Iran's biggest economic problem is the growing production slump at its factories and workshops. For both workers and the business elite, Iran's domestic industrial troubles are far more pressing--and generating far more public anxiety --- than international sanctions.
The biggest danger for Iran in 2011 is the combination of higher unemployment and inflation produced by government inaction, unintended consequences of subsidy reform, and dwindling foreign capital caused by banking sanctions.
1907 GMT: The US State Department Spokeswoman, Victoria Nuland, has defended a Syrian-government funded trip by a US ambassador to tour northern Syria. Nuland said that it was an opportunity for Ambassador Robert Ford to "see for himself the results of the Syrian government's brutality." According to Ford, the town of Jisr al-Shughour, a focus of the tour, was abandoned, and there were no civilians present to dispute the Syrian government's claims.
1844 GMT: An activist with sources in Libya is claiming that NATO has struck positions occupied by pro-Gaddafi forces near Nalut. Also, Gaddafi's forces in Ghazaya have also been hit by NATO aitstrikes five times in the last day, and his forces in Ruwais have also been struck:
1811 GMT: Journalists in Libya are reporting that Misurata is once again being shelled by Gaddafi forces, potentially by Grad rockets. Three or four large explosions have been heard in the last hour, and there were explosions on Benghazi street.
1910 GMT: At the Movies. Lebanese authorities have banned the screening of the Iranian film "Green Days" about the protests after the 2009 Presidential election.
The ban was implemented after a request by the Iranian Ambassador. When the organiser of the Beirut International Film Festival, asked Lebanese officials for a reason, they said, "This is not our decision, we are only carrying out orders."
The film was to be screened at the Festival's "Forbidden Films Festival". It is directed
by Hana Makhmalbaf, 22, the daughter of prominent filmmaker Mohsen Makhamalbaf, who is close to opposition figure Mir Hossein Mousavi.
Lebanese authorities also banned the screening of "Green Days" at a festival last October, at the same time that President Ahmadinejad visited Beirut.
President Obama is expected to announce within a week if and how many combat troops he plans to withdraw from the war in Afghanistan. Some of those who will be most impacted by the decision are U.S. soldiers and their families and Afghans who have been dealing with the ramifications of the war for nearly a decade.
Yet the war is affecting more than just Western soldiers and their families and Afghan citizens. It has become a costly drain on our nation’s treasury; the money that is being spent on the war represents resources that are being drained away from important domestic priorities in a nation with crumbling infrastructure.
President Obama plans to announce his decision on the scale and pace of troop withdrawals from Afghanistan in a speech on Wednesday evening, an administration official said Monday.
As he closes in on a decision, another official said, Mr. Obama is considering options that range from a Pentagon-backed proposal to pull out only 5,000 troops this year to an aggressive plan to withdraw within 12 months all 30,000 troops the United States deployed to Afghanistan as part of the surge in December 2009.
Under another option, a third official said, Mr. Obama would announce a final date for the withdrawal of all the surge forces sometime in 2012, but leave the timetable for incremental reductions up to commanders in the field — much as he did in drawing down troops after the surge in Iraq.
A Town in the Nile DeltaOn his first political foray beyond cosmopolitan Cairo, Shady Ghazali Harb, a British-educated surgeon, hoped to find support for his effort to build a political party.
What he found instead, here [in Buzoor] in the Nile Delta, was uncertainty about the new crop of politicians emerging from Egypt’s revolution. Farmers who had gathered in a dirt yard to hear Harb speak stared blankly as the 32-year-old idealist in jeans, a purple dress shirt and Adidas sneakers spoke of his desire to set up shop “where people hang out.’’
“People don’t go to coffee shops here,” Karam el-Hadi Mohammed, 55, a merchant and farmer, told him. “They work hard and go to bed early.’’
1855 GMT: Varying reactions to the speech of Syrian President Assad....
Turkish President Abdullah Gul has said Assad's speech is "not enough", as the President should implement a multi-party-system; however, the deputy secretary-general of the Arab League, Ahmed bin Heli, said Syria is a "main factor of balance and stability in the region" and the League rejects any foreign intervention in its affairs.
1710 GMT: The journalists of the human rights organisation Avaaz claim the Damascus suburbs of Harasta and Arbeen the coastal city of Latakia have been locked down by security forces after protests today challenging the speech of President Assad.
The group asserts that security forces are currently conducting a random wave of arrests in Latakia, detaining dozens and chasing and attacking protesters through the side streets.
1705 GMT: Another protest in Syria reacting against President Assad's speech, this one in Binnish in Idlib Province in the northwest:
1740 GMT: The Foreign Ministry Dispute. Leading MP Ahmad Tavakoli has increased the pressure on the Ahmadinejad camp over the proposed appointment of Mohammad Sharif Malekzadeh as staff and finance manager at the Foreign Ministry (see 0500 GMT).
Tavakoli has claimed that Minister of Intelligence Heydar Moslehi told Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi not to appoint Malekzadeh because he is on the verge of arrest over financial irregularities. Tavakoli declared that Salehi had proposed three candidates before Malekzadeh to the President; Ahmadinejad rejected all of them.
Malekzadeh has responded that Tavakoli is spreading slander and should release documents. He claims the MP is providing a story for the enemy.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government is seeking to divert attention from hardline rivals' allegations that some of the Iranian president's allies, including his chief of staff, are involved in black magic and exorcism.
The government is doing so by assuming the leading role in the battle against occult practices and nonconformist ideologies.
Alireza Afshar, acting interior minister in executive affairs, told Nasim Online, a news website, that the ministry had commissioned a non-governmental organisation to identify those engaged in divination and exorcism as well as "deviant schools of thought and false Gnosticism".
On Sunday, the departing US Ambassador, Karl Eikenberry, used a speech to students in the western Afghan city of Herat to rebuke President Hamid Karzai: ""When we hear ourselves being called occupiers and worse, our pride is offended and we begin to lose our inspiration to carry on."
Tuesday, June 21, 2011 at 19:19
Iran's biggest economic problem is the growing production slump at its factories and workshops. For both workers and the business elite, Iran's domestic industrial troubles are far more pressing--and generating far more public anxiety --- than international sanctions.
