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United Nations Iran is accusing US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson of a brazen interventionist plan to change the current government that violates international law and the UN Charter.

Irans UN Ambassador Gholamali Khoshroo said in a letter to Secretary-General Antonio Guterres circulated on Tuesday that Tillersons comments are also a flagrant violation of the 1981 Algiers Accords in which the United States pledged not to intervene, directly or indirectly, politically or militarily, in Irans internal affairs.

Tillerson said in a June 14 hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on the 2018 State Department budget that US policy is to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons and work toward support of those elements inside of Iran that would lead to a peaceful transition of that government.

Those elements are there, certainly as we know, he said.

Khoshroo said Iran expects all countries to condemn such grotesque policy statements and advice the government of the United States to act responsibly and to adhere to the principles of the (UN) Charter and international law.

He noted that Tillersons comments came weeks after President Hassan Rouhanis re-election to another four-year term and local elections in which 71 percent of the Iranian people participated. Rouhani is a political moderate who defeated a hardline opponent.

The people of Iran have repeatedly proven that they are the ones to decide their own destiny and thus attempts by the United States to interfere in Iranian domestic affairs will be doomed to failure, Khoshroo said.

They have learned how to stand strong and independent, as demonstrated in the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

He said Tillersons statement also coincided with the release of newly declassified documents that further clarified how United States agencies were behind the overthrow of Mohammad Mossadegh, the popular and democratically elected prime minister of Iran on August 19, 1953.

At the June 14 hearing, Tillerson said the Trump administrations Iranian policy is under development.

But I would tell you that we certainly recognise Irans continued destabilising [role] in the region, Tillerson said, citing its payment of foreign fighters, support for Hezbollah extremists, and their export of militia forces in Syria, in Iraq, in Yemen.

US lawmakers have long sought to hit Iran with more sanctions in order to check its ballistic missile programme and rebuke Tehrans continued support for terrorist groups, and on June 15 the Senate approved a sweeping sanctions bill.

The bill imposes mandatory sanctions on people involved in Irans ballistic missile programme and anyone who does business with them.

The measure also would apply terrorism sanctions to the countrys Revolutionary Guards and enforce an arms embargo. It now goes to the House. Senators insisted the new Iran sanctions wont undermine or impede enforcement of the landmark nuclear deal that Former President Barack Obama and five other key nations reached with Tehran two years ago.

Meanwhile, tensions have been escalating between the US and North Korea following the death of US student Otto Warmbier, who was arrested in North Korea and sent home in a coma after 18 months, and in the face of Pyongyangs military and nuclear ambitions.

Moon Jae-in, the new leader of North Koreas neighbour and arch enemy, South Korea, is headed to Washington for talks this week. North Koreas state news agency KCNA said: The America-first principle . . . advocates the world domination by recourse to military means just as was the case with Hitlers concept of world occupation.

And it went on to accuse Trump of following Hitlers dictatorial politics to divide others into two categories, friends and foes in order to justify suppression.

It is not the first time the secretive state has evoked Hitler in propaganda against the US.

After George W Bush branded the North, along with Iran and Iraq an axis of evil, Pyongyang hit back, saying the then-US president was a tyrant that puts Hitler in the shade and a political imbecile bereft of even elementary morality.

America has been angling for tougher sanctions against North Korea because of the states insistence on developing missiles to carry nuclear warheads greater distances.

KCNA said the US policy of blocking medical supplies was an unethical and inhumane act, far exceeding the degree of Hitlers blockade of Leningrad. And it added: The Trump way of thinking that the whole world may be sacrificed, just for the better living of the US, has put even its allies and stooges in a pretty fix.

Moon is new in the job, but has already signalled he will move to pressure China on tightening the screws around North Korea. AFP

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Iran accuses US of 'brazen' plan to change its govt - Chronicle

Iran used a Star of David as a target for a missile test last year, the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations revealed Wednesday.

Ambassador Danny Danon shared a startling satellite image of the Jewish and Israeli symbol with members of the UN Security Council, the Jerusalem Post reported.

This use of the Star of David as target practice is hateful and unacceptable, Danon told the Council. This missile test not only violates Security Council resolutions but also proves beyond doubt, once again, the true intentions of Iran to target Israel.

The Star of David was used as a target for a mid-range Qiam ballistic missile test in December, according to a statement from the Permanent Mission of Israel to the UN.

