Tag Archives: Iran

Iran tells Saudi vessels to avoid its waters

Members of Royal Saudi Navy takes part in ÒGulf Shield 1Ó exercise, east of Saudi Arabia, in this handout photo received October 4, 2016. Saudi Press Agency/

DUBAI (Reuters) – Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) warned Saudi naval vessels taking part in military exercises in the Gulf on Wednesday not to get close to Iranian waters, in a sign of heightened tensions between the two regional rivals.

Saudi Arabia began naval war games including live fire exercises on Tuesday in the Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important oil route.

Tehran and Riyadh are fighting several proxy wars in the Middle East, including in Syria and Yemen, but both have been cautious about direct military confrontation.

“The Revolutionary Guards naval forces believe this war game is mainly to create tension and destabilize the Persian Gulf,” the IRGC said in a statement published on Tasnim news agency.

About 17 million barrels per day, or about 30 percent of all seaborne-traded oil, passed through the Strait of Hormuz in 2013, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

The United States, the kingdom’s leading non-Arab ally, said in August and September that IRGC vessels “harassed” U.S. warships several times in the Gulf in incidents that Washington described as “unsafe and unprofessional.”

(Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin, Editing by William Maclean and Andrew Heavens)

Saudi Prince warns Iran against using force to pursue rivalry

Mecca Governor Prince al-Faisal speaks during news conference on conclusion of main rites of the haj pilgrimage in Mina

DUBAI (Reuters) – A senior Saudi official, responding to Iranian criticism of Riyadh’s management of the haj pilgrimage, urged Iran to end what he called wrong attitudes toward Arabs and warned it against any use of force in its rivalry with the kingdom.

Mecca province governor Prince Khaled al-Faisal, in remarks likely to be seen as a reference to Iran, added that the orderly conduct of the pilgrimage this year “is a response to all the lies and slanders made against the kingdom”.

The remarks carried by the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) on Wednesday evening follow an escalating war of words between Shi’ite Muslim Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia since a crush at the annual haj pilgrimage a year ago in which hundreds of pilgrims, many of them Iranians, died.

SPA quoted Prince Khaled as telling journalists his message to the Iranian leadership was “I pray to God Almighty to guide them and to deter them from their transgression and their wrong attitudes toward their fellow Muslim among the Arabs in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and around the world”.

“But if they are preparing an army to invade us, we are not easily taken by someone who would make war on us.”

“When we desire, and with the help of God Almighty, we will deter every aggressor and will never relent in protecting this holy land and our dear country. No one can defile any part from our country if any one of us remains on the face of the earth.”

No top Iranian leader has called for war with Saudi Arabia, something neither country wants.

But last year’s haj disaster, and the execution in January of dissident Saudi Shi’ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr, triggered months of scathing Iranian criticism of the kingdom.

Riyadh broke off relations with Tehran after its embassy there was attacked by Iranians protesting against Nimr’s death. Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards promised “harsh revenge” for Nimr’s death.

Iran blamed the 2015 haj disaster on Saudi incompetence, and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sept. 5 said some of the Iranians who died had been “murdered” by Saudi Arabia. He said Muslims should not let Saudi rulers escape responsibility for “crimes” he said they had committed in Arab conflicts.

(Reporting by Mostafa Hashem, Noah Browning; Editing by William Maclean, Robert Birsel)

Iran deploys Russian-made S-300 missiles at its Fordow nuclear site

File photo of the S-300 air defence system launching a missile during the International Army Games 2016 at the Ashuluk military polygon outside Astrakhan

ANKARA (Reuters) – Iran has deployed the Russian-supplied S-300 surface-to-air missile defence system around its Fordow underground uranium enrichment facility, Iranian state media reported on Monday.

Iranian state TV on Sunday aired footage of deployment of the recently delivered missile system to the nuclear site in the central Iran.

“Our main priority is to protect Iran’s nuclear facilities under any circumstances,” Brigadier General Farzad Esmaili, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ (IRGC) air defense force told state TV.

Iran and the six major powers reached a landmark nuclear deal in 2015 aimed at curbing Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for lifting nuclear-related sanctions imposed on Tehran over its disputed nuclear work.

Enrichment of uranium at the Fordow facility, around 100 km (60 miles) south of Tehran, has stopped since the implementation of the nuclear deal in January.

Russia, under pressure from the West, in 2010 canceled a contract to deliver S-300s to Iran. But Russian President Vladimir Putin lifted that self-imposed ban in April 2015, after an interim deal was reached between Iran and the six powers.

