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For days now, large swathes of western Iran have been covered in dust literally. Dust storms have overwhelmed the oil-rich province of Khuzestan. Air quality is reportedly some 30 to 60 times the healthy level. Power stations have broken down; banks, schools and offices were closed; water supplies were disrupted; and flights to and from Ahvaz were cancelled including, ironically, one scheduled for the regimes top environment official.

Wipe the dust off of Irans scenic Khuzestan province, and youll see an even uglier truth. What is happening in Khuzestan exemplifies the disastrous policies implemented by Tehrans fundamentalist rulers. While it spends billions to wage sectarian conflicts in Syria, Yemen and Iraq, the Iranian regime has systematically and unabashedly neglected the countrys ecosystem and economy for the past 40 years.

For years, Washington has viewed Tehran as the worlds worst state-sponsor of terror while, by some twisted logic, trying to placate the mullahs. The West, in general, has never taken into account how the ruled view their rulers. The Iranian people are grappling with unprecedented, devastating challenges caused by the ruling regimes policies.

Ahvaz, for example, has been described as the worlds most polluted city by the World Health Organization. Khuzestan lies in the Fertile Crescent, with more than one million hectares of agricultural land. Destructive policies, such as the unbridled construction of dams (producing enormous wealth for the select few), have caused rivers to dry up, and the climate has taken a turn for the worse.

For decades, industrial waste and sewage poured into the Karun, Irans largest navigable river, without the slightest state interference. Khuzestan is reeling from unprecedented unemployment, a recession, a housing crisis and lack of access to education.

Add a lack of basic civic services to the environmental mishandling, and the systematic failure of public services, including water and electricity, and you get thousands of people pouring into the streets to protest.

It is clear those responsible for bringing on this enormous scale of ruin and tragedy will not be willing or able to offer genuine remedies. This is a regime, after all, that puts greater emphasis on Syria than its own provinces.

In 2013, a former commander of intelligence for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) proclaimed: Syria is our 35th province, and is a strategic province for us. If the enemy attacks us and seeks to take Syria or Khuzestan, our priority would be to keep Syria, because if we keep Syria, we can take back Khuzestan at a later date. But if we lose Syria, we would lose the capital Tehran.

It is no wonder that the Iranian people, choking on dust and without jobs, despise the IRGC and everything for which it stands. It should be equally self-evident for the U.S. administration that the IRGC is a terrorist entity, and should be so designated. The IRGC must be evicted from Syria, Iraq, Yemen and other countries of the region before any resolution to the regional crises can be found.

For years, some in Washington naively hoped that elusive moderates within the regime would solve everything. But even after the nuclear deal signed in the summer of 2015, the Iranian regime has been neither able nor willing to resolve the Iranian peoples multitude of problems and real-life crises. Now, with the death of their most notable moderate figure, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the chances are more remote than ever before.

Last week, the so-called "moderate" president Hassan Rouhani visited Khuzestan and unashamedly tried to deflect blame from the regime by saying that the catastrophic situation in the province is the result of "divine punishment" for the residents' inability to promote righteousness and to protect the environment.

So, instead of pinning its strategy on self-delusion, Washington now has the opportunity to find a real partner in the Iranian people and their organized opposition. For the sake of American security, policymakers need to decouple Washingtons future from Tehrans failing Islamic extremists and, instead, reach out to the people of Iran who want change, democracy, and a better life.

The regimes next presidential elections are scheduled to take place in May. In 2009, millions of protesters poured into the streets after those same elections, but, unfortunately, the Obama administration stood silent. The resentment of the population is now even deeper than it was eight years ago. The current administration should not repeat the same mistake.

Washington should adopt a firm policy against the Iranian regime and its terrorist and repressive arm, the IRGC, while vociferously standing with those who seek genuine democratic change.This time, we shouldnt stand idly by and let the dust settle in Iran.

Ali Safavi (@samsafavi) is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, which is dedicated to the establishment of a democratic, secular and non-nuclear republic in Iran.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill.

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Failure to aid province highlights Iran's misguided priorities - The Hill (blog)

Syrians walk past the rubble of destroyed buildings in the rebel-held town of Douma, on the eastern outskirts of the capital Damascus, on Feb. 27, 2017.

Russia is struggling to salvage its bid to secure a deal to end six years of civil war in Syria as deepening differences with Iran risk a repeat of previous failed peace efforts led by the U.S.

Things arent going as smoothly as we would want in the Geneva talks, President Vladimir Putin told reporters Tuesday during a visit to Kyrgyzstan.

Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov met the Syrian government delegation head, Bashar Jaafari, in Geneva, where the United Nations is holding the first round of Syria negotiations in almost a year. Hes also due to meet the main Syrian opposition group, the Western-backed High Negotiations Committee. Its demanding that Russia press President Bashar al-Assad and his other chief ally, Iran, to observe a cease-fire and discuss steps for a political transition.

Iran never wants any solution in Syria, the way they act on the ground shows that they want this war to continue, the HNCs chief spokesman, Salem al-Muslet, said in an interview in the Swiss city. Hopefully, the Russians will understand that there is a partner that does not want any political transition and they will put pressure on the regime to start the negotiations.

Russia seized the initiative in Syria after the collapse of peace attempts with the U.S. in the last months of former President Barack Obamas administration. In December, Moscow brokered a cease-fire together with Turkey, a key backer of the rebels seeking to overthrow Assad. But despite an accord last month to involve Iran in monitoring the truce, the opposition says violations are continuing by Assad forces and their allies.

The conflict in Syria since 2011 has killed at least 300,000 people, sent millions more fleeing to neighboring countries and Europe, and allowed Islamic State to seize a swath of territory from which to wage a campaign of global terror. While new U.S. President Donald Trump has called for an alliance with Russia to fight the jihadists, hes also branded Iran as the number one terrorist threat even as the Kremlin insists on including Iranian-backed and Assad forces in the anti-terrorist campaign in Syria.

Russia is in a very difficult position, its being torn between its traditional partners, Assad and Iran, and its potential partners in the fight against Islamic State -- Turkey and the U.S., said Alexander Shumilin, head of the Middle East Conflicts Center at the Institute for U.S. and Canada Studies, a government-run research group in Moscow.

Despite the cease-fire, which excludes Islamic State and forces linked to al-Qaeda, fighting is continuing in several areas including near Damascus, the opposition says. The UN on Monday said it was extremely concerned about the more than 400,000 people who remain besieged in eastern Ghoutah outside the capital. Intense fighting in and around the town has been reported over the past week, according to the world body.

Russian officials say they hope to advance discussions on a new constitution for Syria. Russia proposed a draft law for Syrias governmentlast month that would reportedly curb some of Assads powers and impose term limits.

In a mirror of the previous failed rounds of UN-led negotiations, the opposition is focusing on its demands for political transition, which it insists must include Assads departure. The Syrian leader, confident after military advances with the help of Russian air power that led to the capture of the former commercial capital Aleppo in December, maintains the fight against terrorism is the priority.

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The HNC will propose to UN Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, at a meeting on Wednesday that the negotiations focus first on the formation of a genuine transitional governing body, a member of the delegation, Monzer Makhous, told reporters. If these discussions make some progress, the HNC is ready to talk about the new constitution and make terrorism one of the issues on the agenda, he said. The opposition wont accept to join a token power-sharing government headed by Assad, Makhous said.

Iran and Assad are openly opposed to Russias more flexible stance, which it sees as necessary to involve the U.S. and its allies in a post-war reconstruction and secure an exit strategy for its military campaign in Syria, said Shumilin of the Institute for U.S. and Canada Studies. This is a source of major tension, how to bring in the opposition forces without alienating Assad and Iran, he said.

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Russia Tries to Salvage Syria Peace Bid Amid Iran Dispute - Bloomberg

Iranians delighted Monday in the Oscar victory by director Asghar Farhadi, who won his second foreign language film award but boycotted the ceremony in protest of President Trumps immigration policies.

Farhadi, who won for his drama The Salesman, had an Iranian American engineer Anousheh Ansari, the first Iranian-born person to travel to space deliver a statement on his behalf condemning Trumps inhumane executive order banning citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, from entering the U.S.

Dividing the world into the us and our enemies categories creates fear a deceitful justification for aggression and war, Farhadi wrote. These wars prevent democracy and human rights in countries which have themselves been victims of aggression.

Irans theocratic government and military establishment are accused of human rights abuses, supporting foreign extremist groups and curbing free speech. But Tehran seized an opportunity with the Oscar win to stake out some moral high ground over the United States.

Irans foreign minister, Javad Zarif, tweeted, Proud of cast & crew of The Salesman for Oscar & stance against #MuslimBan.

Iranian state media gave scant coverage to the Oscar news, but many Iranians learned of Farhadis victory which followed his 2012 triumph in the same category for the film A Separation through social media.

Farhadi had announced in January that he wouldnt attend the ceremony. On Friday he joined the directors of the four other Oscar-nominated foreign language films from Denmark, Germany, Australia and Sweden in issuing a statement expressing our unanimous and emphatic disapproval of the climate of fanaticism and nationalism we see today in the U.S. and in so many other countries.

