Egypt ready to ’open new page’ in relations with Iran
HAARETZ--Egyptian Foreign Minister Elaraby meets Iranian official Amani, says people in both countries ’deserve mutual relations reflecting their history and civilization’.
Cairo is ready to re-establish diplomatic ties with Tehran after a break of more than 30 years, Egypt’s foreign minister said on Monday, signaling a shift in Iran policy since the fall of President Hosni Mubarak.
"The Egyptian and Iranian people deserve to have mutual relations reflecting their history and civilization," said Foreign Minister Nabil Elaraby after meeting Iranian official Mugtabi Amani. It was the first publicly announced meeting between officials from both countries since Mubarak was toppled on Feb. 11, handing power to the army.
Shi’ite Muslim Iran and mainly Sunni Egypt severed ties in 1980 following Iran’s Islamic revolution and Egypt’s recognition of Israel. Both have competed for influence in the Middle East. Egypt has long been an ally of the United States and Israel but since Mubarak was toppled there have been signs of warming ties between Cairo and Tehran. Continued…
Fatollahi to represent Iran at SCO meeting on Afghanistan
TEHRANTIMES – Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Asian and Oceanian Affairs, Mohammad Ali Fatollahi, arrived in Moscow on Monday to attend the meeting of deputy foreign ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization scheduled to be held on Tuesday.
In this one-day meeting, deputy foreign ministers of the observer and member states of the SCO will discuss the security issues facing Afghanistan including terrorism, drug trafficking, and extremism.
Fatollahi is also scheduled to meet with a number of his counterparts on the sidelines of the Moscow meeting.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is an intergovernmental security organization which was founded in 2001 in Shanghai by the leaders of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Iran, India, Mongolia, and Pakistan are the observer states of this organization.
US forces Germany to stop Indian oil payments to Iran
The Economic Times-- India is exploring paying for crude oil it buys from Iran in rupee after the US forced Germany to stop routing payments through a Hamburg-based bank.
India in February had begun clearing past dues to Iran by making euro payments through German-based Europisch-Iranische Handelsbank AG ( EIH Bank )). But EIH, which is owned by Iran, is a banned entity in the US and Washington used its influence on Germany to stop payments.
"We are working with Iran to evolve an alternate payment mechanism. We hope to firm up plans very soon," a top finance ministry official said.
The problem had arose after Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in December last year scrapped a long-standing payment mechanism used to pay for Iranian crude imports.
Early in March, Oil Minister S Jaipal Reddy had told Parliament that "pending dues of National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) are now being cleared and as of March 1, 2011, payment of euro 1.5 bn has been made to the Central Bank of Iran." Continued
Payments to Iran via Germany a topic for Merkel, Netanyahu
Reuters- German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu are likely to discuss a German bank providing financial services to Iran when they meet this week, a source said on Monday.
Israel and the United States want Germany to shut down the bank, Hamburg-based EIH, saying it supports the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction by handling payments to known participants in Iran’s contentious nuclear program.
"I would imagine the Iranian issue will be an agenda item, and among those, I imagine that EIH would be an issue," an Israeli political source said, declining to be named. "It would be a good assumption to say they will speak about it."
The U.S. Treasury Department in September sanctioned EIH for facilitating billions of dollars of transactions with Iranian banks blacklisted by the United States and the European Union for aiding Iran’s nuclear or missile programs.
Germany says it monitors EIH closely but cannot act against the bank unless the European Union agrees to sanction it, or if it engages in business with institutions on the EU blacklist.
EU rules allow payments for Iranian oil and natural gas. Continued…
Iran ready to help settle regional crises, Ahmadinejad tells UN chief
TEHRANTIMES – In a telephone conversation with United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Sunday President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Iran is ready to play an active role in resolving the existing issues facing people in the Middle East and North Africa. Ahmadinejad also highlighted the importance of the UN secretary general’s role in directing regional developments to the benefit of nations in the region.
“The time is ripe for the UN secretary general to play his historic and decisive role in settling the existing issues based of mutual understanding and dialogue so that the repetition of the catastrophes in Afghanistan and Iraq can be prevented,” he said.
The president pointed to the Western countries’ interventions in the regional developments and said that the interferences of the U.S. and European governments have complicated the situation and caused worry, so the UN secretary general should call on these governments to stop meddling in the regional countries’ affairs.
“The Western countries are only looking after their own interests. Their double dealing in Bahrain and Libya and their silence about the Zionist regime’s crimes against the innocent Palestinians reveal only part of their contradictory actions in the world,” he added.
Ban Ki-moon said that he is trying to find a way to settle the regional problems through peaceful means.
He also expressed concern over the killing of Bahraini and Yemeni pro-democracy protesters and urged the leaders of these countries to show restraint and respond to the people’s demands.