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TEHRAN- Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian has stated that terrorism in West Asia and Africa is a consequence of involvement by non-regional states.

In a joint news conference with his Malian counterpart Abdoulaye Diop on Tuesday in Bamako, Amir Abdollahian remarked that interference by some extra-regional countries is the reason behind formation of some terrorist groups in the West Asia region and Africa."We are of the opinion that instrumental application of terrorism should be left aside and countries be allowed to act independently," the top diplomat said.

Separately, the senior diplomat addressed the unlawful and cruel U.S. sanctions against Iran.

He said "history has shown that the U.S.'s sanctions have failed" despite the fact that "Iran has been subject to draconian American sanctions for years."

After pulling out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), often known as the Iran nuclear deal, Washington reinstated the sanctions in 2018 and added new ones.

He brought up the matter of Iran's bilateral ties with Mali as well, adding that Tehran prioritizes collaboration with the African country in the diplomatic sphere in the areas of defense, education, and economics.

The two countries are determined to deepen their connections, he said, adding "we have a clear plan for the bilateral relations." He cited his visit to Mali as evidence of Iran's particular focus on the two nations' ties.

The trip, the first to Mali and the African continent by Amir Abdollahian as foreign minister, included a meeting of the nations' joint economic mission, where the two sides decided to increase their cooperation in areas like economy, including digital economy, transportation, rail travel, housing, urban development, and culture.

The Malian official, for his part, called the use of sanctions a catastrophic policy, adding that it was inappropriate to deploy penalties in place of dialogue.

Diop stated that it was in both countries' best interests to work together to combat foreign meddling in bilateral relations.

He said, We hope that enhancement of the relations can open up new ways for both the nations and lead to establishment of high-priority projects in our country.

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Iran FM: Terrorism in West Asia and Africa is result of foreign meddling - Tehran Times

Growing up, I hated Muharram and Safar. These two months of mourning in Shiite Islam meant the already strict enforcement of religious orthodoxy by Irans regime would be that much more brutal. This year, Muharram began on July 30 and Safar ends on September 26. Instead of commemorating the Battle of Karbala, the beginning of the first Sunni-Shiite civil war in the year 680, this year Muharram and Safar might be signifying the defeat of Iranian Islam itself.

Because the religious lunar calendar rotates around the secular solar calendar observed in Iran, every childs birthday is bound to fall during the months of mourning at some point. Once it does, it means no birthday parties for the next five or six years. Instead of celebrations with friends, wed have secret gatherings of close family. I dont know which was worse: missing the opportunity to spend time with my friends, or being forced to endure my stuffy old relatives!

In my early adulthood, my friends were more than happy to discuss and debate political issues with me, but debating religion was taboo. It wasnt that they were going to turn me in, just that they would get very personal about it. They would shout down any dissenting opinion on Islam without debate because, while political criticism of the regime was a societal norm despite the regimes best efforts, apostasy and blasphemy remained off limits. As soon as someone would come close to criticizing Islam, everybodys inner authoritarian would rush to end the discussion before it began.

Its been more than a decade since I left Iran for good, and the country has changed. Im in touch with a few friendssecular people who represented the minority viewpoint alongside meand they sometimes update me on our old peers. The young men who would tell you to shut up when criticizing religious policies and religion itself have now turned into proud blasphemers, cursing at Islam and its vanguard regime. Its a shame I can never go back to Iran, because it sounds like its much improved since I left.

The ninth and tenth of Muharram are the peak of the mourning period. When I was there, people would pour into the streets to give away nazrifood they had pledged to God they would give away on a religious holiday if a wish came true. At night, battalions of men and women would take the streets, playing mourning music, shouting religious chants, and marching. This year, the streets are empty. The battalions have shrunk to small squads, and its embarrassing for the mosque to make demonstrations.

A friend told me, Nobody goes out anymore. I asked, Literally no one? He responded, Well, a few did go out to check out girls! He wasnt kidding. With social life and gatherings limited to mourning, young men and women commit the ultimate heresy of using the holy ceremonies to find hookups. Did I come to America or did America come to Iran?

The religious people who drink socially avoid alcohol during this period as a sign of respect. One young Iranian, a friend of a friend, had sent a picture a few years ago of his hands with blisters from performing the ritualsthe one hed fallen victim to was stirring a gigantic pot of soup for hours. Another infamous one is literally beating yourself to demonstrate worshiping Hussein. A less severe ritual is theatrical storytellingnot history-tellingof the battle. This year, he was with my friend drinking. Another friend asked his septuagenarian father why he was not going back to their hometown, as he does every year during Muharram, to fulfill his nazri pledge. The old man responded, Son, I have come to realize that all these things are bullshit! Its one thing for a young person raised on hip-hop and WhatsApp to make such a statement. But from an old man, pious all his life, it is rather rareor, at least, it would have been ten years ago.

