Iran Dismantles U.S. backed opposition networks.

This just gives the Iranian government more evidence for its claim that the opposition in Iran is all due to US funding and control. Of course some of it is but much of it is not. It is not surprising that many in the opposition plead with the US to keep its distance and even play down any support for them. Support just hurts them! The Iranian contention that the US is funding the opposition is not just propaganda. The US is probably support two terrorists groups as well the MEK and the Balochistan based Jundallah. The 400 million dollar figure was widely reported by Western Sources. It is not Iranian propaganda. Note this.

The White House declined to comment Monday on a news report that US lawmakers last year approved 400 million dollars to ramp up covert operations in Iran to undermine Tehran's leadership.

"I couldn't comment either way," spokeswoman Dana Perino said after The New Yorker magazine reported that the US Congress passed US President George W. Bush's funding request for a dramatic increase in such secret operations.

Iran Dismantles U.S.-Backed Opposition Groups
by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


Iran said Saturday it has broken up several U.S.-backed opposition networks that were gathering information on nuclear scientists and finding ways to circumvent controls on the Internet meant to deprive the opposition of its most crucial tool.

A judiciary statement carried on the official IRNA news agency said the networks were set up by Iranian opposition groups, including the People's Mujahedeen, and that 30 of their members were arrested.

"A number of organized American cyber war networks were dismantled and 30 influential suspects were arrested ... in a series of complicated security operations in the information technology and communications field," IRNA quoted the statement as saying.

The government has repeatedly accused the U.S. and Britain of provoking the unrest that followed June's disputed presidential election — charges both Washington and London have denied. The statement comes as Washington is pushing for tougher sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program, which the U.S. and other nations fear is aimed at producing weapons. Iran denies such an intention and says its nuclear work is only for peaceful purposes like power generation.

The Iranian statement did not say when the suspects were arrested but it accused the U.S. of using such networks to undermine Iran's ruling system under a policy that it asserted originated in 2006 during George W. Bush's presidency.

"The new intelligence battle known as cyber warfare was made part of the U.S. government's agenda," IRNA quoted the statement as saying. The statement claimed the U.S. Congress approved a $400 million budget for the covert operation that also involved groups seeking to restore Iran's monarchy.

Iran "open" to U.S. interests section

This is from aljazeera.
The Iran US situation is certainly mixed up. This comes along with sabre rattling by both sides (and Israel). This is a much more positive step than the provocations that have dominated the news lately. Maybe oil will go down even more now!


Iran 'open' to US interests section
Burns is set to meet Iranian officials to focus on Tehran's nuclear programme [AFP]
Iran is prepared to have dialogue with the United States on establishing a US interests section in Iran, the country's foreign minister has said.
Manouchehr Mottaki also said on Friday that a direct air link between Iran and the United States could be discussed between the two countries.
"In my opinion, talks and a deal on an American bureau in Iran and direct flights between Iran and the United States is possible," Mottaki said after holding talks with Ali Babacan, Turkey’s foreign minister, in Ankara.
Mottaki said Tehran was aware of media reports of a US plan to open an interests section in Iran.
If such a bureau were to be opened, it would mark the first such link between the two countries since the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979.
Washington will announce its plan to establish an interests section staffed with diplomats in Iran, London’s Guardian newspaper reported on Thursday.Nuclear talks
Mottaki’s comments come a day before William Burns, the US undersecretary of state, is due to meet Iranian representatives in Geneva to discuss Iran's nuclear programme.
"I hope this progress [in the negotiation format] will also reflect on the content of the talks," Mottaki said of Burns' visit.
"If the negotiations continue in this way, I hope there will be a positive outcome."
Saeed Jalili, Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator, is set to meet Javier Solana, the European Union policy chief, to discuss incentives offered to Tehran to halt its uranium enrichment programme.
The US and other Western powers say that Iran is enriching uranium with a view to attach it to a warhead.
Tehran rejects the charges and says that it is pursuing nuclear technology to generate electricity.

Keystone Cops Confront Iran.

