See also Iran Analysis: Tehran's Signals on Nuclear Talks --- We Will Negotiate, But We Can Be Tough Just Like the US
Thursday's Iran Live Coverage: "Our Enemies Are Within Our Houses, Mosques, Seminaries, and Schools"
1545 GMT: Executions Watch. Five Iranian-Arab political activists on death row in Ahwaz have gone on hunger strike, according to human rights activists.
The five men --- Hashem Shabaninejad, Hadi Rashedi, Mohammadali Amourinejad, and Jaber and Mokhtar Alboshokeh --- began the strike on 2 March in protest against the conditions at Karoon Prison in Ahwaz. Activists said the five are no longer allowed to contact their families by telephone.
The men were sentenced to death last July for “enmity against God, corruption on earth, and propaganda against the regime and against national security.”
1530 GMT: Your Tehran Friday Prayer Update. Scott Lucas returns from an academic break....
Ayatollah Movahedi Kermani takes the podium today to give the crowd an economic message from the Supreme Leader: "Temporary hardships can be overcome with faith in Islam....The enemy scorns us because of our progress."
The cleric said sanctions had aimed at "opposing the people to the rulers, but they had failed, as seen by the turnout of the Iranian people at rallies in February for the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.
In other words, "unlike the West, we have solutions for economic problems".
1150 GMT:Claim of the Day. Mohammad Javad Larijani, secretary general of Iran's high council for human rights, has accused the UN’s Special Rapporteur for Human Rights, Ahmed Shaheed, of accepting money from the U.S.
Larijani was quoted as saying "The money the special rapporteur has received from the U.S. State Department has led to a situation that he cannot write about anything except their anti-Iran desires," therefore explaining in Larijani’s eyes Shaheed’s repeated criticisms of Iran’s human rights record.
1109 GMT:Oil Watch. India is set to halt all crude imports from Iran due to an unwillingness by insurance companies to cover refineries processing Iranian oil in light of Western sanctions.
India takes approximately one quarter of Iran’s oil exports worth $1 billion each month, making it the second-largest buyer of Iranian oil.
Reuters quotes P.P. Upadhya, managing director of Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, – India’s largest buyer of Iranian crude – as saying "If cover is not available then all Indian refiners will have to halt imports from Iran or else they will have to take a huge risk.”
0843 GMT:Ahmadinejad Watch. Ben Offiler takes the Live Coverage....
President Ahmadinejad will be in Caracas, Venezuela today for the funeral of Hugo Chavez.
Ahmadinejad, who on Wednesday called Chavez a “martyr [who lost his life] in the path of serving the Venezuelan people and preserving human and revolutionary values”, is accompanied by Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi, Vice President for Executive Affairs Seyyed Hassan Mousavi, Vice President for Parliamentary Affairs Mohammad-Reza Mir-Tajeddini and acting Minister of Cooperatives, Labor and Social Welfare Asadollah Abbasi.
0735 GMT:Nuclear Watch. We begin this morning with an assessment of the latest Iranian statements on the nuclear talks with the 5+1 Powers (US, Britain, Germany, France, China, and Russia), including the Supreme Leader's declaration on Thursday.
The analysis, however, is not just of Tehran's line --- an insistence that its right to enrich uranium must be publicly acknowledged --- but of its reaction to tough talk this week from US officials, this week, including Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, and US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice.
President Obama now makes his own contribution, with officials putting out the spin via CNN about the President's White House meeting with Jewish American leaders.
Obama said he will not engage in any "chest beating" over Iran's nuclear program, but then made clear that he will issue a "clear and direct" challenge to Tehran during his upcoming Middle East trip, including a visit to Israel.
The President said "he will still work toward a diplomatic resolution with Iran over its nuclear program, but repeated that no options are off the table, including military ones".