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IAEA: Iran Stayed on Track With Nuclear Pledges

BRUSSELS-—Iran has complied with its main pledges in last November’s interim nuclear deal, the United Nations’ atomic agency said in its quarterly report on Friday, continuing to refrain from enriching uranium to near-weapon-grade levels and converting its stockpile of nuclear material into less dangerous forms. The International Atomic Energy Agency also confirmed that Iran met its pledge to start addressing questions about past nuclear work. However, the report cited satellite evidence that Tehran was carrying out fresh work to clean up a military site in Parchin where Western governments believe Iran has carried out work that could be used to develop nuclear weapons. The IAEA’s latest report on Iran’s nuclear program is the last one before a July 20 deadline set by Iran and six major powers to clinch a comprehensive nuclear deal. A critical report could have set back the negotiations intended to convince Tehran to curtail its […]

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Oil Companies Returning to Iran Face Challenge in Form of Revolutionary Guards

TEHRAN—As the thaw in relations between the West and Iran continues, the Islamic Republic is hoping to lure major oil companies back to invest in its all-important energy sector. But any oil firms that return to Iran will find a new force to be reckoned with: Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, a military force set up in 1979 by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to protect the country’s Islamic political system. In particular, oil companies will find it necessary to come to some sort of accommodation with engineering contractor Khatam ol-Anbia, a company wholly owned by the Guards whose name means "Seal of the Prophets." Khatam was set up in 1989 following Iran’s war with Iraq to provide employment for Revolutionary Guards and make use of skills developed in the conflict such as building roads and bridges. With up to 40,000 employees, according to U.S. government estimates, the company has expanded to […]

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Iran Is Providing Information on Its Detonators, Atomic Agency Says

WASHINGTON — For six years, international nuclear inspectors have been demanding that Iran turn over evidence of experiments that they suspect could have been part of a secret effort to solve the complex science of detonating a nuclear weapon. On Friday, the International Atomic Energy Agency , the monitoring arm of the United Nations, said that it was finally beginning to see the information it had long sought — but that Iran insisted that the detonators were for non-nuclear purposes. The disclosure was buried in a report by the atomic agency that detailed major progress Iran had made in diluting most of its stockpile of medium-enriched uranium, nuclear fuel that the West has long feared could be converted relatively quickly into weapons-grade material. Getting Iran to dilute that uranium was perhaps the biggest single accomplishment of the interim deal struck last year, creating room for the current negotiations, which […]

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Iran complies with its obligation under nuclear deal: IAEA report

Iran continues to cut its most sensitive nuclear stockpile by more than 80 percent in implementing a milestone nuclear deal with six world powers, and is cooperating with the UN nuclear agency to provide greater transparency of its nuclear plan, a UN confidential report showed on Friday. A monthly updating confidential report of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), obtained by Xinhua, showed Tehran has been curbing its disputed nuclear activities under the landmark Geneva deal agreed in last November since the pact came into force on Jan. 20. The report said Iran has cut the amount of its 20 percent enriched uranium by more than 80 percent by diluting or feeding the nuclear stockpile into the conversion process during the past four months, which amounted to 209 kg when the deal took effect. "Iran’s stock of UF6 enriched up to 20% U-235 has decreased […]

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Iraq files for arbitration against Turkey, Botas

Iraq on Friday took legal action against Turkey for facilitating autonomous oil exports by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) without Baghdad’s approval. In a statement given to Iraq Oil Report on Friday, the ministry claims Turkey’s transportation, storing and loading of Kurdish crude oil over the past five months violates the treaty that governs the Iraq-Turkey Pipeline (ITP). The ministry has filed a request for arbitration at the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris against Tur… This content is for registered users. Please login to continue. If you are not a registered user, you may purchase a subscription or sign up for a free trial .

