EAST KURDISTAN (IRAN) – Click Headlines for Full Texts / “Did Merkel save Obama”?
Iran Returns Russian-Built Sub to Persian Gulf
Iran returned a Russian-built Project 877 class (NATO Kilo) diesel-electric submarine to the waters of the Persian Gulf on Tuesday following a refit. The refitted boat, the Tareq, was relaunched at the port of Bandar Abbas. Iran has three Project 877 boats bought from Russia in the 1990s.
Iran preparing internal-only version of the Internet
The move is likely to worry Internet freedom activists and the Obama administration, which has spent millions of dollars on initiatives designed to ease access to the Internet in Iran and other countries with repressive governments.
Did Germany’s Angela Merkel Save Obama?
Germany remains Iran’s largest EU trade partner, with an annual bi-lateral trade volume hovering around 4 billion euros, and this robust trade relationship has been a source of great irritation for the Bush and Obama administrations. According to WikiLeaks, U.S. diplomatic cable dispatches noted before the Treasury rebuke that “Germany won’t sanction German Bank EIH” because “the German business community is very powerful.”
Western report – Iran ships arms, personnel to Syria via Iraq
Iran has been using civilian aircraft to fly military personnel and large quantities of weapons across Iraqi airspace to Syria to aid President Bashar al-Assad in his attempt to crush an 18-month uprising against his government, according to a Western intelligence report.