Judging by Instagramthe social medium most widely used in Iranit was as though the country was dead. Few people posted anything because there was nothing to do. And the few there were had no signs of a period of state-enforced mourning. The smattering of pro-regime young people make an effort at enthusiasm in their posts, but largely from the same handful of mosques, with diminished crowds composed almost entirely of older people. Most of their posts are not from the ceremonies but graphics and texts related to Muharram.

GAMAAN, a Netherlands-based center run by two Iranian political scientists that tracks public attitudes in Iran, reports that 67 percent of Iranians reject the idea of theocracy, and 72 percent reject having a religious figure as the head of the state. A 2020 report by the same organization found that only 32.2 percent identify as Shiite Muslims, with another 5 percent identifying as Sunni. (Contrast that with the CIA World Factbook, which reports that 9095 percent of the country is Shiite.) Nearly half identified as some form of irreligiousnone, agnostic, spiritual, or atheist. A whopping 7.7 percent called themselves Zoroastrian, far higher than the 0.03 percent of the Zoroastrian population inside Iran. Its not that Shiite Iranians are converting en masse to the religion of their pre-Islamic forbearsZoroastrianism doesnt accept converts. The better interpretation is that a significant number of Iranians claim the ancient Persian religion as a method of identifying as Persian and shedding the Muslim identity theyve come to hate.

Irans plummeting fertility rate gives more evidence of its declining religiosity. Iranians have been poor in the past, but they still had high fertility rates despite being high on the misery index. The return of poverty doesnt alone explain why the fertility rate has fallen to 1.7 children per woman of child-bearing years, but it makes sense when one considers the rise of nones. Religiously unaffiliated people, on average, have fewer children than religious people. In 1989, when I was born, Irans average fertility rate was 5.1.

The Free the Hair movement is another sign of how Islam is on the defensive. Iranian social media is replete with videos of women publicly rejecting the compulsory hijab. (After Muhammad bin Salman lifted the compulsory hijab law in Saudi Arabia, Iran spent a year as the only country in the world with this law, until the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan.) More strikingly, when a religious person confronts them about this civil disobedience, a fightverbal or physicalfollows, with the bystanders almost invariably siding with the woman not covering her hair.

But none of these data are as astounding as the clergy under attack. Iranians used to respect the clerical class, either sincerely or begrudgingly. It wasnt just fear for their power but also a tradition and a custom. Nowadays, the stories that populate the news are about how pedestrians, often without cause, physically assault random mullahs on the street.

Half a century ago, secular modernizers in Iran were complaining about how Islam was an obstacle against progress. In the four decades since it seized power, the theocracy has managed to remove this obstacle, leading a proud and pious people to sour on their own religion. Before the Islamic Revolution, Iran had an Iranian state and a religious population. Now, it has a theocracy and a population increasingly embracing the non-religious components of its national heritage.

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The Islamic Republic Is Killing Islam in Iran - The Bulwark

Iran is a sovereign nation occupying an area of 1,648,195 sq. km in Western Asia.

Iran is a very rugged country of plateaus and mountains with most of the land being above 1,500 feet (460 m). The mountain ranges surround the high interior basin of the country. Of note are the Elburz Mountains in the north, and the Zagros Mountains along Iran's western borders as observed on the physical map of Iran above. Iran's highest point, Mt. Damavand reaches 18,934 ft (5,771m). It has been marked on the map by a yellow triangle and is part of the Elburz Mountain chain.

The central and eastern portion is covered by the Plateau of Iran. Marked on the map, the Dasht-e Kavir is sandstone and salty desert plateau, which in the heat of summer is one of the hottest places on the planet.

The coastal areas outside the mountain rings have some of the lowest elevations in the country.

The most significant river is the Karun, in the southwestern corner of the country. Lake Urmia (in the far-northwest) is the country's largest body of water.

Iran (officially, Islamic Republic of Iran) is divided into 31 administrative provinces (ostanha, sing. ostan). In alphabetical order, these provinces are: Alborz, Ardabil, Azarbayjan e Gharbi (West Azerbaijan), Azarbayjan e Sharqi (East Azerbaijan), Bushehr, Chahar Mahal va Bakhtiari, Esfahan, Fars, Gilan, Golestan, Hamadan, Hormozgan, Ilam, Kerman, Kermanshah, Khorasan-e Jonubi (South Khorasan), Khorasan-e Razavi (Razavi Khorasan), Khorasan-e Shomali (North Khorasan), Khuzestan, Kohgiluyeh va Bowyer Ahmad, Kordestan, Lorestan, Markazi, Mazandaran, Qazvin, Qom, Semnan, Sistan va Baluchestan, Tehran, Yard and Zanjan.

With an area of 1,648,195 sq. km, Iran is the 2nd largest country in the Middle East and the 17th largest country in the world. Tehran is the capital and the largest city of Iran. It is also the most populous city in Western Asia as well as the countrys leading cultural and economic center.