In August, Iran said that Russia had delivered main parts of the system to the country, adding that the missile system would be completely delivered by the end of 2016.

The IRGC’s Esmaili did not say whether the system was operational, but added: “Today, Iran’s sky is one of the most secure in the Middle East”.

Iran’s top authority Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Sunday that the country’s military power was for defensive purposes.

“The S-300 system is a defence system not an assault one, but the Americans did their utmost to prevent Iran from getting it,” Khamenei said in a speech broadcast live on state TV.

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Toby Chopra)

U.S. Drone enters Iran’s airspace, leaves after warning

A model of a military drone is seen in front of an U.S. flag as protesters rally against climate change, ahead of the Democratic National Convention, in Philadelphia

ANKARA (Reuters) – Iran’s military detected a U.S. drone entering Iranian airspace on Monday and issued a warning for it to leave, which it subsequently did, Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported.

“Iran’s army air defense detected and warned an American drone in the eastern airspace of the country. It was coming from Afghanistan. The drone left the area,” Tasnim quoted the Iranian military as saying.

Tasnim gave no details on how the Iranian authorities had warned the unmanned drone to leave its airspace.

A U.S. defense official said last week that four of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) vessels ‘harassed’ a U.S. warship on Tuesday near the Strait of Hormuz.

Tehran said the ships had only been carrying out their regular duties monitoring foreign ships near Iranian waters.

(Reporting by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by William Maclean and Toby Chopra)

Iran vessels make ‘high speed intercept’ of U.S. ship

Footage taken aboard the USS Nitze of Islamic Revolutionary Guard vessels

By Idrees Ali

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Four of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) vessels “harassed” a U.S. warship on Tuesday near the Strait of Hormuz, a U.S. defense official said, amid Washington’s concerns about Iran’s posture in the Gulf and in the Syrian civil war.

The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said on Wednesday that two of the Iranian vessels came within 300 yards of the USS Nitze in an incident that was “unsafe and unprofessional.”

The vessels harassed the destroyer by “conducting a high speed intercept and closing within a short distance of Nitze, despite repeated warnings,” the official said.

IRGC, the Islamic Republic’s praetorian guard, is suspicious of U.S. military activity near Iran’s borders and appears to be sticking to a familiar posture in the Gulf that predates last year’s nuclear accord between Iran and six world powers, including the United States.

The United States and other countries are concerned about Iran’s support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, its ballistic missile program, and its backing for Shiite militias that have abused civilians in Iraq.

The U.S. defense official said that in Tuesday’s incident the USS Nitze tried to communicate with the Iranian vessels 12 times, but received no response. It also fired 10 flares in the direction of two of the Iranian vessels.

“The Iranian high rate of closure… created a dangerous, harassing situation that could have led to further escalation, including additional defensive measures by Nitze,” the official said.

USS Nitze had to change course in order to distance itself from the Iranian vessels, the official said, adding that the incident could have led to a diplomatic protest, but the United States does not have diplomatic relations with Iran.

It remains to be seen whether these actions were carried out by rogue Revolutionary Guard commanders or sanctioned by senior officials in Tehran, said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“For four decades the Revolutionary Guard have been told that America is the greatest threat to the Islamic Revolution,” said Sadjadpour. “This institutional culture hasn’t changed after the nuclear deal,” he added.

In January, 10 U.S. sailors aboard two patrol craft were detained by the IRGC when they inadvertently entered Iranian territorial waters. They were released the next day after being held for about 15 hours.

The Gulf separates Iran from its regional rival Saudi Arabia and a U.S. naval base in Bahrain.

(Reporting by Idrees Ali. Additional reporting by Warren Strobel; Editing by Grant McCool and Andrew Hay)

 

 

 

 

Iran says Russian use of air base for Syria strikes over ‘for now’

Still image shows shows airstrikes carried out by Russian air force in Syria

By Bozorgmehr Sharafedin

DUBAI (Reuters) – Russia has stopped using an Iranian air base for strikes in Syria, Iran’s foreign ministry announced on Monday, bringing an abrupt halt to an unprecedented deployment that was criticized both by the White House and some Iranian lawmakers.

Last week long-range Russian Tupolev-22M3 bombers and Sukhoi-34 fighter bombers used Nojeh air base, near the city of Hamadan, in north-west Iran to launch air strikes against armed groups in Syria.