This is from the huffingtonpost. For some reason the U.S. seems to be turning up the temperature in its propaganda offensive against Iran at a time even though the international pressure against Iran seems to have cooled a bit. Perhaps this is why the U.S. feels the need to increase its own pressure.

While in the Mid-East Bush has taken the opportunity to lecture his Mid-East Allies on the necessity to pressure Iran. Yet there is evidence of some detente there. While no doubt Arab States are suspicious of Iran they seem to be taking a road of talking with Iran rather than confrontation.

Keystone Cops Confront Iran
Posted January 11, 2008 | 10:46 AM (EST)


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Read More: Iran, Pentagon, Breaking Politics News



The Pentagon has now admitted that the audio they released in their video of the naval encounter with Iran might not have come from the Iranian ships. The Washington Post reports Friday:

The Pentagon said yesterday that the apparent radio threat to bomb U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf last weekend may not have come from the five Iranian Revolutionary Guard speedboats that approached them -- and may not even have been intended against U.S. targets.
Email
Print
Comment
US officials are trying to spin this admission as not being a big deal.

They are, of course, wrong. It is a huge deal.

The New York Times reported on its website Thursday:

The list of those who are less than fully confident in the Pentagon's video/audio mashup of aggressive maneuvers by Iranian boats near American warships in the Strait of Hormuz now includes the Pentagon itself.
Unnamed Pentagon officials said on Wednesday that the threatening voice heard in the audio clip, which was released on Monday night with a disclaimer that it was recorded separately from the video images and merged with them later, is not directly traceable to the Iranian military.



The Times reported Thursday:

The audio includes a heavily accented voice warning in English that the Navy warships would explode. However, the recording carries no ambient noise -- the sounds of a motor, the sea or wind -- that would be expected if the broadcast had been made from one of the five small boats that sped around the three-ship American convoy.
On Wednesday, a reader identifying himself as a former Navy officer with experience in the Strait of Hormuz wrote to the Times:

All ships at sea use a common UHF frequency, Channel 16, also known as "bridge-to bridge" radio. Over here, near the U.S., and throughout the Mediterranean, Ch. 16 is used pretty professionally, i.e., chatter is limited to shiphandling issues, identifying yourself, telling other ships what your intentions are to avoid mishaps, etc.
But over in the Gulf, Ch. 16 is like a bad CB radio. Everybody and their brother is on it; chattering away; hurling racial slurs, usually involving Filipinos (lots of Filipinos work in the area); curses involving your mother; 1970's music broadcast in the wee hours (nothing odder than hearing The Carpenters 50 miles off the coast of Iran at 4 a.m.)
On Ch. 16, esp. in that section of the Gulf, slurs/threats/chatter/etc. is commonplace. So my first thought was that the "explode" comment might not have even come from one of the Iranian craft, but some loser monitoring the events at a shore facility.



Indeed, it's not at all clear that the voice in the Pentagon's audiotape is even Iranian. The Washington Post reports:

Farsi speakers and Iranians told The Washington Post that the accent did not sound Iranian.
Presumably, all the information that we have now about this incident - that the radio communication that the Pentagon released as part of its video might not have come from the Iranian ships, and that the voice might not even be Iranian - was available to the Pentagon - if they were interested - when they released the tape. Why the rush to release this video without checking?

The most plausible explanation was that there was a rush to release the video prior to President Bush's trip to the region, because his key goal was to press the US case for isolating Iran.

And this is similar to what the Iranians have claimed, that the US was hyping whatever happened to try to bolster their case for isolating Iran ahead of the President's trip.

So, as with the release of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, where the US intelligence conclusion that Iran did not have a nuclear weapons program followed a period in which the US was claiming that they did and Iran was saying that they did not, and IAEA and Russia were saying that they had no evidence that Iran had a nuclear weapons program, the net effect of this incident is that the credibility of the US on Iran is diminished and the credibility of Iran is increased.

Members of Congress, and Presidential candidates, should be asking questions about the Pentagon's rush to release the tape, with the quite possibly unrelated audio. People in the region are likely to conclude that it is the U.S., not Iran, that is behaving in a dangerously provocative way.