Iran is a mountainous country in Western Asia. Iran is situated both in the Northern and Eastern hemispheres of the Earth. Iran is bordered by Armenia and Azerbaijan in the northwest; Turkmenistan in the northeast; Afghanistan and Pakistan in the east; Iraq and Turkey in the west. Iran is bounded by the Caspian Sea in the north, and by the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman in the south.

Iran Bordering Countries: Iraq, Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan.

Regional Maps: Map of Asia

This page was last updated on February 24, 2021

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Iran Maps & Facts - World Atlas

Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian (R) meets with Josep Borell, the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy (L), at the foreign ministry headquarters in Iran's capital Tehran on June 25, 2022.

Atta Kenare | AFP | Getty Images

Iran appears the most optimistic it's been in years about finally clinching an agreement on a renewed version of the 2015 nuclear deal with the U.S. and other foreign powers.

Iranian negotiating team adviser Mohammad Marandi said on Monday that "we're closer than we've been before" to securing a deal and that the "remaining issues are not very difficult to resolve." And the European Union's "final text" proposal for the deal, submitted last week, has been approved by the U.S., which says it's ready to quickly seal the agreement if Iran accepts it.

Still, there are obstacles to rescuing the Obama-era pact, which lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for a range of limits on its nuclear program. Iranian negotiators responded to the EU's proposal, pointing out the remaining issues that may yet prove impossible to reconcile.

And the stakes are high: the more time goes by, the more Iran progresses in the advancement of its nuclear technology far beyond the scope of what the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the 2015 deal's original signatories say is acceptable.

That could risk triggering an all-out war in the Middle East, as Israel has threatened military action against Iran if it develops nuclear weapons capability.

An Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) military personnel stands guard next to two Iranian Kheibar Shekan Ballistic missiles in downtown Tehran as demonstrators wave Irans and Syrian flags during a rally commemorating the International Quds Day, also known as the Jerusalem day, on April 29, 2022.

Morteza Nikoubazl | Nurphoto | Getty Images

Already in the spring of 2021, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said of Iran that "only countries making bombs are reaching this level" of nuclear enrichment.

With a revived nuclear deal, the U.S. and the deal's other signatories France, the U.K., Germany, China and Russia, known collectively as the P5+1 aim to contain the nuclear program and prevent what many warn could be a nuclear weapons crisis. Iran maintains that its aims are peaceful and that its actions fall within the country's sovereign rights.

Three main sticking points remain. Iran wants the Biden administration to remove its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from its designated terrorist list, which so far Washington seems unwilling to do.

It also wants a guarantee that the deal will be binding regardless of future U.S. administrations. Biden cannot legally guarantee that, and the reality remains that another administration could cancel any deal just as former president Donald Trump did.

The third item is a long-running investigation by the IAEA into traces of uranium found at three of Iran's undeclared nuclear sites several years ago. Tehran wants it shut down, something the agency itself, as well as Western governments, are opposed to.

The regime appears to have found a winning formula: widening its nuclear footprint while narrowing the inspections and monitoring regime.

Behnam Ben Taleblu

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

The U.S. didn't seem to have much patience with Tehran's demands, with State Department spokesperson Ned Price saying this week that "the only way to achieve a mutual return to compliance with the JCPOA is for Iran to drop further unacceptable demands that go beyond the scope of the JCPOA. We have long called these demands extraneous."

In the time since Trump withdrew the U.S. from the deal in May 2018 and reimposed harsh sanctions on Iran, the Islamic Republic's government has pushed ahead with rapid nuclear development.

Its stockpile of enriched uranium is now at 60% enrichment, its highest ever and a huge leap from the 3.67% limit set out by the 2015 deal, formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA.

The level required to be able to make a bomb is 90%. Commercial enrichment for energy use is between 2% and 3%. It's also slashed IAEA access to its nuclear sites for monitoring.

"The restoration of the deal is getting close to a now or never situation," Hussein Ibish, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States in Washington, told CNBC.

"We have little time to lose and about as plausible a framework for getting back to the 2015 deal as we are ever likely to have. So either it's going to happen in the near future or it's going to become increasingly difficult and of increasingly less value, at least regarding containing Iran's nuclear ambitions."

Much uncertainty remains and that's deliberately part of Iran's strategy, said Sanam Vakil, deputy head of the Middle East North Africa program at U.K. think tank Chatham House.

"This is the Iranians taking us down to the wire, dangling the prospect of the deal and trying to extract final concessions, guarantees from both the IAEA and the P5+1 part and parcel of the negotiating strategy," she said.

"They're both in a stalemate. And they're both actually in a position of weakness," Vakil said, noting the Biden administration's concern over Iran's nuclear capability if no deal is reached, its aim of achieving a foreign policy "win" before the November midterm elections, and Iran's suffering economy desperately in need of sanctions relief.

