A study by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute released Jan. 30 said the state-owned Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines has renamed 90 of its 123 vessels since 2008, many with innocuous English names like "Bluebell" or "Angel." One was simply named "Alias."

SIPRI reported the company has also reflagged a "significant percentage" of its fleet to further mask its clandestine arms shipments to Tehran's allies, such as Syria, and proxies, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon.

This is also intended to confuse U.S. authorities striving to block Iran's acquisition of components and high-tech machinery for what Washington insists is a secret program to develop nuclear weapons.

Western intelligence officials say Iran has consistently used IRISL to transport nuclear components, largely bought clandestinely through front companies in the West.

"The Iranian ships are being shuffled like a deck of cards in a Las Vegas casino," observed Hugh Griffiths, SIPRI arms trafficking expert and one of the authors of the institute's report.

"There is a constant game of cat and mouse being played and the renaming and reflagging of vessels is a way of trying to avoid inspection because of sanctions."

The United States launched a crackdown on IRISL in 2008. Stuart Levey, then U.S. Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, observed that Iran's merchant fleet was "a critical lifeline for Iran's proliferation and evasion. …

"Some of Iran's most dangerous cargo continues to come and go from Iran's ports, so we must redouble our vigilance over both their domestic shipping lines and attempts to use third-country shippers and freight forwarders for illicit cargoes."

SIPRI reported that the Iranian shipping companies reflagging efforts, aimed at shielding their vessels from international scrutiny, has meant that on paper the Islamic Republic's maritime fleet has shrunk dramatically.

Until 2011, IRISL was ranked the 23rd largest container line in the world. Now it's not even listed in the top 100.

In 2008, the U.S. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, invoked regulations designed to freeze the assets of proliferators of weapons of mass destruction and initiated sanctions against IRISL for working with the arms of the Revolutionary Guards Corps that oversees Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs.

That brought a swift response from companies around the world, which stopped dealing with IRISL.

It was then, the Financial Times reported, that the Iranian company "started to use an array of deceptive and practices to conceal its identity and skirt sanctions -- including falsifying shipping documents, changing names and nominal ownership of vessels and even repainting ships.

"It has also sought to assign vessel ownership to front companies outside Iran," the Financial Times reported.

Most of the vessels originally identified as belonging to IRISL are listed as being owned and operated by companies that don't appear on the U.S. blacklist. These companies are invariably located far from Iran, in places such as Hong Kong, Germany, the Isle of Man, Malta or Cyprus.

But in most cases, international investigators have established from corporate records that these fronts are either run by IRISL officials or are wholly owned by the Iranian company.

IRISL denies any involvement in clandestine weapons or nuclear shipments but the unmasking of its corporate camouflage efforts underline the extent of Tehran's maritime operations.

Lloyd's of London, the international shipping registry, says at least four IRISL vessels have been scuttled.

Lloyd's issues large merchant vessels with unique identifying numbers and tracks them across the globe during their operational lifetimes.

SIPRI reported that in October 2010, Germany removed ships suspected of being owned by IRISL from its shipping registry after the European Union imposed sanctions on the Iranian company.

But, the institute noted, other EU members, including Cyprus and Malta, continue to have Iranian ships on their registries.

Since the U.S. Treasury crackdown began, the United Nations has named three IRISL subsidiaries for international sanctions and granted powers to allow Iranian-flagged ships, and vessels carrying cargoes to or from Iran to be inspected.

The U.S. Treasury later sanctioned five IRISL front companies and 27 ships and identified many IRISL vessels that had been renamed.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Washington (AFP) Feb 6, 2012 - US President Barack Obama unveiled new sanctions on Iran's central bank Monday, tightening an economic choke hold with speculation rampant over a possible Israeli strike on Tehran's nuclear program.

Obama's move came as he insists that the tough range of US and European sanctions is exerting "unprecedented" pain on Iran, but with anxiety growing in Israel that the punishments will not halt Tehran's nuclear drive in time.

"I have determined that additional sanctions are warranted, particularly in light of the deceptive practices of the Central Bank of Iran and other Iranian banks to conceal transactions of sanctioned parties," Obama wrote in a message to Congress.

The president also decried Iran's anti-money laundering regime and what he said was the "continuing and unacceptable risk posed to the international financial system by Iran's activities."

