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WASHINGTON Irans top diplomat Sunday accused President Trump of violating the international nuclear deal.

The United States has failed to implement its part of the bargain, Iran foreign minister Javad Zarif told CNNs Fareed Zakaria GPS.

He pointed to Trumps recent meetings in Germany with world leaders as evidence of the US violating the two-year-old deal.

President Trump used his presence in Hamburg during the G-20 meeting, in order to dissuade leaders from other countries to engage in business with Iran. That is violation of not the spirit but of the letter of the JCPOA, of the nuclear deal, Zarif said.

I believe the United States needs to bring itself into compliance with its party of the obligation under the deal.

Trump campaigned on ripping up the disastrous Iran nuclear deal that was negotiated by President Obamas administration. But Trumps team is expected to certify as soon as Monday that Iran is in compliance with the deal, according to the Washington Post. Its part of the routine certification required every 90 days.

Zarif said Iran has held up its part of the deal as verified by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The IAEA has verified, I believe, seven times now since the implementation date that Iran has implemented the deal faithfully, fully and completely, Zarif said. Unfortunately we cannot make the same statement about the United States.

Four GOP senators Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Tom Cotton (R-AR), David Perdue (R-GA), and Ted Cruz (R-TX) are urging the Trump Administration to not certify Irans compliance with the deal in order to bring back sanctions. Among the points of evidence they cite are German intelligence reports in 2015 and 2016 that Iran tried to procure nuclear and missile technology.

Zarif brushed aside the allegations and said Iran only engages in peaceful nuclear operations as permitted by the deal.

It is enrichment to engage in peaceful purposes, Zarif said.

He said naysayers of the deal are just trying to build up fear.

I think people basically want to engage in scare-mongering, he said.

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Iran's top diplomat accuses Trump of violating nuclear deal - New York Post

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

ISIS has captivated Western attention for so long with its gruesome beheadings, stabbings, vehicular homicides, shootings and bombings in Europe and the United States, the horrific aftermaths deservedly the focus of television news, that virtually forgotten is the worlds biggest terror threat Irans IRGC, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

The IRGC, often misidentified in Western press as the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps dwarfs ISIS by any measure.

ISIS never had more than about 30,000 fighters, equipped mostly with small arms, with very little access to high-tech weaponry.

In contrast, the IRGC has about 125,000 fighters. It is the only terror organization in the world with an army, navy, and special forces.

The IRGC Army has 100,000 troops in 20 infantry divisions. The IRGC Navy has 20,000 sailors, including 5,000 Marines. IRGC Special Forces, called the Quds (Jersusalem) Force numbers 5,000.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps also has reservists called the Basij Militia, paramilitary volunteers numbering 90,000 normally but potentially capable of mobilizing an estimated 300,000 to 1 million fighters.

The IRGC is not to be confused with Irans regular armed forces, called the Artesh. Irans regular army, like normal armies everywhere, is responsible for defending Irans territorial integrity and political independence.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps is the instrument by which Iran is the worlds leading sponsor of international terrorism including against its own people.

The IRGC was founded on May 5, 1979, in the immediate aftermath of Irans Islamic Revolution that overthrew the shah and brought to power the mullahs, the Islamic clerics who run Iran today. The mullahs purged the regular army, but still did not trust it.

So they formed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a military and ideological counterweight to the regular army and to the people, to ensure that there would be no counter-revolution to overthrow Irans Islamic state. The IRGCs purpose is to preserve Irans Islamic nature, to stop deviant movements among the people that the mullahs see as a threat to Islam, to serve as morality police enforcing the tenets of Islam upon national life.

The IRGCs purpose is also to advance the Islamic Revolution in the Middle East and the world.

The genesis of the IRGC and its purpose parallels that of Adolph Hitlers establishment of the Schutzstaffel (the SS) as a check on Germanys regular army, the Wehrmacht, to ensure the permanence of Nazi power, to enforce ideological purity among the people, and to serve as the elite tip of the spear in Nazi Germanys conquest of the world.

The IRGC has killed and wounded thousands of Americans, far more than ISIS, in Iraq and Afghanistan. The IRGC has killed more U.S. allies too through their terror operations. For example, Hezbollah and Hamas, the twin terror plagues of Israel, are subsidized by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

While ISIS has sometimes been described as the first terrorist state because of their occupation of lands in Syria and Iraq from which ISIS is now on the verge of being expelled many analysts believe the IRGC is the dominant power in Iran, even more powerful than the mullahs.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is deeply woven into the political and economic fabric of Iran. Former President Mamoud Ahmadinejad was an IRGC member, as are many of Irans parliamentarians and mayors.

The IRGC is a multi-billion dollar business empire, controlling much of Irans economy.

For example, Irans biggest construction company, Khatam al-Anbia, worth $7 billion, with 25,000 engineers and staff, belongs to the IRGC. The IRGC also controls the Telecommunications Company of Iran, worth $7.8 billion. Irans wealthiest charities, including the Mustazafan Foundation (Foundation of the Oppressed) and the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans, belong to the IRGC.

