According to Vali Nasr (Dean of one of the Faculties at the John Hopkins University and a Fellow of the Brookings Institute) there is not much leverage left on Iran through further sanctions: we are at the end of the sanctions option.
On access to Parchin to investigate past suspected non peaceful uses of nuclear materials there is still no progress and the Iranians have now shortened the break-out time to go from 20% enrichment to 90% to just a month or so from any time they decide to make a nuclear bomb.
Judging by the comments below they have no intention of rushing to negotiate anything with the P5+1.
"We proposed concrete dates and a venue in December," said a spokesman for Catherine Ashton, who oversees contacts with Iran on behalf of United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany, often referred to as the six world powers.
"Since then, we have been very surprised to see Iran come back to us again and again with new pre-conditions on the modalities of the talks, for example by changing the venue and delaying their responses," spokesman Michael Mann said.
The $ has traded at around 37,000 rials in the last few days while the best central bank rate for purchases of essential medicines, etc. has remained unchanged at around 12,250, so of course donkeys laden with medicines must be crossing from Iran to Iraq to strip out the difference between the central bank rate and the market rate. Robberies and burglaries have increased. Hence the hangings have to be more public to deter crime (2 hanged in a public park this week in Teheran for a violent robbery where none of the victims died).
This looks like the year where Iran either tests the bomb or the West attacks it. The behaviour of our directors is therefore inexplicable. I've heard rumours that NIOC is changing some of its $ oil revenues at the black market rate (it helps to plug any budget deficit?). I bet we only get the 12,250 rate when we pay the Teheran office rent, but as long as our directors refuse to talk about Iran, I presume we will never know.
UCL Price at posting:
13.5¢ Sentiment: None Disclosure: Held