In an interview with NBC, Obama tried to quell nervousness about the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iran, saying he did not think such a decision, that could trigger a new war in the Middle East, had been taken.

The sanctions, contained in an executive order signed by Obama on Sunday, block all property and interests of the Iranian government, the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) and all Iranian financial institutions within US jurisdiction.

Previously, US institutions were required to reject, rather than block, such transactions.

The exact dollar figure of assets involved was not immediately clear, but was likely small, with the new sanctions serving as a symbolic sign of US intent towards Tehran after a decades-long feud.

Tough US and EU sanctions make it more difficult for Iran to pay for euro- and dollar-denominated goods, and for it to receive petro-dollars. But Tehran is now increasingly looking to Asia for commerce and trade opportunities.

European sanctions on Iran are expected to have particular impact.

The EU for instance imported some 600,000 barrels per day of Iranian oil in the first 10 months of last year -- equivalent to nearly 20 percent of Iran's exports -- making it the key market alongside India and China.

But Europe last month banned all new contracts for Iranian oil.

Obama's move came amid a torrent of speculation about the possibility of a go-it-alone strike by Israel on underground Iranian nuclear installations it sees as a threat to its existence.

US observers are concerned that a unilateral Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities could trigger a furious response from Tehran, including missile attacks and action by extremist groups allied to the Islamic republic, as well as damaging global economic turmoil after a likely steep hike in oil prices.

There is also anxiety that the United States could get drawn into the conflict to protect its Middle East ally, soon after managing to extricate itself from another damaging war in Iraq.

Obama has refused to take the option of a US military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities off the table, but there are signs that Washington does not view the threat as imminently as Israel does.

Tehran is not yet believed to have started enriching uranium to weapons grade, a process that would take months before any device was ready to be turned into the deliverable weapon that Washington says it will not tolerate.

Iran denies its nuclear program is intended to build an atomic arsenal.

The Israeli Maariv newspaper on Monday reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had warned officials to stop "blabbing" about the possibility of an attack.

The measures Obama signed were contained in legislation passed by Congress last year which also required him to impose penalties on foreign financial institutions that do business with the CBI or other Iranian finance firms.

Obama's action on Monday however does not implement those extra sanctions, designed to bar Iran's business partners from the lucrative US market. But the Treasury Department warned that firms doing business with Iran "remain at risk" of US punishments.

Senior US officials are currently studying such punishments to find a way to implement them that maximizes pain for Iran, but does not spike oil prices, for instance, in a way that could harm the fragile US recovery.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Washington (UPI) Feb 6, 2012 - World concern that Israel could soon launch a pre-emptive strike against Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities is rising amid new bellicose statements from Tehran.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said a "great event" was coming that would demonstrate Iran's power, and that "the Zionists and the Great Satan" would soon be defeated.

Israel, he added, was a "cancer" that "should be cut and will be cut."

Israeli Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Strategic Affairs Moshe Yaalon said Tehran is building a missile with a distance of 6,000 miles "aimed at America," while Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned that Iran is moving steadily to place its facilities in so-called "immunity zones" -- areas such as underground bunkers and within mountains where they cannot be hit by missiles and bombs.

"The world has no doubt that Iran's nuclear program is steadily nearing readiness and is about to enter an immunity zone," Barak said at a conference in Tel Aviv. "If the sanctions (by the West) don't achieve their goal of halting Iran's nuclear weapons program, there will arise the need of weighing operations."

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta added to the mix. He was quoted in a newspaper interview as saying an Israeli strike on Iran could come as early as April. Later clarifications of the remarks attributed to him have done little to calm the waters.

The world would certainly appear heading toward an Armageddon of sorts since any armed conflict between Tehran and Tel Aviv would result in repercussions -- at the very least, economic -- for other countries of the region as well as Europe, Asia and the United States.

The heart of the issue is Iran's nuclear program, which it claims is for peaceful purposes. Iran's nuclear interest began decades ago, even before the Islamic Revolution. Interest waned temporarily but revived after the revolution and Russia helped Tehran build a major facility.

It later emerged, from information from Iranian dissidents, that Tehran was building clandestine facilities for uranium enrichment.

