke Iran’s oil and shipping industries, while temporarily allowing top customers such as India and China to keep buying crude from the Islamic Republic. Having abandoned a 2015 Iran nuclear deal, US President Donald Trump is trying to cripple Iran’s oil-dependent economy and force Tehran to […]
The U.S. is pursuing a “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran that includes the re-imposition of key energy and banking sanctions. With Tehran refusing to capitulate over its nuclear program or regional policies, the U.S.-Iran rivalry could escalate across the region. Read Here – International Crisis Group
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