Most worrisome about the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is that it is in charge of Irans missile forces and nuclear, chemical, and biological weapon programs.

The U.S. Institute of Peace notes that, Iran has the largest and most diverse ballistic missile arsenal in the Middle East. And that most Iranian missiles were acquired from foreign sources notably North Korea.

Iran and North Korea are strategic partners, pledged by treaty to share science and technology. North Korean scientists are in Iran helping their space program, which is controlled by the IRGC.

According to the U.S. Institute of Peace: The Islamic Republic is the only country to develop a 2,000-km missile without first having a nuclear weapons capability.

A Congressional Research Service report Irans Foreign and Defense Policies (October 2016) and the Federation of American Scientists warn of evidence that Iran is pursuing chemical and biological weapons in violation of its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention and Biological Weapons Convention. German Federal intelligence warned in 2015 the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps sought German equipment for atomic, biological, and chemical weapons in a war.

When the smoke clears over Raqqa and ISIS is no more in Syria and Iraq, the IRGC will be there, and its proxies will be everywhere, casting a darker, more ominous shadow of terror over the world.

R. James Woolsey was director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Peter Vincent Pry is chief of staff of the congressional EMP Commission and served in the House Armed Services Committee and the CIA.

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Iran terrorizes own people with Revolutionary Guard - Washington Times

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran on Saturday blamed what it called Donald Trump's "arbitrary and conflicting policies" for global security threats, rejecting the U.S. president's description of Tehran as a rogue state.

Tensions between Iran and the United States have heightened since the election of Trump, who has often singled out Tehran as a key backer of militant groups.

"(Trump) ought to seek the reason for subversion and rebellion in his own arbitrary and conflicting policies and actions, as well as those of his arrogant, aggressive and occupying allies in the region," said foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi, quoted by Iran's state news agency IRNA.

President Trump said on Thursday that new threats were emerging from "rogue regimes like North Korea, Iran and Syria and the governments that finance and support them".

Senior Iranian officials have blamed U.S-allied Saudi Arabia, Iran's Sunni Muslim regional rival, for instability and attacks in the Middle East, including last month's assaults that killed 18 people in Tehran.

Saudi Arabia has denied involvement in the attacks which were claimed by Islamic state.

While Trump has kept up his criticism of Tehran, a senior U.S. official said on Thursday that the president was "very likely" to state that Iran is adhering to its nuclear agreement with world powers although he continues to have reservations about it.

Reporting by Dubai newsroom; Editing by Stephen Powell

See original here:
Iran blames Trump for instability, rejects 'rogue' label - Reuters

When ten American sailors found themselves captives of Irans Revolutionary Guards Corps in the Persian Gulf last year, then-Secretary John Kerry secured their freedom in less than sixteen hours. He used a remarkable instrument to score this stunning victory: A telephone.

Within hours of their capture, Kerry had his Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, on the line. They spoke five times that evening, but they already had a deal by the second call. The subsequent conversations served to handle logistical issues and resolve problems and misunderstandings that arose along the way.

For instance, at one point U.S. Navy ships and helicopters were approaching the Iranian island where the sailors were kept. Please tell your navy not to get close, Zarif told Kerry, his tone revealing the urgency of the matter. We dont want a military confrontation. But if your planes get close, we will have serious trouble. Kerry immediately hung up and called General Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to urge him to pull back. Were risking potential escalation here, Kerry told the general. They were giving us positive indications that they are gonna release these guys, so we should back off the helicopters for now and test if this is real. Dunford complied, and a dangerous confrontation was avoided. To prove that the sailors were safe, Zarif emailed a picture of them from his Gmail account to Kerrys State Department email.

It had taken two years of intense discussions and negotiations for Kerry and Zarif to build the rapport that enabled them to so quickly resolve unforeseen crises such as that of the U.S. sailors. But once the channel of communications and the rapport had been established, its utility and efficiency was unquestionable. Indeed, the sailors incident could have ended up as another prolonged hostage crisis. Instead, most Americans have not even heard of their mishap.

Today, there are many unforeseen crises that risk bringing the U.S. and Iranindeed, the entire Middle Eastinto direct confrontation. The U.S. and Iran have a shared interest in defeating ISIS in Iraq, but after the fall of Mosul, the balance of their interest may lead them in a more confrontational direction. A similar dynamic is playing out in Syria, where the U.S. already has shot down Iranian drones and bombed Iranian-sponsored groups. Moreover, tensions in the Persian Gulf are rising as Saudi Arabia appears to have received a green light from the Trump administration to double down on confrontation and bullying.

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had no illusions about the end goal of the Saudis. The Saudis always want to fight the Iranians to the last American, he told his French counterpart in 2010. Since then, the Saudi appetite for a U.S.-Iran war has only grown.