The United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency recently said there are indications Iran has done research on building nuclear weapons, a disclosure that fed suspicions by the United States and European countries, which had imposed economic sanctions in retaliation for Tehran's on-again, off-again cooperation with the IAEA and its steadfast refusal to abandon enrichment efforts.

Iran, however, is now in a corner. The United States and the European Union recently approved economic sanctions Tehran cannot ignore -- in the case of the United States, prescriptions on the country's banking transactions that would cripple Tehran's ability to receive payments for its oil exports, which account for about 80 percent of its foreign exchange earnings and which pay for the regime's social programs. Europe, a major market for Iranian crude, agreed to stop importing Iranian oil from this summer.

Thus the set stage for a violent clash if either side weren't to blink and back down.

Tehran's leaders continue to rattle sabers, threatening to block the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf -- a major choke point for oil exports from the region, including its own to Asian countries -- on one hand, while also expressing an interest in negotiating a deal with the West, a deal that wouldn't include abandoning its nuclear program.

With European countries facing economic hardship from halting oil imports from Iran, appearances of cooperation could be used to weaken Western resolve. To flat out back down would be tremendous loss of face for a country seeking leadership of the anti-Israel, anti-West Arab masses.

U.S. President Barak Obama, who had opposed the new sanctions insisted upon by Congress, said over the weekend he still preferred carrot to stick. That is obvious by earlier actions by administration officials who have urged Israel to refrain from hostilities.

But while diplomacy is obviously the preferred avenue to rectifying the impasse, Israel may not wait. First, it's very existence is at stake and, as Israeli leaders have noted, Iran could have a nuclear weapons capability very soon. The effect of sanctions would take months before Iran had no choice but to legitimately negotiate a compromise.

Thus each side is in a corner, with Israeli actions the wild card. With relations between Washington and Tel Aviv at low ebb, there is no assurance Israel would give the Obama administration a heads up on impending strikes.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Washington (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - Hints, warnings and coded political signals from Israel about a possible strike against Iran are piling pressure on US President Barack Obama and fueling an explosive election year debate.

Obama personally weighed into the churning speculation on Sunday, saying he did not believe Israel had yet made a decision to attack underground Iranian nuclear facilities it views as a threat to its existence.

And the president forcibly argued that "unprecedented" tougher sanctions on Iran were having a painful impact.

"They are feeling the pinch. They are feeling the pressure," Obama told NBC.

Speculation about a strike on Iran's nuclear program hit new heights when Israeli intelligence writer Ronen Bergman concluded a week ago in a New York Times magazine article that Israel would attack Iran this year.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak sent reverberations through Washington when he called for timely but unspecified action against Iran, adding, "Whoever says 'later' might find that 'later' is too late."

Then, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius set off alarm bells by writing that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta believed there was a "strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June."

"President Obama and Panetta are said to have cautioned the Israelis that the United States opposed an attack," Ignatius wrote.

Panetta refused to elaborate, but did not contradict the article, deepening intrigue over Israel's next move.

Even if it has not decided to act, analysts say Israel may see martial rhetoric as a way to press for more non-military pressure on Iran.

"Israel is effectively pressing the US Congress and the president to pass more sanctions and implement those that have passed as quickly as possible," said Cliff Kupchan, an Iran specialist with the Eurasia Group risk consultancy.

Kupchan said that the feeling that Israel could attack may also be seen as an attempt to force Tehran back to nuclear talks.

Some observers in Washington calculate that Israel may be bluffing because previous military strikes, like the suspected assault on a Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007, were not preceded by saber rattling.

Israeli leaders may also not yet be ready to unleash the dire consequences of an attack, which could include reprisal missile strikes by Iran and action by allied terror groups against the Jewish state.

But no one here can say categorically what Israel plans to do.

The saga has again exposed divisions between the White House and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, which may be on show again when the Israeli leader visits Washington next month.

The US administration has signaled that it believes the last resort scenario that would see a strike on Iranian nuclear sites has not yet been reached.

"Israel has indicated that they're considering this... we have indicated our concerns," Panetta told reporters last week.

Iran expert Trita Parsi said that as the White House steps up pressure on Iran, bellicose rhetoric from Israel could be helpful if it spooks Tehran over the possibility of an attack.

