Expose Rushdie Attacker’s Ties With Iran, Activists Urge US

In a conference on Monday about ways to revive Lake Urmia (Orumiyeh), near Western Azerbaijan Province capital of the same name, Isa Kalantari highlighted that the lake has lost 95 percent of its water over the past three decades, despite government claims that it has appropriated hundreds of millions of dollars to prevent the environmental disaster.

If the lake is not restored, it will have security consequences, and no government can survive in the country because it cannot withstand the flood of migration of millions of people who reside near it, he said. 

Kalantari said that the country's experts had warned about the drying up of this lake since the mid-1990s, but the authorities ignored the warnings. 

Considering the fact that it has 13 billion tons of salt in its bed, if the lake dries up completely, the city of Tabriz should be evacuated, he elaborated, adding that even if this evacuation is possible, it will cost at least one trillion US dollars.

“The residents of the neighboring provinces will be forced to migrate; winters will be at least 3-4 degrees colder and summers 3-4 degrees hotter, which will disrupt the entire ecology of the region," he noted. 

At its greatest extent, Urmia was the largest lake in the Middle East and sixth largest salt lake in the world, with an original surface area of 5,200 square kilometers in the 1970s, or 2,000 square miles. It had shrunk to 700 sq km by 2013. The lake began shrinking in the 1980s due to water mismanagement and climate change. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken highlighted that Namazi has now spent “2,500 days wrongfully detained in Iran,” adding that “We are determined to secure his freedom and ensure all Americans who have been wrongfully detained by Iran, including his father Baquer (Bagher), can return home.”

Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley tweeted that “Iran’s unjust imprisonment of US citizens for use as political leverage is outrageous,” urging the Islamic Republic to allow Siamak, and his father, as well as other American citizens.

Calling on Iran to free all Americans, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Jim Risch (R-Idaho) called it “unconscionable” that Namazi has spent 2,500 days in prison on “fraudulent charges,” saying that “The regime, in addition to its horrendous support for terrorism abroad, continues to play political games with the lives of innocent Americans.”

Senator Marco Rubio (R- Florida) slammed Tehran’s hostage diplomacy, noting Siamak’s “suffering has gone on far too long" and calling for his release.

Echoing similar sentiments, US Representative Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said that “He and all US hostages in Iran must be freed immediately.

In a message from prison, Namazi said that “the other hostages and I desperately need the Biden administration to match up claims that rescuing us is a priority with effective action...Today, our fate is subsumed under the nuclear talks and our freedom is contingent on their success.”

State Department spokesperson, Ned Price, said in his press briefing on Tuesday that the US has not tied the fate of Namazi and other hostages to the result of the nuclear talks to revive the 2015 deal.

In an interview with Etemad Onlinein Tehran Safari, Deputy Foreign Minister for Economic Affairs explained that Iran relies on Russia for importing essential commodities and in return exports cement to Russia. "We lend our export capability to Russia," he said, adding that "Our trade volume with Russia is $5 billon and we want to increase it to $10 billion."

Safari said Russia is a powerful country in oil and gas and can invest in Iran in the same areas while also transferring technology to Iran. He added that "Iran can also swap Russia's gas and oil with other countries. We get gas from one country and sell it to another country and make some profit. This is our economic and geopolitical potential."

Lately, Iranian officials have spoken about gas swap with Russia. Receiving natural gas and selling it to neighboring countries. But in reality, only Iraq is need of gas, but it is not a customer of Russia.

Safari, who has studied electronic engineering and telecommunications at George Washington University is introduced by Iranian media as a Russia expert. The Etemad Online reporter characterized him as a man with a conservative character who refused to remove his face mask during the interview.

Meanwhile, Safari, a former Iranian ambassador to Russia and China, told Etemad Online that Iran has signed barter trade contracts with up to ten countries despite US sanctions, however, he declined to name those countries. Safari added that barter trade is Iran's solution to circumvent the sanctions.