Despite these hotspots, the Trump administration and Secretary Rex Tillerson have allowed the hotline with Tehran to go cold. Despite the significant risk of war, not a single phone call has taken place between Tillerson and Zarif. Not a single attempt at resolving the tensions diplomatically has been made.

When asked about diplomacy with Iran during his visit to the Saudi kingdom, Tillerson said that he had no plans to reach out to Iran, although he didnt rule it out in the future.

That is simply not good enough. It is the foremost responsibility of the President and his administration to keep America safe and to only put American servicemen and women in harms way once all other options have been exhausted.

On both of these counts, the Trump administration doesnt just fail, they fail abysmally because they havent even tried. The United States is about to sleepwalk into yet another devastating war in the Middle East without a debate as to whether such an escalation lies in the U.S.s national interest, and without the Trump administration even giving lip service to diplomacy. Other potential foes in the world observe this behavior as they consider the payoff of peaceful engagement with the U.S. versus conflict. Do we want to send those actors the message that the U.S. shoots first and asks questions later?

The George W. Bush administration at least had the decency to lie to the American public when it sold the electorate the Iraq War. And however skewed and faulty, the Iraq War was preceded by a debate and a vote in Congress. Though President Bush eschewed diplomacy, he nevertheless presented a deeply flawed case as to why diplomacy no longer was an option. Trump and Tillerson simply dont even bother.

The Trump administrations recklessness is endangering America and putting American servicemen and women at risk. If Tillerson was supposed to be the adult in the room steering Trump in the right direction, he needs to start to act the part.

Before the escalation with Iran reaches a point of no return, diplomacy must be given a chance. That responsibility falls on Mr. Tillerson. The former Exxonmobil CEO has Zarifs number. Its time he places a call.

Trita Parsi is the author of Losing an Enemy Obama, Iran and the Triumph of Diplomacy. He is the president of the National Iranian American Council.

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Secretary Tillerson, It's Time to Phone Iran - The American Conservative

THE United States fears what one country will do even more than North Korea, an adviser to President Donald Trump has warned.

Rudy Giuliani, the ex-Mayor of New York, warned Iran is the countrys biggest fear right now.

Speaking after a conference in Paris earlier this month, he said the nation poses a greater threat than both Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin.

Mr Giuliani was attending a rally in Paris organised by the Peoples Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI), which is the largest and most active opposition movement to the regime.

The Paris-based group supports a totally secular political system in the hardline Islamic country.

GETTY

Since 2008, photographer Eric Lafforgue ventured to North Korea six times. Thanks to digital memory cards, he was able to save photos that was forbidden to take inside the segregated state

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Taking pictures in the DMZ is easy, but if you come too close to the soldiers, they stop you

Mr Giuliani said: Iran is our biggest enemy, Iran is our fiercest enemy. It is the greatest danger to freedom in the world.

Our long term danger is Iran.

Iran [is] a bigger threat than North Korea, it is expanding into an empire. North Korea is contained.

They have more technological capability and they have what is truly an insane regime.

In North Korea, were not sure about Kim Jong-un and we do have the hope that China can contain him.

As tension between the US and Iran mounts, with President Donald Trump rattling his sabres ever louder, Iranians take to the street to protest.

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Iranian people burn an effigy of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Iran is our biggest enemy, Iran is our fiercest enemy. It is the greatest danger to freedom in the world

Tensions between the US and North Korea are at an all time high.

The secretive state has repeatedly threatened to blast the US with nuclear weapons, with supreme leader Kim even saying it would be a "piece of cake" to drop a nuke on the country.

But Mr Giuliani,who was Mayor of New York at the time of the September 11 terror attacks, warned the Iranian regimes downfall cant be brought about via military action.

He said it would happen through a civilian revolution within the Middle Eastern superpower, which the United States can only help bring about through economic sanctions.

The [regime change] needs to happen from within. How did the regime change in the Soviet Union or Poland or in the Czech Republic? No army came in.

"The people finally rose up and they were just too much for the military to contain, he explained.

Kim Jong-un used the annual "Day of the Sun" parade in Pyongyang to make a chilling display of the country's burgeoning nuclear power and military might

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Military vehicles carrying missiles believed to be North Korean KN-08 Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles

His comments come as the PMOI again accused the international community of ignoring the global threat posed by Iran.

Last year, Europe and the United States, under President Barack Obama, lifted sanctions including oil and financial penalties placed on the country over its expanding nuclear programme.

They also unfroze approximately $100billion of its assets after inspectors said crucial parts of its nuclear capabilities had been dismantled something the PMOI claims is a lie.

Urging the reintroduction of sanctions, Mr Giuliani said the US has the power to tighten the noose around the regime.

He said that because three-quarters of substantial global trade is done via American banks, Iran could be squeezed financially to such an extent it would spark major unrest in the country.

Read more here:
'This country is WORSE than North Korea' Rudy Giuliani says US fears new 'biggest enemy' - Daily Star