But Parsi, author of a new book on Obama's Iran policy called "A Single Roll of the Dice," warned that using the implied threat of war if sanctions do not stop the nuclear program was a large gamble.

"The administration knows that there are moving parts which it does not control," Parsi said, referring to uncertainty about how Israel or Iran could react in moments of high crisis.

A unilateral military strike by Israel would have deep strategic consequences for the United States and grave political implications for Obama.

Washington would almost certainly be drawn into a new conflagration in the Middle East at a time when Obama wants to claim credit for getting troops home from Iraq.

Oil prices would shoot up, crimping the US economic recovery just as it speeds up and slowing jobs growth that Obama needs to win reelection.

Israeli leaders, keen students and practitioners of US politics, understand this, and know Obama may be vulnerable to pressure during his reelection bid.

Daniel Levy of the New America Foundation said the tough talk from Israel and sense of crisis had not been triggered by sudden advances by Iran on its nuclear program -- but politics.

"The only reason why that this is anywhere near the top of the agenda where it is now is because of the American presidential election," said Levy.

"(The Israelis) know that whoever gets in next year will be in a much stronger position to lay down the law than is the case for a president in an election year."

Republicans are trying to capitalize on Obama's discomfort, with leading White House candidate Mitt Romney accusing him of "appeasement" and using the Iran showdown to try to dent Obama's foreign policy record.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Jerusalem (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that economic and military might are Israel's only guarantee for peace and security following the latest developments in Iran and Syria.

"In the past few days we received a reminder of what kind of neighbourhood we live in," Netanyahu said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting.

"In such a region the only thing ensuring (our) existence, security and prosperity is strength.

"We shall continue to build the military, economic and social strength of Israel; that is the only guarantee for peace and also Israel's only defense if peace collapses," said the Israeli premier.

"We heard the comments of the ruler of Iran on the destruction of Israel, we saw the Syrian army massacring its own people, we saw other incidents of bloodshed," he added.

Netanyahu was referring to a speech on Friday by Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and to the reported mass killing of civilians by Syrian troops.

In his televised address, Khamenei described "the Zionist regime" as "a cancerous tumour that must be cut out, and God willing it will be."

"From now on we will support any group that will fight the Zionist regime," said the all-powerful Iranian leader.

Khamenei's comments came amid heightened speculation that Israel -- believed to have the Middle East's only, albeit undeclared, nuclear arsenal -- was mulling air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities.

Syria, which shares a land border with Israel, saw one its bloodiest weekends since an uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's regime erupted, with activists reporting more than 200 civilians were killed during an assault by regime forces on the protest city of Homs.

"In our region, various rulers have no moral impediments to killing their neighbours or their own people," Netanyahu said on Sunday.

Israel, which joined the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development in 2010, has been enjoying above average economic growth in the club of developed nations.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Tehran (AFP) Feb 4, 2012 - Iranian naval ships docked on Saturday in the Saudi port city of Jeddah on a mission to project the Islamic republic's "power on the open seas," the Fars news agency reported.

The supply ship Kharg and Shaid Qandi, a destroyer, docked in the Red Sea port in line with orders from Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, it quoted navy commander Admiral Habibollah Sayari as saying.

"This mission aims to show the power of the Islamic republic of Iran on the open seas and to confront Iranophobia," he said, adding that the mission started several days ago and would last 70 to 80 days.

The commander did not give other destinations.

Iran's navy has been boosting its presence in international waters since last year, deploying vessels in the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden on missions to protect Iranian ships from Somali pirates.

Tehran also sent two ships into the Mediterranean for the first time in February 2011 through the Suez Canal.

Ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia, which have long been strained, deteriorated in late 2011 following US allegations that a foiled plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to Washington had been hatched in Tehran.

Tehran has also called on Riyadh to reconsider its vow to make up for any shortfall in Iran's oil exports due to sanctions over its nuclear programme, saying Riyadh's pledge to intervene on the market was unfriendly.

Pacifists protest possible war against Iran
New York (AFP) Feb 4, 2012 - Hundreds of protesters demonstrated Saturday in New York and pacifist groups took to the streets in dozens of other US and Canadian cities in a "Day of Mass Action" against a possible war with Iran.

About 500 protesters gathered in Manhattan's Times Square and marched to the headquarters of the US mission to the United Nations and to the Israeli consulate.