It was the first time a foreign power used an Iranian base since World War Two. Russia and Iran are both providing crucial military support to President Bashar al-Assad against rebels and jihadi fighters in Syria’s five-year-old conflict.

Some Iranian lawmakers called the move a breach of Iran’s constitution which forbids “the establishment of any kind of foreign military base in Iran, even for peaceful purposes”.

Iranian Defence Minister Hossein Dehghan dismissed that criticism but also chided Moscow for publicizing the move, describing it as showing off and a “betrayal of trust.”

“We have not given any military base to the Russians and they are not here to stay,” Dehghan was quoted as saying by the Fars news agency late on Sunday.

He said there was “no written agreement” between the two countries and the “operational cooperation” was temporary and limited to refueling.

The U.S. state department last week called the move “unfortunate but not surprising,” and said it was looking into whether it violated UN Security Council resolution 2231, which prohibits supply, sale and transfer of combat aircraft to Iran.

ABRUPT END

On Monday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Russia’s use of the base has ended.

“Russia has no base in Iran and is not stationed here. They did this (operation) and it is finished for now,” Bahram Qasemi was quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency.

Iran’s defense minister had said last week that Russia will be permitted to use the Nojeh base “for as long as they need”.

Relations between the two countries, long cordial, appeared to reach a new level last September when Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a military intervention in Syria in support of Assad.

After some delay, Russia supplied Iran with its S-300 missile air defense system, evidence of a growing partnership that is testing U.S. influence in the Middle East.

Dehghan said that to make up for the delay, Russia had suggested providing Iran with its advanced S-400, but that Tehran was not interested as it is working to advance its own home-made defense system.

Iran unveiled its new missile defense system, Bavar 373, on Monday, a system designed to intercept cruise missiles, drones, combat aircraft and ballistic missiles.

Iran’s defense minister also said Tehran has shown interest in buying Russian Sukhoi Su-30 fighter jets and Moscow’s reply “has not been negative so far.”

The United States has said it would use its veto power in the United Nations’ Security Council to block the possible sales of the fighter jets to Iran.

(Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin; Editing by Dominic Evans)

U.S. says payment to Iran used as leverage for prisoners’ release

Jason Rezaian, Washington Post reporter and one of the U.S. citizens recently released from detention in Iran, poses to media outside the Emergency Room of the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center (LRMC) in the southwestern town of Landstuhl, Germany

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. State Department said on Thursday it released $400 million in cash to Iran under a tribunal settlement only once it was assured that American prisoners had been freed and had boarded a plane.

“The payment of the $400 million was not done until after the prisoners were released,” State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters.

“We took advantage of that to make sure we had the maximum leverage possible to get our people out and get them out safely,” Kirby added.

It was the first time the administration has said publicly that it used the payment as leverage to ensure the prisoners were released by Iran.

Three of the five prisoners, including Jason Rezaian, the Washington Posts’s Tehran bureau chief; Saeed Abedini, a pastor from Idaho and Amir Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine from Flint, Michigan, as well as some family members, were part of a prisoner exchange that followed the lifting of most international sanctions against Iran following a nuclear deal in 2015.

One more prisoner, Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, chose to remain in Iran, while a fifth prisoner, American student Matthew Trevithick, was released separately.

Both U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have denied that the payment was ransom for the release of the prisoners or tied to the Iran nuclear deal.

The White House announced on Jan. 17 it was releasing $400 million in funds frozen since 1981, plus $1.3 billion in interest owed to Iran, as part of a settlement of a long-standing Iranian claim at the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal in The Hague.

The funds were part of a trust fund Iran used before its 1979 Islamic Revolution to buy U.S. military equipment that was tied up for decades in litigation at the tribunal.

The payment was made by the United States in cash due to international sanctions against Iran.

The administration has maintained that negotiations over the funds and the prisoners were conducted on separate tracks and were in no way linked.

Representative Jason Chaffetz, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has asked Kerry to appear at a future committee hearing to discuss the payment.

(Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Russia, spurning U.S. censure, launches second day of Syria strikes from Iran

Russian plane

By Alexander Winning and Andrew Osborn

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia launched a second day of air strikes against Syrian militants from an Iranian air base, rejecting U.S. suggestions its co-operation with Tehran might violate a U.N. resolution as illogical and factually incorrect.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner on Tuesday called the Iranian deployment “unfortunate,” saying the United States was looking into whether the move violated U.N. Security Council resolution 2231, which prohibits the supply, sale and transfer of combat aircraft to Iran.

Russia bristled at those comments on Wednesday after announcing that Russian SU-34 fighter bombers flying from Iran’s Hamadan air base had for a second day struck Islamic State targets in Syria’s Deir al-Zor province, destroying two command posts and killing more than 150 militants.

“It’s not our practice to give advice to the leadership of the U.S. State Department,” Major-General Igor Konashenkov said in a statement.

“But it’s hard to refrain from recommending individual State Department representatives check their own logic and knowledge of basic documents covering international law.”

Moscow first used Iran as a base from which to launch air strikes in Syria on Tuesday, deepening its involvement in the five-year-old Syrian civil war and angering the United States.

Russia’s use of the Iranian air base comes amid intense fighting for the Syrian city of Aleppo, where rebels are battling Syrian government forces backed by the Russian military, and as Moscow and Washington are working toward a deal on Syria that could see them cooperate more closely.

Russia backs Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while the United States believes the Syrian leader must step down and is supporting rebel groups that are fighting to unseat him.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday any U.S. dismay over Moscow’s military co-operation with Iran should not distract from efforts to realize the U.S.-Russia deal on coordinating action in Syria and securing a ceasefire.

Lavrov said there were no grounds to suggest Russia’s actions had violated the U.N. resolution, saying Moscow was not supplying Iran with military aircraft for its own internal use, something the document prohibits.

“These aircraft are being used by Russia’s air force with Iran’s agreement as a part of an anti-terrorist operation at the request of Syria’s leadership,” Lavrov told a Moscow news conference, after holding talks with Murray McCully, New Zealand’s foreign minister.

A graphic illustrating which targets Russia has so far struck from Iran can be seen here: http://tmsnrt.rs/2b458P3

(Additional reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Russia uses Iran as base to bomb Syrian militants for first time

A still image, taken from video footage and released by Russia's Defence Ministry on August 16, 2016, shows a Russian Tupolev Tu-22M3 long-range bomber based in Iran dropping off bombs at an unknown location in Syria. Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation/

By Andrew Osborn

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia used Iran as a base from which to launch air strikes against Syrian militants for the first time on Tuesday, widening its air campaign in Syria and deepening its involvement in the Middle East.

In a move underscoring Moscow’s increasingly close ties with Tehran, long-range Russian Tupolev-22M3 bombers and Sukhoi-34 fighter bombers used Iran’s Hamadan air base to strike a range of targets in Syria.

It was the first time Russia has used the territory of another nation, apart from Syria itself, to launch such strikes since the Kremlin launched a bombing campaign to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in September last year.

It was also thought to be the first time that Iran has allowed a foreign power to use its territory for military operations since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

The Iranian deployment will boost Russia’s image as a central player in the Middle East and allow the Russian air force to cut flight times and increase bombing payloads.

The head of Iran’s National Security Council was quoted by state news agency IRNA as saying Tehran and Moscow were now sharing facilities to fight against terrorism, calling their cooperation strategic.

Both countries back Assad, and Russia, after a delay, has supplied Iran with its S-300 missile air defense system, evidence of a growing partnership between the pair that has helped turn the tide in Syria’s civil war and is testing U.S. influence in the Middle East.

Relations between Tehran and Moscow have grown warmer since Iran reached agreement last year with global powers to curb its nuclear program in return for the lifting of U.N., EU and U.S. financial sanctions.

President Vladimir Putin visited in November and the two countries regularly discuss military planning for Syria, where Iran has provided ground forces that work with local allies while Russia provides air power.

TARGET: ALEPPO

The Russian Defence Ministry said its bombers had taken off on Tuesday from the Hamadan air base in north-west Iran. To reach Syria, they would have had to use the air space of another neighboring country, probably Iraq.

The ministry said Tuesday’s strikes had targeted Islamic State as well as militants previously known as the Nusra Front in the Aleppo, Idlib and Deir al Zour provinces. It said its Iranian-based bombers had been escorted by fighter jets based at Russia’s Hmeymim air base in Syria’s Latakia Province.

“As a result of the strikes five large arms depots were destroyed … a militant training camp … three command and control points … and a significant number of militants,” the ministry said in a statement.

