Concerns Rise Over Growing Afghan Population In Iran

The hardline ruthless fundamentalism has consistently simmered beneath the surface, irrespective of the government in charge of foreign policy, whether ultraconservative like the Ahmadinejad and Raisi administrations or more pragmatic like former President Hassan Rouhani, former Majles Speaker Ali Larijani, and former Nuclear Chief who, at times, guided Tehran's nuclear policy.

Until recently, Iran's current Chief Nuclear Negotiator, Al Bagheri-Kani, a protégé of former hardliner chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, was believed to oppose any rapprochement with the United States and the West over the nuclear issue. His behavior, including avoiding the press, reinforced this perception.

When for the first time Bagheri defended the negotiations with the West as a means of securing “national interests" in early September, many of the same observers did not believe him. Pundits in Iran had been constantly criticizing the government for appointing Bagheri as the man in charge of the nuclear talks and linked him to Jalili whose sinister remarks about the negotiations have continued here and there although officially, he has nothing to do with the matter. Many Iranian politicians and military commanders often pass naïve and sometimes funny judgement on the nuclear case and Jalili is no exception.

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Bagheri, however, has been mysteriously silent about his mission since 2021. His early September comments in which he levelled criticism at opponents of negotiations, accusing them of stripping the regime of a vital and crucial “instrument for securing national interests,” came at a time when Iranian moderate politicians and foreign policy analysts began to call for a milder approach in the nuclear issue, insisting that an agreement with the United States could help Tehran to improve its problematic economic situation. 

This shift in Bagheri's stance was seen as "a new Bagheri-Kani" by Khabar-Online website in Tehran, which praised him for criticizing hardliners who portrayed negotiations as an anti-revolutionary trend while disguising their opposition to the negotiations as defending revolutionary values.

The website praised Bagheri as a man who has tried many ways to resolve the dispute with the West over Iran's nuclear program. 

Khabar Online's in a new article on September 24 made another attempt to portray Bagheri as a new moderate voice among an army of hardliners. The headline of the report is self-explanatory: "Ali Bagheri encircled by those who wish to benefit from sanctions." The report characterized Bagheri's new approach as "realistic and unprecedented" and asked whether Raisi can put an end to the negotiation-resistance bipolar. 

However, Khabar Online reminded that two weeks after Bagheri voiced his new idea about how to further the nuclear talks, President Ebrahim Raisi had not yet reacted to the hardliner advocating sanctions as a blessing for Iran. Khabar Online further assessed Bagheri's idea as an honest attempt to secure Iran's national interests regardless of his political affiliation. 

While hardliners in Iran and the United States have been calling for tougher stances in recent weeks, and there were indications that Washington was softening at least part of its view toward Tehran by facilitating Iran's access to some of its frozen assets, there is still no tangible indication of further rapprochement.

Although Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has been optimistic about Oman's attempt to restart indirect negotiations between Iran and the United States, there has been no news from Washington or Muscat on that matter. In Washington, it takes some time for the administration to show any inclination toward an agreement with Tehran after facing opposition to its attempts to appease Iran.

The Israeli security agency, Shin Bet, disclosed on Wednesday that they had arrested two Arab-Israelis and three Palestinians who were planning to establish a terrorist network for carrying out attacks against public figures.

The operation, conducted in collaboration with the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israel Police, successfully exposed and thwarted the activities of these terrorists operating from the West Bank. The group was receiving guidance from an individual residing in Jordan who acted on behalf of Iranian security officials, reported I24.

The arrested individuals were identified as Murad Kamamaja, 47, Hassan Mojarimah, 34, and Ziad Shanti, 45. Additionally, two Israeli citizens living in the northern part of the country, Hamad Hammadi and Yosef Hamad, were also apprehended.

Kamamaja and Mojarimah had been tasked with smuggling illegal weapons into Israeli territory and gathering intelligence on protected individuals and senior public figures.

Controversial National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, known for his right-wing views, and former Likud lawmaker Yehuda Glick, were among the intended targets.

The Iranian security forces had instructed the agents for "the execution of terrorist activity within the territories of Israel, including, by setting fire to the vehicles of Israeli citizens."

The allegations against Iran come as tensions between Iran and Israel escalate over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program. Last week, the Israeli Prime Minister stated in a public address at the United Nations that, in order for the Islamic Republic to abandon its nuclear weapon development, it is necessary to confront it with a "credible military threat."

Mohammad Mosaddegh, Deputy Chief of Iran's Judiciary, announced on Wednesday that "legal measures have been initiated against 73 Americans" including Trump and former secretary of state, Mike Pompeo.

On January 3, 2020, President Donald Trump ordered a drone strike near Baghdad International Airport that resulted in the death of Soleimani. The US justified the action by claiming Soleimani was actively planning attacks against American diplomats and military personnel in Iraq and the broader region.

Mosaddegh called Soleimani's killing “a threat to Iran's national security” and claimed this week that “the judiciary has already dispatched 800 official letters to legal authorities and compiled 12,000 legal documents related to the matter".

Soleimani, who held a prominent role in Iran's military and intelligence operations abroad, oversaw the support and coordination of various militant proxy groups, including Lebanon's Hezbollah and Shiite militias in Iraq, which frequently targeted US forces.