It's difficult to overstate how low the credibility of U.S. statements is in the Middle East right now. It may actually be negative. If the U.S. announces that two plus two is four, some people in the Middle East are going to scratch their heads and say, "Well, until now we thought it was four, but perhaps it is five."

You have to wonder if some folks in the Washington foreign policy establishment are counting the days until they can put the empire under new management.

Iran and US conclude talks

It doesnt sound as if much of a concrete nature was achieved but it sounds as if they at least did not spend the time shouting at each other! Maliki's statement that both sides want an Iraq free of foreign forces and influence must be the goofiest statement of the whole meeting!

Iran and US conclude Iraq talks








Talks between Iran and the US on the security situation in Iraq have concluded "positively", the US ambassador has said.

Ryan Crocker, the US envoy, and Hassan Kazemi-Qomi, his Iranian counterpart, met in Bagdhad's Green Zone, in a reversal of approach by Washington, which broke ties with Iran in 1980.




Crocker said: "Discussions focused on how we might support as effectively as possible Iraq, its people and its government in restoring peace and stability to the country and furthering a political reconciliation process.

"What we need to see is Iranian action on the ground."






'Positive' steps

Kazemi-Qomi said Iran saw "positive" steps in the talks.

"Some problems have been raised and studied and I think this was a positive step ... In the political field, the two sides agreed to support and strengthen the Iraqi government, which was another positive item achieved in these talks," he told state television.

Crocker said the Iranians had proposed setting up a mechanism with Iranian, US and Iraqi participation to co-ordinate on Iraq's security. He said he would refer the proposal to Washington.

Kazemi-Qomi told reporters that Iran had offered to help train and arm Iraq's military.

From Tehran, Manouchehr Mottaki, Iraq's foreign minister, left open the possibility of future meetings with the US but only if Washington admitted its war in Iraq and other regional issues have not been successful.



"We are hopeful that Washington's realistic outlook toward the current issues in Iraq, a confession about its failed policy there and the region as well as an indication of determination to change the policy would guarantee the success of the current talks and possible further negotiations."



Crocker said that "the Iranians did not go into any great detail" during the meeting at the home of Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone.



'Opening of a door'



"They made the assertion that the coalition presence was an occupation and the effort to train the Iraqi security forces had been inadequate to the challenges."




It was the first high-level meeting between the two countries for 27 years. Iraqi officials also attended the meeting.



Al-Maliki told both sides that Iraqis want a stable country free of foreign forces and regional interference.



He also said that the US-led forces in Iraq were only here to help build up the army and police and the country would not be used as a launching ground for a US attack on its neighbours - a clear reference to Iran.



Hoda Abdel-Hamid, Al Jazeera's Iraq correspondent, said that the meeting should be viewed as the "opening of a door".



"Both parties are deeply suspicious of one another. The issues are complicated and intertwined, so you can't look at the Iraq situation without looking at broader regional issues.



"Publicly, the US wants Iran to stop training and providing the Shia militias with weapons, and logistical and financial support [and] Iran wants a US timetable for troop withdrawal from Iraq.



"Iran has some of the strongest political and economic ties in Iraq.



"[But] Iraq also needs the US at this stage because of its security situation. It cannot take care of security issues by itself," she said.



Talks hailed



Hoshiyar Zebari, the Iraqi foreign minister, said: "I think it is a positive development. We should encourage it and build on it. This is just the beginning of the process."



Iran's nuclear programme, which Washington believes to be a bid for developing atomic weapons, was not discussed. at the meeting.





Crocker said that the US expected Iran to propose a second meeting on Iraq.

As the meeting ended, a truck bomb exploded outside one of Baghdad's most revered shrines in the business district of Sinak, killing at least 19 people and damaging the Abdel Qadir Gilani Mosque.






Source: Al Jazeera and agencies

Iran says US bombers violate Iranian air space

Does the US hope Iran fires at them or what? This could be the required incident that provokes an attack.