The destroyed facilities had all been used to support militants in the Aleppo area, it said, where battle for control of the divided city, which had some 2 million people before the war, has intensified in recent weeks.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based war monitor, said heavy air strikes on Tuesday had hit many targets in and around Aleppo and elsewhere in Syria, killing dozens.

Strikes in the Tariq al-Bab and al-Sakhour districts of northeast Aleppo had killed around 20 people, while air raids in a corridor rebels opened this month into opposition-held eastern parts of the city had killed another nine, the observatory said.

The Russian Defence Ministry says it takes great care to avoid civilian casualties in its air strikes.

Zakaria Malahifi, political officer of an Aleppo-based rebel group, Fastaqim, said he could not confirm if the newly deployed Russian bombers were in use, but said air strikes on Aleppo had intensified in recent days.

“It is much heavier,” he told Reuters. “There is no weapon they have not dropped on Aleppo – cluster bombs, phosphorus bombs, and so on.”

Aleppo, Syria’s largest city before the war, is divided into rebel and government-held zones. The government aims to capture full control of it, which would be its biggest victory of the five year conflict.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians are believed to be trapped in rebel areas, facing potential siege if the government closes off the corridor linking it with the outside.

Russian media reported on Tuesday that Russia had also requested and received permission to use Iran and Iraq as a route to fire cruise missiles from its Caspian Sea fleet into Syria, as it has done in the past.

Russia has built up its naval presence in the eastern Mediterranean and the Caspian as part of what it says are planned military exercises.

Russia’s state-backed Rossiya 24 channel earlier on Tuesday broadcast uncaptioned images of at least three Russian Tupolev-22M3 bombers and a Russian military transport plane inside Iran.

The channel said the Iranian deployment would allow the Russian air force to cut flight times by 60 percent. The Tupolev-22M3 bombers, which before Tuesday had conducted strikes on Syria from their home bases in southern Russia, were too large to be accommodated at Russia’s own air base inside Syria, Russian media reported.

(Additional reporting by Polina Devitt, Bozorgmehr Sharafedin, Angus McDowall and Thomas Perry; Editing by Peter Graff)

New hacking group detected targeting firms in Russia, China

A padlock is displayed at the Alert Logic booth during the 2016 Black Hat cyber-

By Eric Auchard

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – A previously unknown hacking group variously dubbed “Strider” or “ProjectSauron” has carried out cyber-espionage attacks against select targets in Russia, China, Iran, Sweden, Belgium and Rwanda, security researchers said on Monday.

The group, which has been active since at least 2011 and could have links to a national intelligence agency, uses Remsec, an advanced piece of hidden malware, Symantec researchers said in a blog post (http://symc.ly/2aTHoOm).

Remsec spyware lives within an organization’s network rather than being installed on individual computers, giving attackers complete control over infected machines, researchers said. It enables keystroke logging and the theft of files and other data.

Its code also contains references to Sauron, the all-seeing title character in The Lord of the Rings, Symantec said. Strider is the nickname of the fantasy trilogy’s widely traveled main character Aragorn.

Separately, Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab has labeled the same group using the Remsec spyware as “ProjectSauron”.

The newly discovered group’s targets include four organizations and individuals located in Russia, an airline in China, an organization in Sweden and an embassy in Belgium, Symantec said.

Kasperksy said it had found 30 organizations hit so far in Russia, Iran and Rwanda, and possibly additional victims in Italian-speaking countries. Remsec targets included government agencies, scientific research centers, military entities, telecoms providers and financial institutions, Kasperksy said.

“Based on the espionage capabilities of its malware and the nature of its known targets, it is possible that the group is a nation state-level attacker,” Symantec said, but it did not speculate about which government might be behind the software.

Despite headlines that suggest an endless stream of new types of cyber-spying attacks, Orla Fox, Symantec’s director of security response said the discovery of a new class of spyware like Remsec is a relatively rare event, with the industry uncovering no more than one or two such campaigns per year.

Remsec shares certain unusual coding similarities with another older piece of nation state-grade malware known as Flamer, or Flame, according to Symantec.

Kaspersky agreed that the same group it calls ProjectSauron appears to have adopted the tools and techniques of other better-known spyware, including Flame, but said it does not believe that ProjectSauron and Flame are directly connected.

Flamer malware has been linked to Stuxnet, a military-grade computer virus alleged by security experts to have been used by the United States and Israel to attack Iran’s nuclear program late in the last decade (http://reut.rs/2b2FA8z).

(Editing by Greg Mahlich)