Iran Steps Up Nuclear Programme, Holds South Korean Tanker

By Amir Havasi

Iran said Tuesday it had stepped up its uranium enrichment at a time of heightened tensions with the United States and after it seized a South Korean tanker in strategic Persian Gulf waters.

Tehran said it was now refining uranium to 20 percent purity—far above the level permitted under its 2015 agreement with world powers, but far below the 90 percent required for an atomic bomb—in a step Washington condemned as "nuclear extortion.”

The European Union noted Iran's step "with deep concern" and said it planned to "redouble our efforts to preserve the agreement and return to its full implementation by all parties.”

It was the most striking suspension yet of Tehran's commitments under its landmark deal with six nations, which has been fraying since US President Donald Trump withdrew from it in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions.

A war of words has flared again in the final weeks of Trump's presidency and as Iran and its allies have marked one year since a US drone strike in Baghdad killed Iran's most revered military commander, Qasem Soleimani.

Washington has meanwhile reversed an order to bring home its USS Nimitz aircraft carrier from the Persian Gulf, citing "threats" against Trump, after recently also flying B-52 bombers over the region.

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has warned it is ready to respond to any attack.

'Not Hostage-Takers'

On Monday, the Guards seized the South Korean-flagged Hankuk Chemi and arrested its multinational crew of 20 near the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint through which a fifth of world oil output passes, alleging the tanker had polluted the area's waters.

South Korea has demanded the ship's release and deployed a destroyer to the area—though with no plans to engage in an offensive operation, an unnamed military official told Yonhap News Agency.

Seoul said it would send a government delegation to Iran to negotiate the release of the vessel and its crew. Iran's move came after Tehran had urged Seoul to release billions of dollars of Iranian assets frozen in South Korea as part of the US sanctions.

"We are not hostage-takers," said Iran's government spokesman Ali Rabiei. "It is the government of Korea that has taken over $7 billion of ours hostage on baseless grounds."

South Korea's vice foreign minister Choi Jong-kun plans to go ahead with a scheduled three-day trip to Tehran early next week, his office said.

Nuclear Tensions

Iran first announced Monday it had stepped up the uranium enrichment process at its underground Fordo site, in a move confirmed by UN nuclear watchdog the IAEA.

"We can produce about eight to nine kilograms of 20 percent enriched uranium so that we reach the 120 kilos the law requests from us," Ali Akbar Salehi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said on Tuesday.

Iran's conservative-dominated parliament voted for the step after the November killing of its top nuclear physicist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, an assassination Iran blamed on Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has charged Iran's latest nuclear move proved it is seeking to build an atomic bomb—a claim Iran has always strongly denied—and pledged the Jewish state "will not allow" it to do so.

The US State Department labelled Iran's stepped-up enrichment "a clear attempt to increase its campaign of nuclear extortion, an attempt that will continue to fail.”

Trump's son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner was in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday for a Persian Gulf regional summit, amid a broader US diplomatic strategy to build a regional united front against Iran.

As a Riyadh-led group sought to end a three-year rift with Qatar, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman spoke of a "desperate need" to unite and to "confront challenges... especially the threats posed by the Iranian regime's nuclear and ballistic missile programme and its plans for sabotage and destruction.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's government has signalled it is ready to engage with US President-elect Joe Biden, who has likewise expressed a willingness to return to diplomacy.

Biden, who takes office on January 20, was vice president to Barack Obama, whose administration had finalised the 2015 nuclear deal and hailed it as a landmark achievement.

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Tehran took the latest enrichment step "after years of non-compliance" by other parties and that "our measures are fully reversible upon full compliance by all.”

Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement it "paid tribute to the regular declarations by Iranian leaders of their willingness to return to full respect for the requirements of the agreement".

It added, however, that "additional efforts and costs will now be required to bring the Fordo site in line with the terms of the agreement."

Photo: IRNA

Iran Says Cooperation Plan Sent to Persian Gulf Neighbors

Iran said Saturday it has sent Iraq and Arab states of the Persian Gulf the text of its security and cooperation project first unveiled by President Hassan Rouhani at the UN in September.

