DUBAI: Iran’s nuclear chief on Wednesday dismissed a suggestion that the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rafael Grossi would visit Iran next month but instead invited Grossi to a conference in Tehran in May.
Grossi said this week Iran was continuing to enrich uranium well beyond the needs for commercial nuclear use and said he planned to visit Tehran next month to tackle “drifting apart” relations between the IAEA and the Islamic Republic.
But Mohammad Eslami said a visit next month was unlikely due to a “busy schedule” without giving further clarification. “Iran’s interactions with the IAEA continue as normal and discussions are held to resolve ambiguities and develop cooperation,” he said at a weekly press conference in Tehran.
Eslami said Grossi had been invited to attend Iran’s first international nuclear energy conference in May.
Speaking to Reuters on Monday, Grossi said while the pace of uranium enrichment had slowed slightly since the end of last year, Iran was still enriching at an elevated rate of around 7kg of uranium per month to 60 percent purity.
Enrichment to 60 percent brings uranium close to weapons grade, and is not necessary for commercial use in nuclear power production. Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons but no other state has enriched to that level without producing them.
Under a defunct 2015 agreement with world powers, Iran can enrich uranium only to 3.67 percent. After then-President Donald Trump pulled the US out of that deal in 2018 and re-imposed sanctions, Iran breached and moved well beyond the deal’s nuclear restrictions.
The UN nuclear watchdog said the 2015 nuclear deal “is all but disintegrated.”
Iran dismisses plan by UN nuclear watchdog head to visit next month
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Iran dismisses plan by UN nuclear watchdog head to visit next month
- IAEA’s Rafael Grossi: Iran continuing to enrich uranium well beyond the needs for commercial nuclear use
- Under a defunct 2015 agreement with world powers, Iran can enrich uranium only to 3.67 percent
Houthis say 2 killed in US strikes Sanaa
- The Houthis, who control large parts of Yemen, also reported strikes in other parts of the country, including their stronghold of Saada in the north
SANAA: Houthi media said on Sunday that strikes on Yemen’s capital Sanaa attributed to the US had killed two people and wounded several others.
“Two people were killed and another injured after the Americans targeted a house” in a neighborhood in south Sanaa, the Houthis’ official Saba news agency said.
“Nine others were injured, including two women and three children, in the attack on a residential area in the west of Al-Rawda,” another district of the Yemeni capital, according to the same source.
On Saturday evening, the AFP correspondent in Sanaa reported hearing explosions.
The Houthis, who control large parts of Yemen, also reported strikes in other parts of the country, including their stronghold of Saada in the north.
They said the fuel port of Ras Issa in the western Hodeida region — where they reported 80 people killed in strikes just over a week ago — had also been hit.
The Houthis portray themselves as defenders of Gaza during the Israel-Hamas war.
They have regularly launched missiles and drones at Israel and cargo vessels plying the key Red Sea trade route.
The US military has, since January 2024, been attacking their positions, saying it is trying to stop their attacks.
Those attacks have intensified recently, with strikes carried out almost daily for the past month.
On Sunday, the Houthis claimed to have launched, for the second time in two days, a missile toward Israel.
The Israeli army reported intercepting a missile from Yemen before it crossed into the country’s territory.
On Saturday, CENTCOM, the US military command in the region, posted footage from the US aircraft carriers Harry S. Truman and Carl Vinson conducting strikes against the Houthis.
Sultan of Oman, UK foreign secretary discuss Gaza, US-Iran negotiations
- They met at Al-Barakah Palace in Muscat on Sunday
- David Lammy reaffirmed British government’s commitment to strengthening bilateral cooperation
LONDON: Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq discussed regional and international issues with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy at Al-Barakah Palace in Muscat on Sunday.
The sultan praised cooperation between the two countries, and Lammy reaffirmed the British government’s commitment to strengthening cooperation, the Oman News Agency reported.
They discussed Gaza ceasefire efforts, and US-Iranian negotiations mediated by Oman to reach an agreement regarding Tehran’s nuclear program, ONA reported.
Also in attendance were Omani Foreign Minister Sayyid Badr Hamad Al-Busaidi; Sir Oliver Robbins, permanent undersecretary at the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office; and British Ambassador Liane Saunders.
Iraq’s judiciary acquits powerful former speaker of forgery
- Halbussi’s media office said on Sunday that “the Iraqi judiciary acquitted” the former head of parliament “of the charges previously brought against him”
BAGHDAD: Iraq’s judiciary has acquitted the influential former parliament speaker, Mohammed Al-Halbussi, after dismissing him in 2023 over accusations of forging a document, his office announced Sunday.
Halbussi had been the highest-ranking Sunni official since he first became speaker of parliament in 2018 with the support of Iraq’s powerful pro-Iran parties, and then in 2022 following early elections.
