News Archive - 21 March 2013

While President Obama spoke to Israeli students in Jerusalem today, nearly 1,000 miles away Iran ’s supreme leader issued a fiery threat to the coastal cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa. “At times the officials of the Zionist regime (Israel) threaten to launch a military invasion,”...

>"I am not optimistic about these talks. Why? Because our past experiences show that talks for American officials does not mean for us to sit down and reach a logical solution... What they mean by talks is that we sit down and talk until Iran accepts their viewpoint," Ayatollah Ali...

>DUBAI (Reuters) - Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned on Thursday that the Islamic Republic would destroy the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa if its nuclear infrastructure came under attack from the Jewish state. Israel puts little stock in big power negotiations aimed at curbing Iran's uranium...

>* Cyprus in talks with Russia for loan, banking and energy deals* Brent-WTI spread narrowest in more than 2 months* Coming up: U.S. CFTC positions data; 1930 GMTBy Florence TanSINGAPORE, March 22 (Reuters) - Brent crude held above $107 a barrel on Friday, but was still on track for...

JERUSALEM (AP) — President Barack Obama is warning Iran that the U.S. will "do what is necessary" to prevent the Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

>Cyprus targets big depositors in bank plan ()Rosneft closes $55 bln TNK-BP deal ()AstraZeneca to cut 5,000 jobs by 2016 ()StanChart pressured into retreat by US ()Hermes sales in China rise 30 pct () HP authorises 10 pct dividend increase ()Sarkozy faces probe over donation claims ()Scotland sets date for...

>Anhui Conch Cement, China Construction Bank , China Shenhua Energy Co Ltd, China Petroleum and Chemical Corp (Sinopec) and CNOOC are among companies due to report corporate earnings later in the day.On Thursday, the Hang Seng Index closed down 0.1 percent at 22,225.9. The China Enterprises Index...

It is not easy to be a winner. Ben Affleck has won the Best Picture Oscar for Argo. But he seems to have ruffled quite a few feathers by taking liberties with the story of the rescue of the six American staff living in hostage conditions in Iran after...

>* Euro zone manufacturing sector deteriorates in March* China, U.S. economic data more supportive* Coming up: CFTC positions data 3:30 p.m. EDT Friday (Recasts, updates with settlement prices, Iran detail, paragraphs 1,6-8,19-21)By Robert GibbonsNEW YORK, March 21 (Reuters) - Crude oil prices fell more than 1 percent on...

>WHEAT SALES: Iran's state grains buyer GTC has purchased 120,000 tonnes of milling wheat from Australia and Germany, European traders said on Thursday.WHEAT SALES: Japan's Ministry of Agriculture bought a total of 132,777 tonnes of food wheat from the United States, Canada and Australia in a weekly tender that...

>* Talk of "strategic partnership" masks unease over future* Oil deals expected but differences over gas pipelineBy Thomas GroveMOSCOW, March 22 (Reuters) - Decorated with Chinese paintings and red silk armchairs, a huge business complex on the edge of Moscow is the kind of enterprise China's new leader Xi Jinping...

President Obama and his national security team are no doubt making final preparations for the upcoming trip to Israel. Obama already began to lay the groundwork for his trip by sending messages to the Israeli leadership who remain fanatically wed to coercing the U.S. to go to war...

Since all archaeological objects are mute, they lend themselves to multiple interpretations. Many different stories from different points of view can be told about a single object. The Cyrus Cylinder is no exception. This iconic object discovered in Iraq in 1879, legally but unethically was exported from that country...

When President Obama arrives in Jerusalem for the first time as the United States President, he will undoubtedly brief Israeli officials on his three-week old proposal to solve the Iranian nuclear crisis. Ironically, the president's new policy shift is still mostly unknown in the U.S. because it has...

In a fascinating coincidence, President Barack Obama's visit to Israel comes on the 10th anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. While Obama opposed the invasion, which ended up costing America trillions of dollars and thousands of lives, and vastly more Iraqis, in creating one of the...

Shortly after it was announced that President Obama would travel to the Middle East, I led a congressional delegation to Israel and Turkey and then to Austria to attend the annual Winter Session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Everywhere we...

Beyond the high-profile ceremonies and cordial meetings with Israeli leaders and society, the president's discussion with Jordanian King Abdullah may be the most momentous item on his visit this week to the Middle East. The Hashemite Kingdom has played host to four waves of refugees, in 1948, 1967, 1990,...

Three-year-old Artin Rahimian stands in line to visit his mother in Iran's Evin prison. It's been two years since Faran Hessami and her husband, Kamran Rahimian, were arrested for their role as educators for the Baha'i faith community, Iran's largest religious minority. Since then, their son has come with...

Watching President Obama's latest Nowruz speech, I couldn't but tread a minefield of conflicting emotions, flirting between paroxysm of hope and anxious memories of recent diplomatic debacles vis-à-vis the Iranian nuclear impasse. He sounded upbeat, and considerably more hopeful than his previous greetings, especially in 2011 and 2012, when...

TEHRAN , March 20 (UPI) -- The daughter of former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was released from prison after serving a six-month term, her lawyer said.

By Steve Gutterman MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Thursday that Iran and six global powers made progress in expert-level talks this week on the standoff over Tehran 's nuclear programme but there was no breakthrough and that backsliding remained a danger. "This progress is real but it is not...

Iran began the Persian New Year on Wednesday with its most senior leader asking the people to stand up to piling Western economic sanctions and also warning that the pressure was unlikely to ease.

TEHRAN , Iran (AP) — Iran is not opposed to direct talks with the U.S. to resolve its nuclear standoff with the West, the country's top leader said Thursday in comments that appeared to soften its long-held policy of outright rejection of bilateral talks with Washington.

>LONDON (Reuters) - Standard Chartered (STAN.L) Chairman John Peace apologized on Thursday for inaccurate comments he made earlier this month about his bank breaching U.S. sanctions over Iran. The highly unusual retraction indicated U.S. regulators had put pressure on the bank to clarify the comments following a...

>LONDON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Standard Chartered (STAN.L) bowed to pressure from U.S. authorities and apologized on Thursday for comments by the bank's chairman denying the bank had intentionally breached U.S. sanctions on Iran. The highly unusual retraction and apology was forced on the bank by the U.S.

>JERUSALEM (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama appealed directly on Thursday to the Israeli people to put themselves in the shoes of stateless Palestinians and recognize that Jewish settlement activity in occupied territory hurts prospects for peace. In a showcase speech in Jerusalem to Israeli university students, Obama coupled...

>BEIJING, March 21 (Reuters) - China's crude oil imports from Iran rebounded last month from a 10-month low hit in January, official data showed, in line with an International Energy Agency (IEA) report that said new U.S. sanctions appeared to have had little impact on shipments.The rebound also...

>KIEV, March 21 (Reuters) - Ukraine has resumed exports of maize to Iran, which has been hit by international sanctions, with a shipment of 30,000 tonnes made on March 13, analysts and traders said on Thursday.A vessel bound for Iran had been loaded in the port of Yuzhny near...