Hours before the ceremony on Sunday, London Mayor Sadiq Khan, a Muslim, held a free public screening of The Salesman that drew thousands. Khan has called Trumps travel ban shameful. The travel orderhas been stymied in court.

Trump has singled out Iran for criticism since taking office, ordering fresh sanctions following an Iranian missile test and threatening to reconsider a nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers, including the United States, that has eased economic restrictions against the Islamic republic.

For many Iranians, who have reacted with a mixture of fear and contempt to Trumps harsh rhetoric, Farhadis victory was a moment to celebrate.

The Oscar for The Salesman shows the world of art is beyond man-made frontiers, with an emphasis on humanity, said Rahim Zohabi, a 65-year-old businessman in Tehran.

Art cannot be limited by bans and walls. Hopefully [the Oscar] will promote peace and understanding between nations, if not politicians.

The film centers on an Iranian couple actors starring in a local production of Arthur Millers play Death of a Salesman whose life is upended when the woman is assaulted by an intruder.

Some hardliners criticized the film for presenting a negative image of Iran. Others speculated that Iranian authorities submitted the film for Oscar consideration in an attempt to show a humane side to the theocracy and that Farhadi was rewarded by a liberal Hollywood for his opposition to Trump.

The award was politicized, said Farshid Farivar, a 54-year-old publisher of art magazines. The Salesman didnt deserve the Oscar.

Ahmad Kassaeian, an optician and writer, said Iranians worldwide would cheer the success of one of their own.

I think Mr. Farhadi cannot make any tangible impact in reducing the tension between Iran and America, said Kassaeian, 54. But culturally, if we gain greater recognition and respect among Americans, thats important.

Special correspondent Mostaghim reported from Tehran and Times staff writer Bengali from Thiruvananthapuram, India.

shashank.bengali@latimes.com

Follow @SBengali on Twitter for more news from South Asia

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Read more here:
Iran celebrates an Oscar win and a chance to needle President Trump - Los Angeles Times

The establishment of a joint bank account between Iran and Indonesia will foster financial cooperation and facilitate bilateral transactions, said the Central Bank of Irans governor. Valiollah Seif made the statement during a meeting with Indonesias Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Darmin Nasution on Monday, CBIs website reported. Based on this system, both countries can open a bank account in each others central banks to facilitate the payment process, he said. Seif, who also heads the Money and Credit Council, said both countries can even use their local currencies for making payments, though the currency of choice must first be agreed upon by both sides. He noted that these accounts will be used only to settle bilateral trade deficit or surplus every three months. Relations between the two countries central banks will improve our banking ties and give our banks the opportunity to open branches in Iran and Indonesia, he added. Seif noted that since tourism potentials of Iran and Indonesia are high, the two countries banking card systems could be integrated for Indonesian citizens to be able to use their cards in Iran and vice versa. The Indonesian minister showed interest in Seifs proposals, noting that his trip to Iran is a follow up on his presidents visit in December. I hope that this meeting will ease our relations, especially in monetary and financial sectors. However, I believe that restoring trust between our businessmen is crucial to improve trade, he said. Nasution noted that improvement of bilateral banking relations will definitely impact investments and business. The Indonesian Oil and Natural Gas Company (Pertamina) has close relations with the National Iranian Oil Company in purchasing natural gas and oil so following our negotiations, I hope to witness expansion of business relations between Iran and Indonesia in the near future, he said. Heading a high-ranking economic delegation, Indonesian President Joko Widodo visited Tehran on December 2016. Several memoranda of understanding for cooperation in a wide range of fields, including banking, stock exchange, oil, paper and food, were signed between Iran and Indonesias chambers of commerce.

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Iran, Indonesia to Open Joint Bank Account - Financial Tribune

Irans Ministry of Agriculture has lifted a ban on the import of Pakistani kinnow. Pakistans Commerce Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan also announced that fast progress will be made in trade between Pakistan and Iran, Associated Press of Pakistan reported. He said the relaxation in export of kinnows has been granted by Iran before the expected visit of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to the Economic Cooperation Organization summit in Islamabad. The 13th ECO Summit will be held in Islamabad on Wednesday. There was great demand for Pakistan kinnow in Iran and it was a good step to lift the restriction three weeks before the Iranian national festival of Norouz, he said. He urged Pakistani exporters to take advantage of this opportunity. The border closure had an adverse impact on the export of kinnow to Afghanistan, but the traders would hopefully make up for the loss by selling kinnows to Iran, he said. The Pakistani minister added that the central banks of Iran and Pakistan would soon sign an agreement to establish banking relations, which will increase bilateral trade threefold. Khan said a joint economic conference of the two countries may be held in Tehran at the end of March.

Excerpt from:
Iran Lifts Ban on Pakistani Kinnow Import - Financial Tribune