Washington acknowledges that there is no simple way to return to the original nuclear deal with Iran, yet the lack of a viable alternative leaves the Biden administration seemingly rudderless.
Open ties between the two nations are in everyone’s interest, but it will take serious intent and deft maneuvering from America to get there. Is the administration up to it?
European governments are reportedly pressuring the Biden administration to revive efforts to reach a new nuclear deal with Iran despite a deepening of Iranian-Russian strategic relations...
Iran’s foreign minister said on Sunday the United States and Iran were on the cusp of a “prisoner swap,” with media reports adding that the exchange could include a U.S. ransom...
Iran’s government appointed Mohammad Reza Farzin as the new governor of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) in late December as the country’s national currency, the rial, plummeted against the U.S. dollar....
When asked last week whether nuclear negotiations with Iran were still ongoing, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, “We continue to believe that ultimately diplomacy is the most...
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service is investigating Iranian death threats against Canadians who have publicly criticized Tehran, the spy agency said last week. The announcement appears to reflect Ottawa’s increasing efforts to hold Iran accountable for its bloody suppression of anti-regime protests. Last Wednesday, Canada imposed its fifth round of sanctions this year against regime targets pursuant to the Special Economic Measures Act, bringing Ottawa’s total number of designations to 280. However, Ottawa has stopped short of perhaps the most impactful step it could take: designating Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization pursuant to Canada’s Criminal Code.
Human rights groups report that the Islamic Republic of Iran has killed at least 233 Iranians, including at least 32 minors, while detaining thousands more during mass protests over the past five weeks. Though the State Department said last week that nuclear talks with Iran are “not our focus right now,” the Biden administration has yet to withdraw offers of sanctions relief already made to the regime in Tehran — leaving the door open for lifting sanctions on entities and sectors of Iran’s economy that finance the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which has played a role in suppressing protests.
The new nuclear deal currently under negotiation with Iran would not revive the original 2015 agreement. Instead, this shorter, weaker version would reduce the time Iran needs to produce enough fissile...
On day one of a new Iran nuclear deal, the United States would reportedly repeal three executive orders that imposed sanctions on major sectors of Iran’s economy connected to the Islamic Revolutionary...
“Russia plans to use Iran as a backdoor to circumvent international sanctions over Ukraine if Tehran’s nuclear accord with world powers comes back into force,” Politico reported on Tuesday. Trade, finance, and energy officials from both Tehran and Moscow have met in recent months to develop what Politico calls a “get-out-of-jail-free card” for Russia to evade Western sanctions. Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Iran in July to strengthen ties between the two countries.
A top Iranian spokesman said on Sunday that Iran achieved “huge progress” in “sanctions issues.” The West has reportedly offered Iran economic concessions that would lift indirect sanctions on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). As part of a revived nuclear deal, this action would effectively dismantle the bipartisan sanctions architecture overwhelmingly enacted by Congress just five years ago while America remained a participant in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). This and other forms of sanctions relief would allow Tehran to access up to $275 billion during the accord’s first year and $1 trillion by 2030.
European and American diplomats say negotiations over the fate of the nuclear deal with Iran have reached their final stage. As a series of previous FDD publications have shown, the new nuclear deal would...
An admirer of the regime in Iran attacked the author Salman Rushdie on August 12, stabbing him roughly 10 times minutes before his scheduled lecture in Chautauqua, New York. Rushdie faces a long “road to recovery,” stated his agent. He may even lose an eye. European and Middle Eastern intelligence officials said the assailant, 24-year-old Hadi Matar of Fairview, New Jersey, had contacts with members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). A U.S. law enforcement official said Matar’s posts on social media show his sympathies to Shia extremism and IRGC causes.
This month marks the first anniversary of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s assumption of power, but he has failed to fulfill one of his key campaign pledges: to relieve Iran’s economic plight. Over...
The administration has said it will not remove the IRGC’s terrorist designation, but it is likely looking for ways to ease the burden on Iran.
U.S. policy can no longer afford to be limited to seeking a new nuclear deal.
Tehran has announced that in the first month of the Persian year 1401 (April 2022), Iran’s non-oil exports grew 25 percent compared to the same month last year. This growth follows a 40 percent increase...