Rouhani "sent the full text (of the initiative) to the heads" of the Gulf Cooperation Council and Iraq and "asked for their cooperation in processing and implementing it,” the foreign ministry said.

The GCC is a six-nation bloc that groups Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman.

Ties have been tense between Iran and GCC members Saudi Arabia and the UAEnited Arab Emirates, both allies of the United States and leading members of a military coalition battling Iran-backed Huthi rebels in Yemen.

In September, Rouhani proposed in a speech at the UN General Assembly a "Coalition for Hope" that would unite all regional countries in a pledge of non-aggression and non-interference in each others' affairs.

It came after a string of mysterious attacks on oil tankers in the Persian Gulf and Saudi oil installations, which the United States blamed on Tehran. Iran denied any involvement in the attacks.

"The security of the region shall be provided when American troops pull out," Rouhani said at the General Assembly.

"In the event of an incident, you and we shall not remain alone. We are neighbors with each other and not with the United States," he added.

Tensions between Tehran and Washington have escalated sharply since US President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew last year from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

He has since reimposed unilateral sanctions as part of its "maximum pressure" campaign.

The arch-foes came to the brink of a military confrontation in June when Iran downed a US drone and Trump ordered retaliatory strikes before canceling them at the last minute.

Photo: IRNA

Iran’s Rouhani Vows Response to Oil Tanker Attack

By Golnar Motavelli and Arsalan Shahla

President Hassan Rouhani vowed Monday that Iran would respond to an attack on one of its oil tankers in the Red Sea, saying the evidence suggested it was the work of a government not a terrorist group.

Addressing reporters in his first news conference since the U.S. abandoned the 2015 nuclear deal last year, Rouhani said officials in Tehran had seen footage of the incident and it was likely that several rockets were aimed at the tanker. He stopped short of assigning blame, but the vessel was sailing near the Saudi port of Jeddah at the time of the attack.

“This wasn’t a terrorist move, nor was it carried out by an individual. It was carried out by a government,” Rouhani said, adding that officials were also assessing rocket fragments.

The Gulf has seen a surge in tit-for-tat attacks on oil facilities, drones and shipping traffic since Donald Trump’s administration tightened sanctions on Iran’s oil exports earlier this year. The measures are part of Trump’s “maximum pressure” policy aimed at forcing Iran to curb its ballistic missile program and support for proxy militia around the Middle East, but have been met with defiance by the Iranian government, which has, instead, rolled back its own compliance with the nuclear accord.

Although all sides have said they want to avoid war, repeated incidents pose a growing risk to supplies from the world’s most important oil-producing region.

The attack on the Sabiti tanker came weeks after a drone strike on a major Saudi oil facility which the kingdom blamed on Iran. Iranian officials have said they weren’t involved in the attack, which rattled global oil markets, and was claimed by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Photo: IRNA

EU States Cool on US Blaming Iran for Gulf Tanker Attacks

European states on Monday urged caution in attributing blame for last week's tanker attacks in the Gulf, pointedly refusing to fall in line with Washington's assessment that Iran was behind the incidents.

Several EU foreign ministers arriving for talks in Luxembourg backed UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres' call for an independent investigation into explosions that damaged two tankers sending tensions—and oil prices—soaring.

US President Donald Trump has said the Gulf of Oman attacks had Iran "written all over it" and Britain has concluded responsibility "almost certainly" lies with Tehran, but the EU has called for caution.

"We know the findings of the American and the British intelligence services, which assume that you can be almost certain. We are comparing this with our information. I think you have to proceed very, very carefully on this," German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told reporters.

His Finnish counterpart Pekka Haavisto said it was vital to have "the full evidence" before reaching conclusions.

"I support very much the line of the UN Secretary General Mr Guterres, that a proper investigation (to put) all the facts on the table and then we can look what really has happened, who is behind this," he said.

"I think its a very very concerning event but let's have all the details first."