Alongside the symbol, a round crater caused by the rocket also can be seen.

The Security Council must act immediately against this demonstration of hate and Irans provocative violations that threaten the stability of the entire region, Danon said.

It is the Iranians who prop up the Assad regime as hundreds of thousands are killed, finance the terrorists of Hezbollah as they threaten the citizens of Israel, and support extremists and tyrants throughout the Middle East and around the world, he added.

Earlier this month, Iran fired missiles at Syria, targeting ISIS positions in the first attack by Iran outside its country in 30 years since the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988, the Times of Israel reported.

The missiles were seen as a threat to Israel and the US.

I have one message for Iran: Dont threaten Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said after the attack.

Iran has previously fired missiles with anti-Israel messages written on them in Hebrew.

In March 2016, it test-fired two ballistic missiles, which an Iranian news organization said were inscribed with the phrase Israel must be wiped out.

Meanwhile, it has been announced that Israel will test its Arrow 3 intercontinental ballistic missile defense system in the US next year.

The test will be carried out in cooperation with the US Missile Defense Agency, the Jerusalem Post reported.

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Iran once used Star of David as missile target - New York Post

A police officer stands outside the U.S. Supreme Court on June 26, 2017 in Washington. Eric Thayer / Getty Images

Although foreign countries are generally immune from U.S. lawsuits, the law makes exceptions for acts of terrorism. A federal judge eventually awarded the Americans $71.5 million. But because Iran has few assets frozen in the US the usual source for satisfying such court judgments lawyers for the Americans had to come up with other assets to seize.

The Supreme Court case involved thousands of small clay tablets from Persepolis, the ancient capital of Persia, on long-term loan by Iran to the

In 2016, a federal appeals court ruled that the antiquities could not be used to help satisfy the court judgment, because Iran was not using them for commercial purposes.

The federal government has generally sided with Iran during the years of litigation. "Although the United States sympathizes with petitioners and other victims of terrorism, the seizure of a foreign sovereign's property via attachment or execution can affect the United States' foreign relations," said Jeffrey Wall, the Trump administration's acting solicitor general.

Originally posted here:
Supreme Court Takes Up Dispute Over Iran Antiquities in Terror Case - NBCNews.com

SUT represents the aspirations of a generation of Iranian policy makers who, in the wake of the 1979 revolution, were determined to put their country on the science and technology map.

"I don't want to exaggerate the situation," says Professor Jawad Salehi, tongue far from cheek, but "MIT is the Sharif of the U.S."

Be that as it may, Iran's educational leaders must also brace themselves for the fact that Sharif is a conduit out of the country.

"The computer engineering department in this university -- they call that the airport," says 19-year-old civil engineering student Kiarash. "Our main reason for joining this university is for going abroad."

"Going back really to (the) early stages of the revolution, but it continues, the government has really invested in education, partly to address inequality," says Arang Keshavarzian, associate professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at NYU.

That investment took on new importance after the bloody Iran-Iraq war launched by Saddam Hussein, says Salehi.

The war "showed the core of our system -- that knowledge and technology is very fundamental for our survivability in the future."

The lesson, says Salehi, was broad. MIT "helped to advance the American society," he says. "Iranian society at the time was in need of engineers, more than anything else."

"Our society would have to advance itself based on knowledge, on science, and know-how."

The resemblance between Sharif and major Western universities doesn't extend much beyond the groups of students chatting beneath the trees outside -- the buildings are heavy on breeze block and concrete. There are no starchitect-built theaters here, but faculty members and students speak of the place with pride.

"If you gave us the MIT budget," says Salehi, " and you gave us the facilities and laboratories, but here in the Sharif campus, I am sure that -- I mean, I don't want to exaggerate this -- but I am sure that we would be at par with some of the best of the world."

SUT staff would not allow CNN to chat to students on campus, but we spoke to several on the streets nearby; they are identified here only by their first names, as some of their comments could be considered controversial.

The university is "the best in the country," says 25-year-old electrical engineering student Mehdi.

But he says Western sanctions -- some now lifted in the wake of the 2015 nuclear deal -- have limited students' access to scientific papers, equipment, and the ability to "reach the technology. It's heavily affected us."

Walking to campus with four friends, Kiarash says that the "university atmosphere is way better" than most other Iranian institutions.

Kiarash's generation lives in a different world to that of their parents; through the internet, Western culture reaches Iran like never before.

