Iran Needs Higher Oil Price for 2013 Budget - Report

Iran needs the highest oil price among OPEC members to balance its 2013 budget, the Arab Petroleum Investments Corp., known as Apicorp, said today. Iran requires an average crude price of $144 a barrel this year to break even. (Bloomberg, 27 July)

Iran is now at last place among the six Persian Gulf oil exporters. The oil sanctions has pushed Iranian exports to below 1.5 million barrels a day, hence the need to get more per barrel to balance its budget.

Saudi Arabia needs $98 to balance its budget. Not surprisingly, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said on May 31 in Vienna that Brent at about $100 is a fair price.

Rouhani to Introduce His Cabinet at Inauguration - MP

Rouhani reportedly will introduce his cabinet during his swearing-in ceremony on August 4, Member of Majlis Ramezan-Ali Sobhanifar said today. (IRNA/Press TV, 27 July)

The swearing-in ceremony will be held one day after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei  officially endorses Rouhani’s victory in a separate ceremony.

Rouhani is expected to introduce a coalition government, comprising of ministers representing different political leanings. The most sensitive cabinet posts (including Intelligence, Defense, Oil, Interior), as well as the Secretary of Supreme National Security Council who acts as chief nuclear negotiator, need to have Khamenei’s approval, or at least his lack of objection, before Rouhani could introduce his choices. Who would occupy those posts will be the first major indication of how much leeway and independence Rouhani would have to shape the internal and foreign policies of the country in his first term.

Photo credit: Iran’s President-elect Hassan Rouhani (IRNA/Press TV)

White House-Congress Divide on Iran Sanctions Widens – LA Times

As Iran prepares to inaugurate its moderate president, the Obama administration and Congress are sharply divided on how tough an approach to take on the country's nuclear program, the LA Times reported today.

“Obama administration eases some sanctions in the wake of Hassan Rouhani's election. (But) some lawmakers want even more (sanctions), fearing time is short to block a nuclear bomb.” (LA Times, 27 July)

The Obama administration, which hopes to meet incoming President Hassan Rouhani's team in September on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, this week announced an easing of sanctions on medical supplies, farm products and humanitarian aid.

Meanwhile, the House appears close to passing a tough new sanctions measure aimed at further cutting Iran’s oil exports.


Secretary of State John Kerry and other officials are urging Congress to hold off on new sanctions before expected nuclear talks, warning of the risk of alienating new leaders who might be willing to give diplomacy a chance, the LA Times said.

"You could have a train wreck if a draconian new bill is passed during negotiations," said Cliff Kupchan, an Iran specialist at the Eurasia Group and a former State Department official.

Senior members of Obama's nuclear team from his first term are among those who have called on the administration to take a new approach.

File photo: The White House (whitehouse.gov)

Iran sanctions result in huge downturn for Renault

Above: Pars Khodro production line of Renault Megane 

 According to the BBC:

French carmaker Renault has reported a huge fall in profits for the first half of 2013 after writing off the entire value of its business in Iran.

Net income for the six months to June fell 87% to 97m euros ($129m; £83.7m), down from 774m euros a year earlier, a statement said.

The firm took a 512m-euro charge after halting its activities in Iran because of international sanctions imposed over the country's nuclear programme.

Sanctions are a two-way street. In place of European (and potentially American) cars, Iran is importing and assembling Chinese models.

Without sanctions, carmakers such as Renault and GM would be making considerable profits with Iranian commerce. Boeing would be manufacturing and selling more airplanes; General Electric would be building ten more nuclear reactors, etc, etc.

Imagine what peace and rapprochement with Iran would mean to American economic recovery, and the American employment it could generate.

File Photo: Pars Khodro

Rouhani Was Instrumental in Halting Clandestine Nuclear Program – French Ambassador

In an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times, Francois Nicoullaud, France’s ambassador to Tehran from 2001 to 2005, writes that Iran’s President-elect Hassan Rouhani was instrumental in halting IRGC’s clandestine nuclear weapon program in late 2003.

“As Hassan Rouhani prepares to become the next president of the Iranian Islamic Republic, it is worth recalling the leading role he played as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator in late 2003, when the clandestine program run by the Revolutionary Guards to produce a nuclear weapon was halted,” said Nicoullaud. (The New York Times, 26 July)

To read Mr. Nicoullaud’s piece, please click here.

Iran Seeking Direct Talks With U.S. on Nuclear Program – New York Times

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of Iraq told the Obama administration this month that Iran was interested in direct talks with the United States on its nuclear program, and said that Iraq was prepared to facilitate the negotiations, the New York Times reported today, quoting Western officials.

In a meeting in early July with the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad, Mr. Maliki suggested that he was relaying a message from Iranian officials and asserted that President-elect Hassan Rouhani would be serious about any discussions with the U.S.

“The Iranians see Maliki as somebody they have some trust in,” said Mr. Samore, the director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard. “From Maliki’s standpoint, it would serve a number of different purposes. He does not want to be squeezed between Washington and Tehran.” (The New York Times, 26 July)

In a separate move on Thursday, the State and Treasury Departments announced that the United States was expanding the list of medical devices, like dialysis machines, that could be sold to Iran without a license.

Photo credit: Secretary of State John Kerry meeting with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of Iraq, center, in Baghdad in March (Jason Reed, Pool Photo/New York Times)