Syria Audio Analysis: The Real Importance of the "Russian Missiles to Syria" Story

On Monocle 24's The Daily on Thursday night, I discussed the latest rumours and claims over the Russian shipment of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Syria to get to the real significance of the story.

Listen from the 7:41 mark on The Daily's homepage or in a pop-out window

The take-away line? "The S-300 story is more important as a political game --- with the "West" trying to put Russia in a corner and Moscow standing firm --- than as a military development."

Iran Today: Presidential Election --- The Nuclear Issue

US Sanctions Petrochemical Firms

In the first American sanctions against Iran's petrochemical industry, the US Treasury has blacklisted eight companies.

The companies, owned or controlled by the Iranian Government, include Bandar Imam Petrochemical, Bou Ali Sina Petrochemical, and Mobin Petrochemical.

The petrochemical industry is Iran's largest source of foreign earnings after oil sales.

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Syria Video & Transcript: President Assad's Interview with Al-Manar TV

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Al-Manar: Mr. President, we are in the heart of the People’s Palace, two and a half years into the Syrian crisis. At the time, the bet was that the president and his regime would be overthrown within weeks. How have you managed to foil the plots of your opponents and enemies? What is the secret behind this steadfastness?

President Assad: There are a number of factors are involved. One is the Syrian factor, which thwarted their intentions; the other factor is related to those who masterminded these scenarios and ended up defeating themselves because they do not know Syria or understand in detail the situation. They started with the calls of revolution, but a real revolution requires tangible elements; you cannot create a revolution simply by paying money.

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Syria Today: Last Chance for Opposition "Unity" in Istanbul Talks

Opposition Representatives at This Week's Talks Oppositions Appeals for Help in Besieged Qusayr and Damascus Suburb

Insurgent commanders in the besieged town of Qusayr, near the Lebanese border, have appealed for help and warned of dire consequences if it does not arrive:

If all rebel fronts do not move to stop this crime being led by Hezbollah and Assad's traitorous army of dogs...we will soon be saying that there was once a city called Qusayr.

Malek Ammar, an opposition activist in Qusayr, said, "The town is surrounded and there's no way to bring in medical aid."

Ammar said about 100 of 700 wounded needed oxygen: "What we need [insurgent units] to do is come to the outskirts of the city and attack the checkpoints so we can get routes in and out of the city."

Qusayr has been under sustained shelling and attacks for almost two weeks. On Wednesday, the Syrian military captured the nearby airbase of Dabba, cutting off the town on all sides and bolstering their positions.

Elsewhere, insurgents blockaded in the eastern Ghouta, east of Damascus, appealed for help on Facebook, claiming Assad's forces were "preparing to commit more massacres".

The fighters said they held the opposition Syrian National Coalition, whose members have spent a week arguing in Istanbul over the orgnaisation of the leadership, responsible for their plight.

George Sabra, the acting head of the opposition Syrian National Coalition, has confirmed that the group will not attend any international "peace" conference.

However, whereas the Coalition's formal declaration on Wednesday emphasised its demand that President Assad step down as part of any transitional government, Sabra's statement said the condition was the international community's intervention to end the Syrian military's siege of Qusayr, near the Lebanese border.

Then Sabra declared, "The National Coalition will not take part in any international conference or any such efforts so long as the militias of Iran and Hezbollah continue their invasion of Syria."

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Middle East Today: Iraq --- Deadly Bombings Continue

Egypt: Concern Over Effect of Proposed Law on NGOs

Human Rights Watch has expressed concern that a draft law, placed by President Morsi before the legislature on Wednesday, would allow the Government and security agencies to arbitrarily restrict the funding and operation of independent groups.

HRW claims the Associations Law will reinforce and formalise State control over non- Governmental groups by denying them access to both domestic and international funding and giving "complete discretion" to authorities to object to activities of Egyptian and international organisations.

HRW said there were improvements in the draft, notably over the withdrawal of the designation of all NGO funding as "public" and thus open to Government supervision; however, it said the Government still retains excessive powers.

HRW cited the requirement of submission of an annual financial report, as well as copies of all internal decisions and a report on annual activities, to the authorities --- who could object and try to shut down the NGO. Groups also must notify the government in advance every time they wish to raise money through TV campaigns, charity events, or mail campaigns, and a Government committee has absolute discretion to block all access to foreign funding.

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Iran Today: Presidential Election --- Aref and Rezaei Go To The People

Presidential Election Watch: Rouhani Criticizes Ahmadinejad's Holocaust Denial & Calls To Annihilate Israel

The IRDiplomacy website, close to former Iranian diplomat and adviser to former President Khatami Seyed Mohammad Sadegh Kharazi, has published excerpts of an interview with Presidential candidate Hassan Rouhani, which is highly critical of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's foreign policy.

Rouhani argues that though the events of the Arab Spring --- which Iran refers to as the Islamic Awakening --- could have changed the strategic balance in the Middle East to Iran's advantage, "some unwise and radical behaviors deprived the Islamic Republic of Iran of using the situation to its benefit."