But, she added, Iran is known for its "strategic patience," waiting out the other side until they can get the most possible concessions out of them.

Meanwhile, Biden faces harsh criticism from political opponents fiercely opposed to any deal with Iran.

"Every quest for a guarantee is just another opportunity Tehran is taking to have Washington fight among itself and attempt to offer more in exchange for less," said Behnam Ben Taleblu, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

"Under these circumstances, the only reasons Iran might agree to a deal like the JCPOA is to repair its economic armor in advance of another change in U.S. policy after 2024."

Indeed, many question why a deal that could be ripped up by the next U.S. administration is even worth considering for Iran.

Through this deal Iran would regain access to its foreign reserves, which are estimated to be well over 100 billion, Vakil noted. "That injection of liquidity into the Iranian economy will help in infinite ways from investment to paying government wages to supply chain challenges," she said. "So even if this deal is a two-year deal, as many see it to be, it's a two-year reprieve, and it stems a nuclear crisis."

Tehran's moves to escalate its nuclear activity have put it in the driver's seat for these negotiations, Ben Taleblu said. "The regime appears to have found a winning formula: widening its nuclear footprint while narrowing the inspections and monitoring regime."

Nonetheless, both the U.S. and Iran have an interest in continuing negotiations rather than ditching them altogether, some analysts say, arguing the alternative for both parties is worse.

"Those who have argued that no deal is better than the restored JCPOA have in practice unleashed Iran's nuclear program and failed to produce a better alternative,"said Ali Vaez, Iran project director at the International Crisis Group.

"Right now, the options are either to restore a deal that would put Iran's nuclear program in a box, acquiesce to Iran with a bomb or bomb Iran."

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A renewed Iran nuclear deal may be closer than ever, but problems remain

DUBAI, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Iran accused the United States on Monday of procrastinating in efforts to revive Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal - a charge denied by Washington, which said a deal was closer than two weeks ago because of apparent Iranian flexibility.

After 16 months of fitful, indirect American-Iranian talks, with European Union officials shuttling between the sides, a senior EU official said on Aug. 8 it had laid down a final offer and expected a response within a "very, very few weeks".

Iran last week responded to the EU's text with "additional views and considerations" while calling on the United States to show flexibility to resolve three remaining issues.

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Josep Borrell, the EU's foreign policy chief, said on Monday he hoped the United States would respond positively as early as this week to the bloc's proposal, adding that Iran had given a "reasonable" response. read more

"The Americans are procrastinating and there is inaction from the European sides. ... America and Europe need an agreement more than Iran," Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Nasser Kanaani, told a news conference.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price denied that, telling reporters in Washington: "The notion that we have delayed this negotiation in any way is just not true."

Price said the United States was encouraged that Iran seemed to have dropped demands such as the removal of its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from the U.S. foreign terrorist organization list.

Iran's and U.S.' flags are seen printed on paper in this illustration taken January 27, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration

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"That's part of the reason why a deal is closer now than it was two weeks ago. But the outcome of these ongoing discussions still remains uncertain as gaps do remain," Price said, adding the United States was working as quickly as possible to provide its response.

The United States has called on Tehran to release Iranian-Americans held in Iran on security charges. Iran has demanded that several Iranians detained on charges linked to U.S. sanctions be freed.

"The exchange of prisoners with Washington is a separate issue and it has nothing to do with the process of negotiations to revive the 2015 pact," Kanaani said, saying Tehran was ready to swap prisoners.

In 2018, then-U.S. President Donald Trump reneged on the deal reached before he took office, calling it too soft on Iran, and reimposed harsh U.S. sanctions, prompting Tehran to begin breaching the pact's nuclear curbs.

"We seek a good agreement which would ... be long-lasting," Kanaani said. "We won't be bitten twice."

The 2015 agreement appeared near revival in March after 11 months of indirect U.S.-Iran talks in Vienna. But talks then broke down over obstacles such as Iran's demand that the United States provide guarantees that no future American president would abandon the deal. U.S. President Joe Biden cannot provide such ironclad assurances because the deal is a political understanding rather than a legally binding treaty.

In Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid told French President Emmanuel Macron by telephone that Israel objected to a revived pact and would not be bound by it should one reached. Israel, widely believed to possess its own nuclear arsenal, has made veiled threats to take preemptive military action against Iran if diplomacy fails.

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Additional reporting by Christina Thykjaer and Inti Landauro in Madrid and by Simon Lewis, Humeyra Pamuk and Costas Pitas in Washington;Writing by Parisa Hafezi and Arshad MohammedEditing by Toby Chopra, Will Dunham, Angus MacSwan and Catherine Evans

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Iran says U.S. delaying on nuclear deal, U.S. sees progress - Reuters