"No war, no sanctions, no intervention, no assassinations," read a banner leading the march.

The demonstrations came as Europe and the United States slapped tough new sanctions on Iran, and Israel this week launched new threats of military intervention if the Islamic republic fails to rein in its suspected nuclear development program.

There is heightened speculation that Israel is contemplating air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, fueled in part by US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's comments to the Washington Post in which he said he believes there is a "strong possibility" that Israel will launch such air strikes this spring.

Iran admits it has a nuclear program but insists it is for peaceful purposes like generating electricity.

"The actions of the Iranian government in no way justify a US war on Iran," Debra Sweet, director of the organization "The World Can't Wait," told AFP at the New York march.

The protest joined efforts from a coalition of about 60 pacifist and human rights organizations.

A leaflet distributed at the New York demonstration said "in many ways, US war on Iran has already begun," citing as examples "harsh economic sanctions" against Tehran, "killing Iranian scientists in car bombings" and that "US aircraft carriers are right off Iran's shore."

"I don't know what (US President Barack) Obama will do but I do know what he has done, which is very hard sanctions that only will hurt ordinary people," Sweet said.

In Los Angeles, activists dressed themselves in orange prison jumpsuits and wore black hoods similar to Guantanamo detainees as part of the anti-war protest there.

Other peace marches were held Saturday in Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington and other US cities, according to organizers.

In Canada protests were staged in Calgary and Vancouver, and events were also planned in Britain, Ireland and India.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Washington (AFP) Feb 4, 2012 - The United States is offering technical assistance to Spain to clean up land contaminated by radiation from undetonated nuclear bombs that accidentally fell on the area in 1966, the US State Department announced Saturday.

The Spanish and US governments have not yet reached an agreement on the cleanup.

At the request of the Spanish government, an American technical team led by the US Energy Department traveled to the southeastern Spanish town of Palomares in February 2011 to offer advice for the remediation plan.

"No final decision has been reached regarding cleanup of the site," the State Department said in a statement on its website.

On January 17, 1966, a US B-52 bomber carrying four nuclear bombs collided with a KC-135 tanker during mid-air refueling off the coast of Spain. In addition to killing seven crew members on the airplanes, three hydrogen bombs fell to the ground near Palomares and one fell into the Mediterranean Sea.

The non-nuclear explosives on two of the bombs that hit the ground detonated, spreading seven pounds of plutonium over a 200 hectares (490 acres). The bomb that fell into the sea was recovered intact after a search by the US Navy.

"In 1966, we worked closely with Spain to remediate the accident site, and have collaborated with Spanish authorities for more than 40 years to monitor the site and the health of local inhabitants," the State Department statement Saturday said.

Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Garcia-Margallo spoke with US State Department Secretary Hillary Clinton about the remediation this week during the Munich Security Conference in Germany, according to the Spanish newspaper Herald of Aragon.

Clinton is "personally committed" to resolving the contamination issue, Garcia-Margallo told the Spanish news media.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Tehran (AFP) Feb 3, 2012 - Iran on Friday rejected allegations by the US director of national intelligence James Clapper that the Islamic republic was more willing now to carry out attacks on American soil.

"Iran categorically denies James Clapper's unfounded allegations," foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said.

"Those who are themselves accused of supporting the assassination of Iranian scientists in Tehran cannot allow themselves to make such false and inexact allegations," he said.

In written remarks on Tuesday to senators, Clapper said an alleged plot last year to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States showed Tehran might be more willing now to carry out attacks on US soil.

"Iran's willingness to sponsor future attacks in the United States or against our interests abroad probably will be shaped by Tehran's evaluation of the costs it bears for the plot against (Saudi Arabia's) ambassador as well as Iranian leaders' perceptions of US threats against the regime," he said.

The United States made its allegations early last October and claimed it traced the supposed plot back to the Quds Force, a special operations unit of Iran's Revolutionary Guards.

Iran has repeatedly denied any involvement in the plot, which have strained its already frayed relations with Saudi Arabia.

A key US Senate panel on Thursday adopted a sweeping package of tough new sanctions aimed at forcing Iran to freeze its controversial nuclear programme amid escalating worries of a military confrontation.

The Senate Banking Committee approved the harsh new measures by voice vote, without dissent, as part of a mounting campaign in the US Congress to tighten the economic screws on defiant Iran.

Tehran denies Western charges that it seeks the ability to build a nuclear weapon, insisting its atomic activities are an effort to develop a civilian power-production capability.

Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a 32-year-old deputy director of Iran's main uranium enrichment plant, was murdered on January 11 along with his driver/bodyguard when assassins on a motorbike fixed a magnetic bomb to their car.

It was the fifth such incident targeting Iranian scientists in the past two years. Four other scientists -- three of them involved in Iran's nuclear programme -- died in the attacks.

Iranian officials say the attacks are a covert campaign by Israel and the United States.

Pentagon chief urges world unity on Iran sanctions
Ramstein Air Base, Germany (AFP) Feb 3, 2012 - The world must join together in backing tough sanctions to pressure Iran into giving up its suspect nuclear programme, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Friday.

Describing the sanctions as "very tough" political and economic measures, Panetta said: "We've a tremendous amount of pressure on Iran to isolate Iran from the rest of the world.

"We've got to continue that kind of pressure," he said, in response to question from a US trooper during a visit to the US air base of Ramstein in the German state of Rheinland-Pfalz.

"My view is that right now the most important thing is to keep the international community unified in keeping that pressure on to try to convince Iran that they shouldn't develop a nuclear weapon..." Panetta said.

"If they don't, we have all options on the table," he said.

Panetta's comments came a day after Israel launched new threats of military intervention. There is heightened speculation that Israel is contemplating air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, with or without US help.

The Jewish state has pushed for tough sanctions and warned it retains the option of a military strike if necessary to prevent Tehran from obtaining atomic weapons.

Israel has the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear arsenal, which international experts believe contains between 100 and 300 nuclear warheads, but it has never confirmed or denied such reports.

Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Thursday praised new European sanctions against Iran's oil sector, being phased in over the next five months, and called to extend them to the financial system and central bank.

Later Barak said there was currently "broad international understanding that if the sanctions do not achieve their desired goal of stopping the Iranian nuclear military programme, the need to consider action will arise."

He also stressed the need for timely "action" against Iran, without specifying its nature.

Western economic sanctions have ramped up against Iran over the past three months, since the UN nuclear watchdog issued a report saying it had evidence the Islamic republic appeared to be researching atomic warheads.

A key US Senate panel adopted a sweeping package of tough new sanctions Thursday targeting Iran's national oil and tanker firms and its elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.

It would for the first time also widen sanctions on Iran's energy sector to any joint venture anywhere in the world where Iran's government is a substantial partner or investor.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Seoul (UPI) Feb 3, 2012 - The head North Korea's reunification negotiating committee called on ex-patriot Koreans to put aside their differences and work for reunification of the Korean Peninsula.

But Kim Ryong Song, chairman of the North Side Committee for Implementing the June 15 Joint Declaration, also urged Koreans to sweep aside the "Lee Myung-bak group of traitors" who run the South Korean government.

Lee, the South Korean president, remains "a stumbling block" for NSCI's negotiations with its counterpart South Korean Committee, the North Korean government-run Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim as saying.

Kim made his "appeal to all the Koreans at home and abroad" this week in a series of articles published by the KCNA based on a general meeting of the NSCI in Pyongyang.

The NSCI members discussed the start of "a landmark phase for independent reunification this year" based on work already done by the North-South summits of the June 15 Joint Declaration committees, the KCNA said.

One member of the committee said all Koreans long for reunification, "but the bellicose forces at home and abroad are driving the situation on the Korean Peninsula to the brink of war," KCNA reported.

All Koreans in the North, South and abroad should "drive the U.S. imperialist forces from South Korea and resolutely punish the present South Korean puppet regime," the member said.

The reunification summits were started with a declaration on June 15, 2000, in Pyongyang by South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, who died in December 2011.

The first summit signaled a thaw in the troubled relations between the two Koreas, separated by the 1953 armistice demarcation line. The armistice ended three years' of armed conflict but the two Koreas technically remain at war.

The first meeting in 2000 also signaled the start of semi-regular meetings of families separated by the demarcation line for decades, never having seen one and other.

Last month the Pyongyang government's Disarmament and Peace Institute called the Lee government a "disturber of peace in northeast Asia." Lee also remains "obsessed with the pipe dream of achieving unification through absorption."