Though many social media websites, such as Facebook and Reddit, are officially blocked, simple workarounds mean they are easily accessible. Encrypted messaging apps like Telegram have taken off, and allow of a form of communication completely out of the government's sight; even Iran's presidential campaigns have embraced Telegram.

Students like Kiarash and his friend Pegah, 20, recognize their privilege, but expect more.

"It's known to be the best university of Iran, but we don't have much facilities," says Pegah.

"We have something," Kiarash chimes in. "A device for mixing some kinds of concrete. It's (from) the former king of Iran's era."

And there are bigger, more fundamental issues.

"I wear whatever I like," says Kiarash. "But, for example, my friend here, she has to wear hijab."

Their clothing would fit it in at any Western university -- jeans and T-shirts. But Pegah, who is female, must adhere to Iran's rules mandating conservative clothing for women.

Several times, Pegah says, she's been reprimanded for her clothing. "For example, they say your jeans are too tight. But it's not tight!"

"The MIT of Iran?" laughs Satya, a 20-year-old in her senior year studying physics. "It is the best university in Tehran, I guess. It's hard. But I am doing it."

The strictures placed on students are not just a matter of personal annoyances, says Iranian economy and education specialist Nader Habibi, of Brandeis University in the U.S. "The government imposes an Islamic lifestyle," he says, but for many urban families, "their vision of a good lifestyle is more liberal."

One way around this, Habibi says, would be to "create small areas where (a) more diverse lifestyle is tolerated" -- think Dubai, an outpost of liberal excesses in a fundamentally very conservative country, the United Arab Emirates. That model has been successful in attracting foreign investment, and convincing multinationals to set up shop.

In Iran, there is a constant tug-of-war between politicians like President Hassan Rouhani -- reform-minded, at least by Iranian standards -- and the conservative, revolutionist clergy, with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei at the helm.

It's evident everywhere in Tehran, where you're as likely to pass a woman covered head to toe in a flowing black chador, as a woman made up to the nines, with coiffed hair, designer clothes, and a scarf half-way back on her head, barely conforming to rules requiring female head coverings.

The Iranian government, says Habibi, has thus far resisted implementing any Dubai-style system in Iran.

As far as Kiarash is concerned, that inflexibility is driving away Iran's brightest students. "They only wait (for) their main civil rights," he says. "And when they don't give them, they have to go."

Ramtin Keramati is one of those who left the country. On the phone from California, the SUT graduate recalls the first time he saw Stanford University's campus. "I was like, 'Oh my God, this is gorgeous! This is amazing!'"

Keramati says the transition was difficult, but he had company -- in the form of roughly 8,700 Iranian students studying in the US, according to a 2014 study by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. They're among as many as 50,000 Iranians studying around the world.

Stanford even has a Persian Students Association, which Keramati says picked him up from the airport and helped him get acclimatized to life on a US campus.

"It's really hard," he says. "I didn't know what to expect ... everything was a surprise."

There is a rich history of Iranians seeking greener pastures -- at least temporarily -- abroad.

President Rouhani studied in Scotland. His foreign minister, Javad Zarif, studied in California. SUT's Salehi got his bachelor's degree at the University of California at Irvine and his PhD at the University of Southern California before working at Bell Labs in New Jersey, which he calls "one of the best periods of my life." Firuzabad, the president of SUT, got his master's degree and PhD in Saskatchewan, Canada.

The "brain drain is significant," says Brandeis' Habibi; he says Iran's government has tried to stem it, using economic incentives.

Anyone who receives a government scholarship to study abroad can have that loan written off if they return to Iran to work for a certain number of years, but "that's only a small fraction of Iran's brain drain," Habibi says.

Much more significant are the students or professionals who move abroad for better opportunities. Once someone has completed their mandatory military service, Habibi says, the government can do nothing to stop them from leaving.

The brain drain is a "very sensitive question," Salehi acknowledges. Everyone has the right to emigrate, he says, "but we can influence their choice."

"It is the duty of the government, or the society, to give so many opportunities in our country that a young person who was thinking of leaving would have a bit of a doubt," he says.

The government often reaches out "to educated professional Iranians in ... Western countries, to encourage them to come back," Habibi says; he estimates that the Rouhani government, aided by the lifting of some sanctions, has convinced 100 to 200 Iranians a year to return to work in their homeland.

And the desire to leave is by no means universal.