Tehran says two U.S. Air Force bombers violated Iran air space
13:25 | 02/ 04/ 2007



TEHRAN, April 2 (RIA Novosti) - Two U.S. Air Force bombers violated Iranian air space last week, a Tehran-based Arabic language news channel, Al-Alam, said Monday.

The channel, referring to a spokesman for Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, said two U.S. bombers crossed the Iranian-Iraqi border Saturday near the city of Abadan, in the province Khuzestan.

The spokesman said that it was not the first time military aircraft of the U.S. occupation forces in Iraq have violated Iran's air space, adding that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was on a working visit to the province of Khuzestan at the time of the incident.

The U.S. has not excluded a military option in the standoff with Iran over its refusal to abandon its uranium enrichment program. The UN Security Council passed a new resolution on Iran two weeks ago toughening economic sanctions against the country and accepting the possibility of a military solution to the crisis.

Tehran has consistently dismissed suspicions that it is running a covert nuclear weapons program, saying the country needs nuclear energy for civilian use.

Last week, a Russian security official said that Russian intelligence had information that the U.S. Armed Forces had nearly completed preparations for a possible military operation against Iran and would be ready to strike in early April.

British sailors nabbed in contested waters

In other articles I have read that the British were doing a routine search of a vessel when the boarding group was nabbed. This article does not make that clear. It is interesting that Iraq is not capable of patrolling its own waters but outsources that task to the UK. Doesn't sound much like a sovereign nation to me.
Aside from asserting its jurisdiction Iran may try to use the situation to bargain for the release of Iranians held by the US. The US seizing of the Iranians in a quasi consulate is even more questionable than the Iranian action but everyone seems to forget about that.


Seizure Occurs in Long-Contested Waters

Friday March 23, 2007 10:16 PM




By ROBERT H. REID

Associated Press Writer

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) - The waters where Iranian navy forces seized a group of British sailors and marines are near an area long contested by Iran and Iraq - just outside the mouth of a muddy, 125-mile-long channel that separates the Arab and Persian worlds.

The neighbors don't even agree what to call it. For the Iranians, it is Arvandrud, or Arvand River. To the Iraqis, it is the Shatt al-Arab, or Arab coastline.

Whatever the name, the waterway is formed by the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which join at the Iraqi town of Qurnah and flow into the Persian Gulf - providing Iraq's only outlet to the sea.

Iranians and Iraqis have been squabbling over the waterway since before the creation of modern Iran and Iraq.

In 1639, the Persians and Ottomans signed an agreement dividing the territory, but without a careful land survey. Bickering continued for centuries, with Iraq claiming the entire waterway right up to the Iranian shoreline.

In 1975, however, the two countries signed a treaty recognizing the middle of the waterway as the international boundary. Five years later, Saddam Hussein tore up the treaty and invaded Iran, unleashing a devastating eight-year war.

Much of the fighting centered around the waterway. When the Iranians captured the Faw Peninsula on the southern end of the channel in 1987, Iraq lost its shipping lanes and had to turn to Kuwait and Jordan for help in exporting its products.

A United Nations peacekeeping force was stationed along the Iran-Iraq border after the war ended, from 1988-1991, with naval personnel in the waterway.

British forces overran the area in the early days of the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam and quickly reopened the port of Umm Qasr. Virtually all of Iraq's oil is exported through an oil terminal near the mouth of the waterway.

In June 2004, six British marines and two sailors were seized by Iran there. They were presented blindfolded on Iranian television and admitted entering Iranian waters illegally, then released unharmed after three days.

Today, the U.N. says it is not involved in any border disputes between the countries.

``It is up to each country to decide their borders,'' said Farhan Haq, a U.N. spokesman. ``The United Nations does not draw borders. What the recognized borders are in that waterway is the decision of Iran and Iraq.''

But Tehran and the new Iraqi government have never signed a treaty to replace the Shah of Iran's agreement with Saddam, meaning control of the waterway remains a matter of dispute, said Lawrence G. Potter, an associate professor of international affairs at Columbia University.