Ahmadinejad's policies --- including his Holocaust denial and calls to eliminate Israel --- merely led to "increased unity among Iran's enemies", Rouhani argued.

Regarding whether Iran should open bilateral talks with the US, Rouhani said:

The present conditions must be carefully analyzed and, if necessary, negotiation and bilateral dialogue with the US must not be avoided. The first steps should be aimed at preventing the increase of pressures and stopping the trend of the present sanctions. During the next stages, the atmosphere must be balanced until the complete elimination of sanctions.

I don’t believe in negotiation just for the sake of negotiation and without achieving any results. We must have a clear agenda and objective in negotiating with the US.

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Syria Today: Political "Chicken" and the Russian Missiles

Bashar al-Assad & Vladimir Putin Syrian National Coalition: No Part in Conference Without Assad Exit

The opposition Syrian National Coalition has officially confirmed that it will not participate in a proposed international "peace" conference in Geneva next month without a guarantee that President Assad will leave power.

The committee adopted a declaration amid a week-long meeting in Turkey, "The participation of the Syrians in any conference is tied to the presentation of a deadline for a solution and giving the necessary binding international guarantees."

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Iran Today: Presidential Election --- Rouhani Ramps Up Campaign

Rouhani Talks About House Arrest of Mousavi and Karroubi

Moderate Presidential candidate Hassan Rouhani's campaign team have published a short excerpt from a Q&A session Rouhani gave at the Sharif University of Technology on May 13, in which he discusses the house arrests of former Presidential candidates Mousavi and Karroubi.

In the video --- taken before the Guardian Council disqualified former President Hashemi Rafsanjani from the election --- the audience applauds as a student asks Rouhani what his plan would be regarding the house arrests of Mousavi and Karroubi.

Rouhani answers:

I believe that the next President of Iran… If I become the next President… but now that Mr Hashemi has registered, we have to wait and see… [applause, students chant 'Praise to Hashemi']… the next government, you see, continuing this split is not in our best interests…the gap, which is getting wider every day, should be eliminated. I believe the election itself could work to reduce the gaps, but I hope that the next government is able to bring about a non-securitized environment.

I don't think it will be difficult to bring about such condition in the next year, in which not only those who are under house arrest, but also those who have been detained after the 2009 elections will be released. [Applause, chants of "Rouhani, we love you".]

Rouhani also tweeted that people have a "natural right" to express themselves without fear of reprisals:

People have a natural #right to express themselves, including their #issues, without any concerns. #Rouhani2013 #hope #ruleoflaw

— Rouhani Campaign (@HassanRouhani) May 29, 2013

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Syria Analysis: The Wider Politics of the "Russian S-300 Missiles to Damascus"

Russia answered the Western pressure with the clear signal that it will continue to provide weapons to the "legitimate" authority in Syria. In so doing, it was sending another message: if you want to have an international "peace" conference, that "legitimate" regime will have to be allowed at the table with no pre-conditions on its participation.

Yet, at the same time, Moscow was not going to wear the villain's mantle designed for it by the "West", but was going to maintain plausible deniability. Th message:

Maybe we are supplying S-300s under an old contract, maybe we are not --- you keep trying to figure it out.

Meanwhile, your move, Washington. Your move, London. Are you really going to pour in more weapons to the insurgency, even as you criticise us for supplying our own to the "legitimate" leaders of Syria?

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Syria Today: Europe Lifts Arms Embargo on Insurgents

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Head of Free Syria Army Threatens Attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon

The Free Syrian Army's Chief of Staff, General Salim Idriss, has warned, "If the attacks of Hezbollah against Syrian territory do not stop within 24 hours, we will take all measures to hunt Hezbollah, even in hell."

Idriss continued with the threat to intervene in Lebanon, where Hezbollah is based, "I will no longer be bound by any commitments I made, if a decision to stop the attacks...is not taken and implemented," said Idriss.

Idriss said, "We are being subjected to a genocide conducted by Hezbollah," and, without giving details of specific operations said he hoped "that everyone will excuse the Free [Syrian] Army" for retaliating.

The principle sticking point involves voting. Existing members of the coalition insist that the inclusion of new members must be based on balloting by existing members only. But this would change little in a monopoly that was made possible by interference from regional countries to begin with, rather than based on consensus among Syrian opposition. The existing members were not chosen by the people to decide whether certain opposition figures should be members or not.

The second issue is the "blocking third", or the veto power held by a third of the members. This idea was advanced by the coalition's secretary general, Mustafa Al Sabbagh, and was clearly meant to maintain the monopoly of the current core group within the coalition.

Hassan argues that this stalemate may cripple the group, and will only fuel the stalemate seen on Syria's battlefields.

On the other hand, The Atlantic's Shadi Hamid argues that the political stalemate can only be solved by progress on the battlefield, and that progress has not happened because the international community is waiting for a unified leadership that will likely never occur:

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