Starting in January 2021, Tehran openly indicated its readiness to carry out deadly missions within the United States to seek revenge for the killing. It consistently singled out Trump, Pompeo, and former CENTCOM Commander General Kenneth McKenzie as top-priority targets for potential retaliation.

Mosaddegh claimed that Iran has independently sent requests for judicial cooperation to nine countries suspected of involvement in coordinating the terrorist attack, and they have received several responses.

Last year, President Ebrahim Raisi told the UN Donald Trump should face trial for his role in the Soleimani killing, and this year, continues to call for "vengeance" to the military man's killers. 

The document, shared with Western allies, advocates for the procurement of long-range missiles to target drone production facilities in Russia, Iran, and Syria, as reported by The Guardian on Wednesday.

The comprehensive 47-page report, delivered to G7 nations in August, discloses that over the past three months, more than 600 drone assaults leveraged unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) incorporating Western technology. Notably, the Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 drone models, containing 52 and 57 electrical components, respectively, sourced from Western companies, have been at the forefront.

The report singles out five European companies, including a Polish subsidiary of a British multinational, as the primary manufacturers of these components.

The document recommends actions, including "missile strikes on the production plants of these UAVs in Iran, Syria, as well as on a potential production site in the Russian Federation."

Furthermore, it proposes that such actions “may be carried out by the Ukrainian defense forces if partners provide the necessary means of destruction.”

The report also underscores a lack of coordination among EU intelligence agencies in addressing the misuse of Western components in these drones.

Additionally, the document notes that “almost all the imports to Iran originated from Turkey, India, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Vietnam and Costa Rica”.

Despite mounting evidence to the contrary, Iran continues to deny its provision of drones to Russia for the Ukraine conflict.

The US, the UK, the EU, Australia, and New Zealand have all imposed multiple rounds of sanctions on Iran due to its purported provision of drones to Russia in the Ukraine conflict.

Al-Ansari stressed Doha's openness to hosting any direct negotiations between Washington and Tehran on the Iranian nuclear file, in the next few weeks.

He elaborated that “After the recent agreement between the two countries, which was concluded with Qatari mediation (the release of American prisoners and the lifting of the freeze on Iranian funds in South Korea), international interest in the Iranian file increased, and the possibility of reaching new understandings about it that would ease tension in the region."

Western and Iranian media have been reporting secret indirect talks in recent months that aim to de-escalate tensions, with Iran slowing down its nuclear program in return for financial rewards by Washington, including lax sanctions enforcement.

Qatar is among the nations to step forward and offer to be the intermediary in talks to revive the nuclear deal known as the JCPOA, including Oman and according to Iran, also Japan.

However, the US has denied the claims, even suggesting that Iran is far from ready to come to the diplomatic table. During Tuesday's State Department press briefing, spokesman Matthew Miller said Iran must take de-escalatory steps if it wants to reduce tensions and create a space for diplomacy.

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“We have not yet seen indications, despite some of these public comments, that Iran is serious about addressing the concerns that we have, the concerns that other countries have about its nuclear program,” Miller told reporters.

Referring to the decision this month to ban one third of the Atomic Energy Agency Inspectors from Iran, Miller said the regime is only undermining the IAEA’s ability to do its work.

“If Iran really is serious about taking de-escalatory steps, the first thing it could do would be to cooperate with the IAEA. We have not seen them fully do that,” he said.

On the topic of direct talks, Miller remained tight-lipped, saying that while the US is open to diplomacy, he was unwilling to talk about how that would transpire. It would first of all, be conditional on Iran’s taking de-escalatory steps such as allowing all necessary access to the IAEA’s team.

“I could give you a long list of things we would like Iran to take in terms of changed behavior, but I’m speaking specifically with respect to the nuclear program right now,” he said on Tuesday in Washington.

Iran's foreign ministry Tuesday dismissed reports suggesting direct negotiations with the United States over sanctions relief have been given the green light by the Supreme Leader.

A website in the UK had earlier claimed that Iran was planning to engage in direct talks with the US in Oman concerning its nuclear program, given the go-ahead by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei.

The Qatari foreign minister’s statement is questionable at best, not backed up by anything substantial from either the US or even Iran, which is always only too happy to portray itself as the pillar of diplomacy, as was seen most recently at the UN where President Ebrahim Raisi even denied the country’s nuclear ambitions in spite of plentiful evidence otherwise.

It perhaps suggests the nation which is now managing Iran’s $6bn freed up from South Korea as a result of a prisoner swap deal this month which saw five wrongfully imprisoned American-Iranians exchanged for five regime agents, is once again trying to position itself as the region’s ‘peacemaker’.

Qatar has a history of engaging with terror groups in the name of diplomacy, hosting both the Taliban and Hamas, while claiming to be acting as mediator. During the four-year blockade of Qatar by the Persian Gulf states, Qatar grew closer to Iran, and the two nations share the world’s largest gas field. During the recent World Cup 2022, dissidents were harassed in Qatar by regime agents openly operating on Qatari soil.

Meanwhile, as the expiration of the United Nations’ sanctions on Iran approaches next month, a bipartisan group of senators have written a joint letter asking the governments of the UK, France and Germany, known as the E3, to prevent the sanctions on Iran’s drone and missile program’s expiration.

The letter, addressed to the ambassadors of the three nations, signed by 31 lawmakers including members of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, thanked them for deciding to maintain their own sanctions beyond the deal’s expiry in October, but calling on them to help prevent the collapse of the sanctions.