France Calls On Iran To Release Filmmakers Jailed For Speaking Out

In a long piece, the agency used the term “attack” for Russia’s intervention in Ukraine, rather than referring to a “crisis” as state-owned media has generally done. Fars also stressed Amir-Abdollahian had dismissed Monday’s claim from United States National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan that Tehran was preparing to send drones, some armed, to Moscow to help its military effort.

UPDATE - Later, the White House released satellite photos and information that Russian military officials visited an Iranian drone base in Kerman to review military UAVs.

This was the fourth phone conversation between the two men, Fars explained, during the crisis, the first before hostilities began in February and three since then.

The agency suggested Amir-Abdollahian had played a mediating role conveying messages between the two sides, including during his trip to Moscow in mid-March and at the meeting of Afghanistan’s neighbors in China, which was March 30-31.

In Friday’s call, Fars reported, Amir-Abdollahian expressed “opposition to Russia’s attack on Ukraine” and reiterated that Iran had “tried to stop this war” and facilitate diplomacy between the two sides. This was in line, the foreign minister had explained, with Iran’s opposition to wars in Afghanistan, Yemen and Palestine.

The foreign minister pointed out that Sullivan’s claims about drones had coincided with “Biden’s trip to occupied Palestine” and said they had been made “simply for political ends.” Fars noted that Iran’s foreign ministry had already stated that while Tehran had “different areas of cooperation with Russia, including defense,” it would take military side and had also made clear its belief that the war in Ukraine should end with a ceasefire.

‘Nato tools,’ grain supplies

Fars also noted the interests of arms producers in “some western countries, trying to sell products,” and reminded readers that at his joint press conference in Tehran June 22-3 with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov Amir-Abdollahian had condemned the US “using Nato tools” as one of the roots of the conflict, a reference to the alliance’s expansion in eastern Europe since 1999.

While Iran has far more imports from Russia than from Ukraine, like many other countries it is feeling the inflationary pinch of disruption in supplies. Iranian Oil Minister Javad Owji told the semi-official Iranian news agency the Young Journalists Club in May that Iran expected to import 5 million tonnes of grain, including some wheat, from Russia in the Iranian year ending March 2023. Tehran’s domestic wheat production is being hampered by low rainfall.

It was also noteworthy that Fars made no mention of the disputween the two countries over the Ukrainian airliner shot down in 2020 over Tehran by two missiles fired by the IRGC. Ukrain had been pursuing the case for a full accounting by Tehran and compensation before the Russian invasion.

An early end to the Ukraine war would not only ease pressure on the Iranian economy but placate those Iranians who have taken up the Ukrainian case, with some gathering outside the Russian embassy in Tehran back in February to chant “death to Putin.” The conservative Jomhouri Eslami newspaper has been firm in backing Ukraine’s cause and condemning Moscow.

The first UAV carrier flotilla of Iran’s Army, comprised of surface and subsurface units equipped with various types of combat, reconnaissance and kamikaze drones, was unveiled by the southern fleet of the Navy in a ceremony attended by Commander-in-Chief of the Islamic Republic of Iran Army Major general Abdolrahim Mousavi and Commander of the Iranian Navy Commodore Shahram Irani. 

According to state media, the drones that were displayed on Friday included the Pelican, Arash, Homa, Chamrosh, Jubin, Ababil-4 and Bavar-5, but it was not clear how many vessels or drones were included in each unit, only that one ship carried 50 drones.

Mousavi said the reconnaissance drones have increased the intelligence sway of Iran’s vessels to hundreds of kilometers beyond the borders of the country, adding that the Navy’s suicide and combat drones have leveled up Iran’s deterrence power. 

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan Monday said that Russia wants to obtain hundreds of drones from Iran, both for surveillance and attack, to use in its war in Ukraine, adding that Iran is “preparing to train Russian forces to use these UAVs with initial training sessions slated to begin as soon as early July.”

Iran is known to have supplied UAVs to its proxies in several countries across the Middle East.

“The Americans and Zionists (Israel) know very well the price of using the word 'force' against Iran,” Brigadier General Abolfazl Shekarchi, spokesman for the Iranian armed forces, was quoted as saying by Iranian media on Friday.

In reaction to the landmark decision of Stockholm’s District Court to sentence Hamid Nouri to life in prison, the rights group said in a Thursday statement that is "an unprecedented step towards justice.” 

His conviction and sentence “sends an unequivocal, and long overdue, message to the Iranian authorities that those responsible for crimes against humanity in Iran will not escape justice,” Diana Eltahawy, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa, said.