Luxembourg's foreign minister echoed his support for Guterres' call, warning against repeating the diplomatic mis-steps that led to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

"I'm convinced, as I was 16 years ago, that you really shouldn't make the mistake of believing that you can solve a problem in the Middle East with weapons," Jean Asselborn said.

Unexploded Limpet Mine

A senior EU official last week said the bloc needed time to analyse the events, insisting this did not mean "that we're convinced or lack conviction" about the US assessment, which included video footage that Washington said showed an Iranian patrol boat removing an "unexploded limpet mine" from one of the damaged tankers.

The latest flare-up comes with the EU scrambling to save the Iran nuclear deal after Trump pulled the US out and reimposed tough sanctions on the Islamic republic.

The top official in the EU's diplomatic service, Helga Schmid, made a whistle-stop tour of the region last week to gather information and press the bloc's call for restraint and de-escalation.

Thursday's attacks took place southeast of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital corridor connecting the energy-rich states of the Middle East to the global market.

Iran, which is struggling with crippling US sanctions, has repeatedly warned in the past that it could block the strait in a relatively low-tech, high-impact counter measure to any attack by the United States.

Photo: ISNA

Pompeo Vows That U.S. Will Protect Shipping in Persian Gulf

By Mark Niquette and Shawn Donnan

There’s “no doubt” Iran was responsible for attacks on two oil tankers leaving the Persian Gulf last week, and the U.S. will guarantee safe commercial navigation going forward with its partners, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said.

“The United States is going make sure that we take all the actions necessary, diplomatic and otherwise, that achieve that outcome,” Pompeo said on “Fox News Sunday,” one of two scheduled appearances on the political talk shows.

Pompeo spoke days after he and President Donald Trump accused Iran of being behind attacks that crippled the tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, which abuts Iran and is a strategic choke point for crude oil coming out of the Persian Gulf.

Asked how certain the U.S. is about Iran’s responsibility, Pompeo said, “it’s unmistakable what happened here” and there’s “high confidence” Iran was behind other attacks throughout the world during the past 40 days as well.

The U.S. has released video of what it says was an Iranian boat approaching one of the tankers at night to remove an unexploded limpet mine and other evidence that it says point to Iran’s responsibility for the attacks.

“Iran did do it and you know they did it,” Trump said Friday during a phone interview with Fox News.

‘Economic Terrorism’

Iran has denied any wrongdoing. The country’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, on Friday suggested in a series of tweets that Iran’s enemies may have been behind the attacks, accusing the Trump administration of “economic terrorism’’ and blaming it for the “renewed tension in our region.”

There’s no question Iran was behind the attacks, and it was a “Class A screw-up,” Democratic Representative Adam Schiff of California, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” But the problem is the U.S. is struggling to persuade its allies to join in a response, he said.

“It shows just how isolated the United States has become,’’ Schiff said.

Pompeo said on CBS he is making calls to allies and “the world needs to unite against this threat.’’ He suggested that Iran is attacking international waterways to “drive up the price of crude oil around the world so that the world will cry uncle.”

The incidents highlight the potential risks of the Trump administration’s aggressive approach toward Iran. They’ve raised fears that months of building tensions over Trump’s decision to abandon a multilateral nuclear deal and restore U.S. sanctions might trigger a military conflict between the U.S. and Iran.

Retaliatory Strike

Republican Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas advocated an attack, saying on CBS that “these unprovoked attacks on commercial shipping warrant a retaliatory military strike.’’ Schiff noted that Trump has said he doesn’t want war with Iran, but that his advisers “seem to be taking actions to undercut that ambition to stay out of warfare.’’

Schiff said Trump’s pressure campaign on Iran after withdrawing from the nuclear accord was “dangerously naïve” and that the attacks on shipping were “eminently foreseeable.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in an interview conducted Thursday that aired on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” on Sunday, said “we have absolutely no appetite for going to war, or to be provocative to create situations that might evoke responses, where mistakes could be made.”

Pompeo blamed Iran for escalating the tensions. He declined to discuss what options the administration is considering in response, but said Trump has been clear that the Islamic Republic will not acquire a nuclear weapon.

Photo: Bloomberg