He has been a member of Iran's nuclear negotiators team since the 2010s when ultraconservative politician Saeed Jalili was in charge of the negotiations. During the interview, says the reporter, he declined to share many information points, fearing that "the other side might take advantage."

Safari told Etemad Online that "sanctions do not mean death and there are many ways to nullify them." However, his only solution was barter trade. He said that despite the sanctions there are many ways to further international trade although sanctions mainly affect international banking. Asked what those ways were, Safari once again referred to barter.

He disagreed with Etemad Online that barter trade will inevitably increase the cost of transactions. While this can be true in normal circumstances, Iran faces sanctions and countries that agree to barter trade with Tehran would use it as leverage to enhance their profits. Barter also deprives the country of foreign currency it can invest for economic growth.

Prominent economic journalist Maryam Shokrani wrote in a series of tweets on Sunday, August 14, that "Russia has quoted a price ten times higher than usual for work on projects in Iran." She quoted the Transportation and Logistics Confederation as saying that "Iran is about to conclude a contract with Russia for constructing a railway between Garmsar and Inceborun.”

The reporter also quoted Meysam Lajevardi, a rail transport expert, as saying that a German company has offered a contract at one tenth of that amount for the same project."

Shjokrani added that Russia had offered no bank guarantee to Iran for that contract and wanted to bring 80 percent of the personnel needed for the project from Russia. She added that the government of President Hassan Rouhani had accepted those unlawful conditions and it appears that the Raisi administration has also submitted to the same conditions.

The demonstrators gathered in front of the governor’s office of Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari province amid a large presence of security forces and chanted slogans against the authorities, such as “Death to President Raisi” and “Down with the governor”.

According to Ahmad Rastineh, the city’s representative in the parliament, the problem stemmed from the recent flash floods in the region and the lack of any water treatment plant for the province.

In addition to the provincial capital Shahrekord, water is cut in four other cities due to the recent floods and increased water turbidity.

In April, a group residents had held another protest rally against a project to transfer water out of the province, causing scarcity in their region. Protesters carried placards and chanted slogans threatening to take up arms against the ‘mafia’ behind the redistribution project.

Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari, a traditionally water-rich region in the Zagros mountains, has seen its water resources decline due to both drought and projects to irrigate other arid regions.

In recent years, many cities across the country were scenes of massive protests against the authorities’ mismanagement of water resources or harmful dam building and politically motivated diversion of rivers that have devastated agriculture and drinking water sources.

Iran has been suffering from drought for at least a decade and this year officials have been warning of a further decrease in precipitation.

Both of these joint military drills, which started on Monday, August 15, are being held in Iran and Venezuela within the framework of Russia’s 2022 International Military Exercises, which was initiated by Moscow. Venezuela has been hosting the “Sniper Frontiers.”

“The goal, the spirit of these games is to unite cultures and peoples more” than to demonstrate military skills, said Venezuelan Defense Minister General Vladimir Padrino Lopez, adding that a delegation of 200 Venezuelan soldiers has also been sent to Russia to participate in other events of these games.

The annual event was launched in 2015 at the initiative of Russia, and about 30 countries including China, Iran, India, Cuba, and Myanmar have participated in the maneuvers.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard also confirmed on Monday that it is holding joint drone exercises with Russia at the Kashan Air Base, adding that Belarus and Armenia are also partaking in the international UAV competitions.

Russia and Iran have expanded their strategic partnership since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Senior Russian and Iranian officials have met frequently in recent months to boost cooperation and sign economic and military agreements.

US State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel reiterated on August 10 that Russian officials have undergone training in Iran in recent weeks as part of an agreement on the transfer of drones from the Islamic Republic.

An advisor to the Ukrainian President’s Office, Oleksiy Arestovych, said earlier in the month that Russia is using Iranian-provided military drones in its invasion of Ukraine, noting that Iran handed 46 drones over to Russia and that the Ukrainian government has already confirmed the use of these drones in combat in Ukraine.