She said the world finally witnessed an Iranian official held to account, adding that “For more than three decades, survivors and relatives of thousands of political dissidents extrajudicially killed and forcibly disappeared in Iran’s 1988 prison massacres, have struggled for truth and justice.”

Eltahawy also called on all states to exercise universal jurisdiction to criminally investigate all other former and current officials against whom there is evidence of involvement in past and ongoing crimes against humanity, including President Ebrahim Raisi, emphasizing that “This critical ruling must serve as a wake-up call to the international community to tackle the crisis of impunity that prevails in Iran.”

Sweden arrested Nouri, now 61, upon his arrival in Sweden at Stockholm Airport in 2019 and in 2021 put him on trial over the mass execution and torture of prisoners at Gohardasht Prison in July and August 1988.

However, a group of MPs used the Thursday open session attended by the prime minister to criticize him over the pact, calling it "a deal with the devil." 

New Flemish Alliance leader Peter De Roover was not dissatisfied with the postponement, saying, “Maybe there will finally be some realization that this is a devil’s pact.”

Georges Dallemagne from the Les Engagés party and Ellen Samyn from Flemish nationalist, right-wing party Vlaams Belang also expressed their dissatisfaction with the treaty once again. “Belgium’s international credibility is not much, but if this is ratified, it will sink under the ground,” said Samyn.

Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, who is also responsible for foreign affairs during Sophie Wilmès’s absence, reiterated that Belgium wants to do everything it can “not to let Belgians who are innocent abroad in prison” stay in jail.

Wilmes, who finalized her resignation as foreign minister on Thursday, quitted to take care of her husband, former Australian footballer Chris Stone, who has been diagnosed with brain cancer. Wilmes had already temporarily stepped down in April, when De Croo took over her foreign affairs duties.

Critics say that the agreement will result in sending back Assadollah Assadi, an Iranian diplomat serving a 20-year prison sentence in Belgium for planning a terror attack in Paris four years ago.

A former Foreign Ministry director general Ghasem Mohebali told Nameh News that the coalition which is likely to be formed in the Middle East against Iran during Biden's visit can lead to an increase in Iran's military expenditure and is likely to have negative economic, security and probably military implications for Iran.

According to Nameh News, although some of Iran's hardliner media have claimed that the visit has already proven to be futile, others are still worried about its implications, particularly in re-aligning relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. What is certain is that the situation is highly sensitive, and Tehran's reaction can be important.

Mohebali said that the fact Biden's article in the Washington Post before his visit, and the fact that the latest round of indirect talks between Iran and the United States in Doha failed, provide a good opportunity for the opponents of the Iran nuclear deal, including Israel and Saudi Arabia to impose more costs on Iran by masterminding new developments in the region.

He added that Iran failed to use the divide between the United States on the one hand and Israel and Saudi Arabia on the other during the Biden administration’s first months in office. Now the situation has changed as the Washington needs Saudi Arabia's oil, Mohebali said. He also argued that Iran can benefit from Washington's need for energy too, but Tehran should reach an agreement first. Otherwise, US sanctions will remain in place and the population will continue to suffer.

International affairs analyst Adnan Tabatabai told the moderate conservative website Khabar Online on July 14, that Biden's regional tour can provide Iran with a strategic opportunity.

Tabatabai said, the main objectives of Biden's visit are discussing Saudi Arabia's oil production and export policies as well as the security of the Middle East and particularly the Persian Gulf region.

The visit marks the United States' renewed interest in the Middle East where oil can play a key part for the West's security. Meanwhile, the visit is likely to pave the way for the creation of what was previously called the Arab NATO or an alliance between Western and Arab states. Meanwhile, Iran perceives a threat resulting from the strengthening of diplomatic and political ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Tabatabai said that following Biden's characterization of Iran as a security threat, Iran is likely to escalate its negative approach to Biden's visit. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are still annoyed by the hesitant US reaction to the 2019 missile and drone attack on Aramco facilities.

The lingering hard feelings in Riadh and Abu Dhabi, said Tabatabai, might provide a strategic opportunity for Iran to continue its talks with Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Meanwhile, proreform daily Arman Melli wrote in its Thursday edition that Iran's nuclear program and reports about Tehran sending "hundreds of drones" to Russia to help Moscow in its war against Ukraine are likely to be on the agenda of Biden's talks during his regional tour. The daily said Putin's probable visit To Iran next week could be Moscow's answer to Biden's regional tour. The daily quoted analyst Ali Asghar Zargar as saying that "Moscow believes Iran is its winning card in its confrontation with the West."