``The problem is that nobody knows where the border is,'' Potter said. ``The British might have thought they were on their side, the Iranians might have thought they were on their side.''

For the Iranians, who have a much longer coastline, exercising their claims to the area is both emotional and strategic. The Iranian cities of Abadan and Khorramshahr lie along the waterway.

Michael O'Hanlon, senior fellow of foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, said the Iranian interest in defending its claims explains the move against the British.

``The only reason they would do what they've done is to show that they feel strongly about those waters,'' he said. ``This is the sort of thing they will want to ratchet down very quickly.''

The sailors' commander said they were patrolling Iraqi waters, on the Iraqi government's behalf.

Shibley Telhami, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said that he doubted that the Iranians would risk harming their relationship with the Iraqi government over the waterways.

``There's always been a dispute about where the line is, but it returned to status quo since the end of the war in 1988,'' said Telhami. ``They have a good relationship with the Iraqi government right now, so it would be surprising if they wanted to open border issues with them at this point.''

With tensions high over Iran's refusal to halt uranium enrichment, and recent U.S. detentions of Iranians in Iraq, Potter said, Iran may have found a way to assert itself internationally without provoking serious repercussions.

---

US-Iran tensions could trigger war

Strange that there are few if any reports of Saudi support for the Sunni insurgency but I am sure that there is some. In fact the Saudis have even spoken of invading Iraq in the event of US withdrawal and all out civil war. The Saudis also may be quite happy to see the US clip Iran's wings and stop Iran and Shia influence grow in the area. Saudi Arabia and other US allies in the mid-East have their own restive Shia populations. I wonder if the US support, training and arming of Abbas forces in Palestine against the elected Hamas government is considered meddling? Some reports by the way suggest that Saudi Arabia is keeping the price of oil down to hurt Iran and that the US hopes this will also hurt Venezuela but there is conflicting evidence on this.

U.S.-Iran tensions could trigger war By JIM KRANE and ROBERT H. REID, Associated Press Writers
Wed Jan 31, 4:38 PM ET



BAGHDAD, Iraq - Citing Iranian involvement with Iraqi militias and Tehran's nuclear ambitions, the Bush administration has shifted to offense in its confrontation with Iran — building up the U.S. military in the Persian Gulf and promising more aggressive moves against Iranian operatives in Iraq and Lebanon.


The behind-the-scenes struggle between the two nations could explode into open warfare over a single misstep, analysts and U.S. military officials warn.

Iraq has become a proxy battleground between Washington and Tehran, which is challenging — at least rhetorically — America's dominance of the Gulf. That has worried even Iraq's U.S.-backed Shiite prime minister, who — in a reflection of Iraq's complexity — also has close ties to Iran.

Iran and the United States are already sparring on the ground.

On Jan. 20, militants kidnapped and killed four American soldiers in a raid in Karbala, and a fifth was killed in the firefight. A U.S. defense official said one possibility under study is that Iranian agents either executed or masterminded the attack, a suspicion based on the sophisticated and unusual methods used in the attack, including weapons and uniforms that may have been American.

He spoke on condition of anonymity because the probe is ongoing.

There has been speculation that the Karbala assault may have been in retaliation for the arrest of five Iranians by U.S. troops in northern Iraq.

Those five Iranians, who were arrested in the northern city of Irbil, included two members of an Iranian Revolutionary Guard force that provides weapons, training and other support to Shiite militants in the Middle East, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said last week. Iraqi and Iranian officials maintain the five were diplomats.

Since the Karbala raid, U.S. saber-rattling has intensified. President Bush said this week that U.S. forces in Iraq would take action against Iranian operatives in the country, while insisting he had no intention of attacking Iran.

"If Iran escalates its military action in Iraq to the detriment of our troops and/or innocent Iraqi people, we will respond firmly," Bush told National Public Radio.

Although little evidence has been made public, U.S. officials have long insisted that Iran was supplying weapons and training to Shiite militias in Iraq, including some that have killed American troops.

The No. 2 U.S. general in Iraq told USA Today in an interview published Tuesday that Iran was supplying Iraqi Shiite militias with a variety of powerful weapons, including Katyusha rockets and armor-piercing rocket-propelled grenades.

"We have weapons that we know through serial numbers ... trace back to Iran," Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno said.

The Air Force is considering more forceful patrols on the Iraqi side of the border with Iran to counter the smuggling of weapons and bomb supplies, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing senior Pentagon officials.

The U.S. is also building up its military presence in the Gulf in what it says is a show of strength directed at Iran. A second aircraft carrier is heading for the region, and Patriot missile batteries are being deployed.

Since Bush announced his new Iraq strategy in early January, Iranian officials have raised the alarm repeatedly that the U.S. intends to attack. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Iran is "ready for anything" in its confrontation with the United States.

A newspaper close to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last week threatened retaliation for any U.S. military action — including stopping oil traffic through the Gulf's strategic Hormuz Straits and attacks on U.S. interests. The top editor of the Kayhan daily warned that Iran will turn the Middle East into "hell" for the United States and Israel if America attacks.

Iran expert Ray Takeyh said the risks are all the greater because Tehran has an "unhealthy" disregard for American power, which "enhances the prospect of a miscalculation."

Prof. Gary Sick, a leading authority on Iran, believes the U.S. is seeking to divert world attention from the crisis in Iraq and organize a coalition of Israel and conservative Sunni Arab states to confront Iran.

"I see this as a very dangerous long-term policy because it promotes the idea that Sunnis and Shiites should be distrustful of each other, and I think that could come back and bite us later on," he said.

Iran and the U.S. also are in dispute over Tehran's nuclear program. The United States accuses Iran of secretly developing atomic weapons — an allegation Tehran denies. Iran's defiant refusal to suspend uranium enrichment prompted the U.N. Security Council to impose limited economic sanctions.

The U.S. has also beefed up support for Lebanon's government in its power struggle with Hezbollah, the Shiite militia that Washington accuses of acting in Iran's interests.

But Lee Feinstein of the Council on Foreign Relations said the U.S. was finding it hard "to calibrate its message" to distinguish "between a stern message and a warning of attack."

The war of words has raised fears among both Democrats and Republicans in Congress that the United States and Iran are drifting toward armed conflict at a time when America is struggling against determined foes in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It has also unnerved the Iraqi government, many of whose members have close ties to Iran.

"We have told the Iranians and the Americans, `We know that you have a problem with each other but we're asking you, please, solve your problems outside of Iraq,'" Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, told CNN on Wednesday. "We do not want the American forces to take Iraq as a base to attack Iran ... we will not accept Iran using Iraq to attack American forces. But does this exist? It exists and I assure you it exists."

As the rhetoric grows more strident, a U.S. military official in the Gulf likened the U.S.-Iran standoff to the buildup in hostility in Europe before World War I, when the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne triggered a tragic war that engulfed a continent.

"A mistake could be made and you could end up in something that neither side ever really wanted, and suddenly it's August 1914 all over again," the U.S. officer said on condition of anonymity, because of the sensitivity of the issue. "I really believe neither side wants a fight."

Iranian coast guard vessels recently veered into territorial waters on the Arab side of the Gulf, an event that could have been viewed as either a mistake or a provocation, the officer said. Both sides are on tenterhooks. "A boat crosses a line ... but what does it mean? You've got to be very careful about overreacting," the officer said.

Even if Iran pulled back from Iraq's conflict, it might not end the country's violence, said Kenneth M. Pollack, research director at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy.

"The truth is that Iraq is a mess. It is in a state of low-level civil war. And all of these groups are largely self-motivated," he said on the Council on Foreign Relations Web site. "But its much easier to blame it on the Iranians."

In Tehran, political analyst Hermidas Bavand said U.S. force increases were leading many Iranians to believe Washington is looking to pick a fight.

"It's an extremely dangerous situation," Bavand said. "I don't think Tehran wants war under any circumstances. But there might be an accidental event that could escalate into a large confrontation."

___

AP writer Jim Krane reported from Doha, Qatar.