Aerospace engineering student Mohammed, 21, says his faculty members have "good connections with the industry to get a job later," adding: "I just want to stay here."

But a very unscientific survey found that the call of foreign countries resonates with plenty of Sharif's students. That's certainly the case with physics student Satya.

As far as she's concerned, "every one" of the university's students goes abroad.

"That's the goal when we come here," she says. "This is why Sharif is important, and very famous, because we can apply and we can go and never come back, maybe."

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Brain drain to the West: Inside 'Iran's MIT' - CNN.com - CNN International

European companies should not rush to pour money into Irans industries.

By Ryszard Czarnecki for The Diplomat

June 27, 2017

Immediately following the reelection of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani last month, the countrys Oil Ministry began boasting about its expectations that new investment deals with European nations would be signed before Rouhani took the oath for his second term later this summer.

There doesnt appear to be much concrete information to back up these claims, and the Islamic Republic of Iran has a demonstrated track record of exaggerating its own prospects, both in terms of economic outcomes and military development. Yet, the latest rhetoric reflects political and diplomatic realities, including the likelihood of some Western policymakers and businessmen taking Rouhanis reelection as a cue to expand their relations with the Iranian regime. This is something that the whole world should be alarmed about.

When the Iran nuclear agreement, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was implemented in January 2016, it was not a good time to invest in Iranian institutions or to attempt the normalization of relations with the Islamic Republic. Now that Rouhani has been reelected following his repetition of the same reformist promises that were broken over the past four years, it is still not a good time for investment or normalization. As a matter of fact, there simply is no good time for those moves. The only circumstances under which Western entities should reenter Iran is after the theocratic regime has given way to a democratic system of governance thataffords liberty to its people.

The U.S. Senate this month approved a sanctions package that would extend terrorism-related restrictions to the entirety of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps a measure that should have been implemented virtually as soon as the hardline paramilitary came into being.

But on the other hand, for all of President Donald Trumps tough talk on the Iranian regime, he has stopped short of blocking newfound deals like the multi-billion dollar Boeing aircraft sale. In fact, his administration has extended the waivers under the JCPOA, even while emphasizing the fact that Iran remains the worlds foremost state sponsor of terrorism and calling for the international community to isolate Tehran and deny it the means of terror financing.

It is arguably understandable that Trump doesnt want to assume the political risks of unilaterally undermining the JCPOA. But this does not absolve Europe from responsibility if any of its governments or businesses decide to hand money to Iran in the nave hope that it will not make its way into the hands of terrorist groups or into the accounts of institutions that are responsible for regional destabilization and the violent repression of the Iranian people.

It will take serious effort for the world to counterbalance the misplaced sentiments of those who see Rouhani as a realistic prospect for moderation within Irans clerical regime.

Of course, this moderation did not manifest during his first term in office, when he oversaw the worst period of executions in 25 years, as well as several illicit ballistic missile tests and a more than two-fold increase in close encounters between IRGC attack boats and Western vessels transiting the Persian Gulf, let alone the IRGCs murderous interventions in Iraq and Syria. In the wake of all this and much more, the vast majority of the Iranian people do not take Rouhanis renewed promises of reform seriously. As such, neither should European governments or would-be investors.

But not everyone in the West is suitably aware of Iranians disillusionment, much less their overwhelming readiness to support international efforts that would isolate and economically cripple the regimes hardline institutions to make way for the democratic transformation of the country. This situation is something that the world community as a whole must understand before individual stakeholders make any decisions that could indirectly finance Iran-backed terrorism.

One way of making this situation known is to focus the attention of policymakers and business leaders onto the Iran Freedom rally that will be taking place outside of Paris on July 1. The annual event, organized by the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), attracts tens of thousands of Iranian expatriates and is viewed by millions of Iranians using illegal satellite dishes inside their home country. I have participated in this event many times. It is well attended by European and American political dignitaries and foreign policy scholars.

Virtually every Iranian who participates in the NCRI rally has lost family or close friends to the Iranian regime, generally under circumstances of willful ignorance on the part of Western authorities. Yet they do not resent todays Western leaders for those losses; rather, they see Western vigilance as a tool that could go a long way toward sparing a new generation of Iranians from suffering the same pain.

Ryszard Czarnecki is vice president of the European Parliament and a former European minister of Poland.

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There Is No Good Time to Invest in Iran - The Diplomat