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Sale of Kurdish Oil to Europe Nations Angers Iraq Government

More than one million barrels of Kurdish oil were shipped from Turkey to Europe yesterday, Turkey’s energy minister and the Iraqi Kurdish administration said, prompting Iraq to try and block the transaction. The oil was despatched from the Turkish Mediterranean oil terminal at Ceyhan at 10 p.m. yesterday, and was probably destined for Italy or Germany, Turkey’s Energy Minister Taner Yildiz said today. Iraq called the sale of the oil without the consent of its oil ministry “illegitimate.” Iraq began arbitration against the government of Turkey and a terminal operator in Ceyhan to prevent the transport, storage and loading of crude pumped directly by the Kurdistan Regional Government to Turkey, according to an e-mailed statement from Iraq’s Oil Ministry. The ministry and its official marketing company , SOMO, said yesterday that they “reserve the right” to embark on legal proceedings against companies loading Kurdish oil from Ceyhan without approval […]

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Kurds confirm oil exports to Europe

A tanker full of crude oil from the Kurdish region of Iraq left a Turkish port bound for European markets, the Kurdistan Regional Government said Friday. "A tanker loaded with over one million barrels of crude oil departed last night from Ceyhan towards Europe," the semiautonomous KRG said in a statement . "This is the first of many such sales of oil exported through the newly constructed pipeline in the Kurdistan region." A pipeline from the Kurdish north is sending oil to storage tanks in Ceyhan, a Turkish sea port. Exports of Kurdish oil, however, had been on hold because of the lingering stalemate between the Kurdish and central governments over who controls what in the Iraqi energy sector. KRG said it was operating according to rules spelled out in the Iraqi Constitution and invited outsiders to observe the sales in an effort to […]

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Tanker Carrying Iraqi Kurdistan's Crude Sets New Course for Iraqi Politics

An oil tanker carrying more than a million barrels of crude from Iraqi Kurdistan across the Mediterranean Sea on Friday signaled a shift in Iraq’s political and economic landscape. The ship bears the first load of oil that was recently piped from Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region into neighboring Turkey, where it was loaded at a port and is being shipped to world markets. Its voyage represents an act of defiance of Iraq’s newly elected central government by Turkish and Kurdish authorities. The government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Friday called the shipment an "illegitimate deed" and said it would file a complaint against Turkey in the International Court of Arbitration for abetting the sales. Mr. Maliki, whose party won the most seats in parliamentary elections last month, maintains that the Kurds must market the crude through Iraq’s oil-sales system, which would then pass a portion of the […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Tanker Carrying Iraqi Kurdistan’s Crude Sets New Course for Iraqi Politics

An oil tanker carrying more than a million barrels of crude from Iraqi Kurdistan across the Mediterranean Sea on Friday signaled a shift in Iraq’s political and economic landscape. The ship bears the first load of oil that was recently piped from Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region into neighboring Turkey, where it was loaded at a port and is being shipped to world markets. Its voyage represents an act of defiance of Iraq’s newly elected central government by Turkish and Kurdish authorities. The government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Friday called the shipment an "illegitimate deed" and said it would file a complaint against Turkey in the International Court of Arbitration for abetting the sales. Mr. Maliki, whose party won the most seats in parliamentary elections last month, maintains that the Kurds must market the crude through Iraq’s oil-sales system, which would then pass a portion of the […]

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Iraq’s future looks more like Kurdistan

Editor’s note: Marina Ottaway is a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center. The views expressed are the writer’s own. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has emerged as the clear winner of the Iraqi parliamentary elections . His State of Law coalition has won at least 92 seats of the 328 seats in the Council of Representatives, three times as many as the next largest party. In the 2010 elections, in contrast, al-Maliki lost by two seats to Ayad Allawi’s Iraqiyya Party, a coalition of secular Shia and Sunni organizations that has now completely disintegrated. There is therefore no doubt that al-Maliki will be asked by the president (when parliament can agree on one) to form the new government. In 2010, he had to battle with Allawi for months to get that chance. But putting together a coalition with the needed 164 votes may prove even harder than in 2010, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple