Let’s delve into the heart of the matter: the blacklisting the IRGC, sanctioning the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, sanctioning Dr. Zariff, the Iranian Foreign Minster, sanctioning General Suleimani, the Commander of the Quds Force wing of the IRGC, et al. Naturally, it was not a surprise to any of us Middle East senior analysts that Iran’s IRGC would eventually ...
With a first ever visit by a Japanese prime minister to Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, many Iranian commentators were quick to declare that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe the best hope for successful mediation between the US and Iran, since Tokyo has warm relations with both sides. Some have argued that pacifist Japan has the capacity and motivation to ...
The principle governing the world oil market is, simply put, supply and demand. When there is a balance between supply and demand in the oil market, prices remain stable. Based on assessments by geopolitical theorists, an open conflict in the Strait of Hormuz, and even the threat of a possible conflict, can have dangerous consequences for energy security, and, consequently, ...
The recent Washington’s designation of Iran’s elite, 125,000-member IRGC (Islamic Revolution Guard Corps) as an FTO (Foreign Terrorist Organization) was overlooked in the Western media as a typical story with the short attention span of the everyday news cycle. I am not an alarmist in my work, but it is now completely ostensible, perhaps more than ever before, that the ...
After Tehran took the line at renouncing its obligations under certain provisions of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), a question has arisen about when it will pull out of the nuclear deal altogether. In the conditions of an escalating conflict with Washington, Tehran has said it suspends compliance with a part of its obligations regarding the stocks of ...
On June 13, Iranian and Arab media reported attacks in the Gulf of Oman on two oil tankers, the Front Altair of Norway and the Kokuka Courageous of Japan. The vessels were attacked in the waters between the territories of Iran, the UAE and Oman. Some data is indicative of a torpedo attack that resulted in explosions and a fire ...
As the situation around Iran continues deteriorating, Japan has taken up an initiative to broker peace and to scale down the tensions between Washington and Tehran. While the situation kept aggravating, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he was heading on a diplomatic mission to Iran. The reports on the Japanese Prime Minister’s forthcoming visit on the background of the reciprocal ...
While the world is adamantly watching the events in the Persian Gulf and trying to figure out when the sea battle between the U.S. and Iran starts off, Washington is drafting Plan B for an attack on the shore. The situation in the Persian Gulf deteriorated sharply at the beginning of May after the U.S. had conducted a number of ...
Exactly a year ago, on May 8, 2018, U.S. President Donald Trump took a pivotal decision on pulling his country unilaterally out of the international nuclear agreement on the Iran nuclear deal brokered by international mediators — the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany. Trump claimed that the Administration of his predecessor in the Oval Office, ...
When Donald Trump took office in January 2017, he made it clear that countering Iran was a top priority on his agenda. Trump ripped up the Iran Nuclear Deal, also known as JCPOA; reimposed pre-JCPOA sanctions and even added new ones that were unprecedented in terms of their scope and scale; and put Iranian citizens, activists and fugitive political dissidents ...