But in November 2023, Iraq’s Federal Supreme Court dismissed Halbussi after a lawmaker accused him of forging a resignation letter and said the former speaker had changed the date on an older document to force him out of parliament.
Halbussi’s media office said on Sunday that “the Iraqi judiciary acquitted” the former head of parliament “of the charges previously brought against him.”
It added that the courts “dismissed the complaints” and closed the investigation.
Halbussi, who heads the Taqadom party, is known for his rapid ascent in Iraqi politics and as a key interlocutor for many Western and Arab dignitaries.
Iraq’s 329-member parliament is dominated by a coalition of pro-Iran Shiite parties.
Under a power-sharing system adopted in Iraq in the aftermath of the 2003 US-led invasion, political positions are divided between Iraq’s ethnic and confessional communities.
In the top positions, the role of prime minister, currently held by Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani, always goes to a Shiite Muslim, that of speaker of parliament to a Sunni Muslim and the presidency to a Kurd.
Israel PM calls security chief ‘liar’, in court filing
- Bar’s dismissal, announced by the government last month but frozen by the country’s top court, triggered mass protests.
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in an affidavit before the Supreme Court on Sunday, described as a “liar” the country’s internal security chief, whom the government is trying to fire.
Netanyahu’s response came almost a week after Shin Bet head Ronen Bar himself made a sworn statement to the court. It accused the prime minister of demanding personal loyalty and ordering him to spy on anti-government protesters.
Bar’s dismissal, announced by the government last month but frozen by the country’s top court, triggered mass protests.
The unprecedented move to fire the head of the Shin Bet security agency has been contested by the attorney general and the opposition, which appealed Bar’s firing to the Supreme Court.
“The accusation according to which I allegedly demanded action against innocent civilians, or against a non-violent and legitimate protest during the protests of 2023, is an absolute lie,” Netanyahu said in his court statement.
In his own affidavit, Bar had said “it was clear” that in the event of a potential constitutional crisis, Netanyahu would expect Bar to obey the prime minister and not the courts.
Netanyahu countered: “There is no proof supporting these remarks.”
Bar had also denied accusations by Netanyahu and his associates that the Shin Bet had failed to warn in time about Hamas’s unprecedented October 7, 2023, attack on Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
“Nothing was hidden” on that night from the security apparatus or the prime minister, Bar said.
Netanyahu countered before the court that Bar “did not accomplish his mission” that night.
“He did not wake up the prime minister. He did not wake up the minister of defense. He did not wake up the soldiers of the army,” or others before the attack, Netanyahu alleged.
The prime minister’s 23-page document said Bar “failed in his role as chief of Shin Bet and lost the confidence of the entire Israeli government as far as his ability to continue to manage the organization.”
Netanyahu’s office had already made similar public comments immediately after Bar filed his affidavit.
An April 8 Supreme Court hearing on the government’s plans to fire Bar ruled that he “will continue to perform his duties until a later decision.”
Syria rejects Kurds’ call for decentralization
- The new authorities in Syria, who replaced the overthrown Bashar Assad in December, have repeatedly rejected the idea of Kurdish autonomy
- Most of Syria’s oil and gas fields are in areas administered by the Kurdish authorities
DAMASCUS: The Syrian presidency rejected on Sunday a Kurdish call for a decentralized state, warning against attempts at separatism or federalism by the minority group.
“We reject clearly any attempt to impose a separatist reality or to create separate entities under the cover of federalism... without a national consensus,” the presidency said in a statement in which it also condemned “the recent activities and declarations” of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) that “call for federalism.”
“The unity of Syria, of its territories and its people is a red line,” the statement said.
The declaration came a day after a conference of Syrian Kurdish parties adopted a joint vision of a “decentralized democratic state.”
The new authorities in Syria, who replaced the overthrown Bashar Assad in December, have repeatedly rejected the idea of Kurdish autonomy.
The US-backed Kurds control large areas of northeastern Syria, much of which they took over in the process of defeating jihadists of the Daesh group between 2015 and 2019.
They have enjoyed de facto autonomy since early in the civil war which broke out in 2011, but the new authorities have insisted on a unitary state.
In March, Syria’s interim president, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, and the SDF chief Mazloum Abdi, signed an agreement to integrate Kurdish institutions into the Syrian state.
Abdi told the conference on Saturday that “my message to all Syrian constituents and the Damascus government is that the conference does not aim, as some say, at division.”
Instead it aimed “for the unity of Syria,” he insisted.
“We support all Syrian components receiving their rights in the constitution to be able to build a decentralized democratic Syria that embraces everyone,” Abdi said.
Most of Syria’s oil and gas fields are in areas administered by the Kurdish authorities. These may prove a crucial resource for Syria’s new authorities as they seek to rebuild the war-devastated country.