The DPI report blamed the United States for destabilizing inter-Korean relations by embarking on military maneuvers at a time of heightened tension.

About 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea.

North Korea often criticizes U.S.-South Korea military exercises, alleging they are dry runs for an invasion, a claim Seoul and Washington just as often dismiss.

Despite urging all Koreans to work toward reunification, the North Korean government recently said its policies toward the Seoul regime won't change because of the death of Kim Jong Il and the rise to power of his youngest son, Kim Jong Un.

But analysts have questioned whether Kim Jong Un, because of his youth and lack of military experience, has a full grasp of power in the usually secretive political structure of North Korea.

His frequent visits to the military could be a sign of weakness and an effort to foster loyalty to the regime, an analyst said.

Kim Jong Un visited eight military units in January alone, South Korea's Yonhap News Agency said in an analysis of North Korean news reports.

He also visited an institute for military officials, attended a military orchestra concert and stopped at a construction site managed by the military.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Vienna Feb 3, 2012 - The UN nuclear agency's trip to Iran was not as "good" as its chief inspector described this week, with real pressure now on Tehran for the next visit later this month, diplomats and analysts said. International Atomic Energy Agency chief inspector Herman Nackaerts's comment at Vienna airport on Wednesday that he had a "good trip" was "off the cuff" and "not meant to be a substantive comment," one diplomat said. "There is no indication that Iran offered substantive cooperation in terms of answering the IAEA's questions," agreed another envoy. "Iran seemed focused on modalities rather than substance." During their three-day visit from Sunday to Tuesday, the six-member IAEA team held talks with Iranian officials, but "not all" those whom they had wanted to meet, the first diplomat said. In addition, they did not visit any sites mentioned in a damning November report in which the IAEA said it suspected Iran "has carried out activities relevant to the development of a nuclear device". Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi's comments to the Fars state news agency that Tehran was "ready to facilitate such visits if they had wanted to" was also disputed by diplomats to the Vienna-based IAEA. The Iranians "quite cleverly stonewalled for three days," one said. That the trip achieved so little was no huge surprise, with experts and diplomats stressing that Nackaerts going to Tehran was a step in the right direction, particularly given the spike in tensions since November's report. But more will be expected from the February 21-22 visit, which will be a closely watched test of Iran's readiness to engage with the international community, just as Western powers ramp up ever-tougher sanctions. "It's possible that Iran gives some additional information to the agency at the next meeting," said Peter Crail, nonproliferation analyst at the Arms Control Association in Washington. "But significant progress is unlikely to happen until Iran decides it can come clean on its past work on a nuclear warhead," Crail told AFP. "At some point Iran is going to have to give the agency access to personnel and sites involved in the programmes the IAEA is concerned about." The second Vienna diplomat said it was unclear if the next visit would achieve much, however. "I don't think the agency has assurances that the next meeting will be more substantive, I think that is still to be decided ... The outcome seems to be 'let's talk some more'," said the diplomat, from a Western power. If there is no progress "it won't look good for Iran," the first envoy said, with the IAEA expected to prepare a report on its cooperation with the Islamic republic for a board meeting of the agency on March 5. "I think the agency is under no illusions that the member states and the international community are going to be shining a very high-beam spotlight onto this visit," the first diplomat said. "The question is, on the next trip, with the Iranians knowing that there are certain areas and places where the agency would like to go, is that on the cards? At this point I don't think the agency knows -- yet." Mark Hibbs, analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that the IAEA "needs a major breakthrough with Iran to prevent the conflict from escalating at the board in March". "They will need to get firm commitments from Iran that it will cooperate. That may need to be negotiated still. At this point a conditional maybe won't suffice," Hibbs told AFP. What won't suffice, diplomats say, is some sort of "work plan" similar to the one agreed with Iran in 2007 that included a series of steps towards resolving the IAEA's concerns. "We would like to avoid being in a work plan situation," said one, adding that his country wanted to "avoid becoming hostage to a box-ticking exercise." ]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:11 AEST Subscribe to our daily selection of space, military, environment and energy newsletters responseText http://visitor.constantcontact.com/manage/optin/ea?v=0016gbbKsaiGSpQFojVO8ZoHw%3D%3D