because we have iran in iran wire.ven justice for iran, which is a human rights organization fighting against the iranian government is harassed because it has "iran" in its name. so that is -- but iranian government is also using these sanctions in order to cover its inefficiencies and mismanagement and blame the u.s. for all the miseries and problems. >> suzanne, how would you assess the american trump administration maximum pressure campaign in terms of its desired intentions to target the irgc, in particular, but regime elements, without alienating the population as a whole? how would you assess the effectiveness of that? >> i think overall, the u.s. strategy has been very effective at compounding the structural economic problems that have existed in iran really since the earliest days of the revolution, that no government has managed to really make progress on addressing in a consistent and durable fashion over the course of the past 40 years. so as maziar said, these sanctions have been effective in part because

so they are ready both inside iran and outside of iran for an attack. think the best policy for the american government and its allies is to have 0 tolerance for iranian military attacks outside of iran because if iranian military intervention in the region is tolerated then it will disable the regime and go on and that in turn will lead to more human rights abuses and brutality by the regime. the regime should know that it has to pay a price. if it attacks the tanker in the persian gulf it is going to pay for it. if it kills an american soldier or attacks american allies in iraq it will pay a price. >> we will be coming to the audience for your questions and 10 minutes or so, think about what you would like to ask our panel. let me ask you to give your judgment, whether additional iranian provocations or escalation are likely in this continuing stalemate when the regime is under pressure, looking for some way to increase pain for the other side. i note that there have been, quoting al jazeera here, since october 28, '10 rocket attacks in iraq near us t

here on the iran help syria get ready for us to acknowledge iran because waster. iran has been supportive of the syrian people from the very start of this conflict and that hasn't changed we've been providing a large amount of aid to syria and the syrian government has been able to restore its positions with the help that we are ready to do all we can to help drive u.s. forces out of the country whenever the syrian government decides to also help. the show on monday in israel consider a late night show me rate in syria as they have done many times before me how. are they trying to target iranian troops. i can say from experience that all of these. crimes committed by israel on syrian soil will not remain on the punished. people if syria and lebanon will strike back . people's a very patient benchley israel will have to pay for its crimes. and we hope that the resistance will survive all these american and israeli bombings. i'm sure that the resistance fighters will make israel gretz action that. israel has experienced retribution in the past when i've been instruc

relations with iran. this event was held at the university of michigan's ford school of public policy in ann arbor. [ applause ] hello, everybody, welcome. i would like first also to add my thanks to the wiser family as well as to the american academy of diplomacy with which we've been fortunate to partner with today's event together. the topic we'll address is timely and extremely important. we will talk about u.s.-iran relations, the nuclear deal, politics and security in the gulf more generally and of course, those issues are linked to a whole range of other regional issues relevant to u.s. foreign policy in the middle east from israel and the palestinian territories to the conflicts in siria, yemen and afghanistan and beyond, and to have a discussion on such an important and wide-ranging array of issues we have assembled a real dream team of diplomats with experience in the region and i'm going introduce them briefly and trust me, introducing them in a time-efficient manner requires distillation of th

and so regime change in iran has to come from iran. [applause] president trump has regularly talked about the need of governments to protect their own people. it is not for us here in the united states to change the iranian regime. for the iranian people to change the iranian regime. we can be supported but we can't interfere. that's a fine line, different people to find that differently, but it's a conversation well worth having and i thank you for raising the question. >> dr. bell. >> thank you. it's a great question and i understand the challenge, that ultimately what we seek is how can we use all measures, short imposing our extra will on iran to try to encourage the changes a behavior, the change is a policy that we seek? and if you think back over the last 20 20 years since 9/11, or express with regime change really doesn't always produce the types of legitimate governments that are seen in the eyes of their peoples but you but to protect and serve the population that can really serve the entire group of the population themselves

thank you for coming to focus on the subject of human rights and iran. i want to recognize some amazing attendees we have over 50 members of the diplomatic corps, thank you very much for coming but we also have so many people from the iranian diaspora as well we will begin today's program with secretary mike pompeo with three cohosts for religious freedom deputy director mike bell. during the listening sessions we heard the members of how we can continue to share your story and support your voices and we will dive deeper into the issue and also have an opportunity to hear from survivors who have first-hand experience of the iranian regime's oppression. assistant secretary for human rights and labor previously chaired and served a six term as commissioner on civil rights. with a 15 year interface dialogue. my friend, bob. [applause] >> good morning, everybody. on behalf of the department of state on human rights and labor , i would like to thank you all this morning for your participation for those that are concerned about reclaiming the broken promises a

iran. the weiser diplomacy center and the american academy of diplomacy hosted this event at the university of michigan ford school of public policy. form school of public policy. [applause] >> hello, everybody. and welcome. i would like first to add my thanks to the wiser family as well as to the academy of diplomacy which we've been fortunate to partner with to bring today's topic. today's topic is timely and extremely important. we're going to talk about u.s.-iran negotiations, politics and security in the gulf more generally. and of course, those issues are linked to a whole range of other regional issues relevant to u.s. foreign policy in the middle east from israel and the palestinian territories in yemen and afghanistan appear beyond. to have a discussion about this, we've assembled a dream team with experience in the region. i'm going to introduce them briefly. and trust me, introducing them in a time efficient manner requires a lot of distlation of their incredible accomplishments

and iran. thank you. >> thank you. >> great, thank you so much and thank you especially to hallie for this opportunity. and incredibly generous introduction which i will interpret at taruf rather than actual description of my role here and in this field. i was one of the great sort of thrills. to go to an iranian studies conference but the greats of the field sitting in the audience and has had the same sense of thrill to be with people who have not just incredible scholarship on this issue, but also the benefit of firsthand experience during what i think was an incredibly critical juncture in the history of iran, the history of the region. increasingly ever more relevant today this particular episode. i'm going to quickly make four big points. about the impact of the hostage crisis on iran. the first is i think many of you already are well aware is the roll of this moment of the seizure of the embassy and 444 day stand off that followed in consolidating the authority of the clerical elements o

with iran help syria get ready for us to acknowledge iran because waster. iran has been supportive of the syrian people from the very start of this conflict and that hasn't changed we've been providing a large amount of aid to syria and the syrian government has been able to restore its position with the help that we are ready to do all we can to help drive u.s. forces out of the country whenever this year and government decides to also help. the show on monday in israel consider a late night show me rate in syria as they have done many times before me how. are they trying to target iranian troops. to. be in. i can say from experience that all of these military crimes committed by israel on syrian soil will not remain on the punished. people if syria and lebanon will strike back. people's a very patient that would eventually israel will have to pay for its crimes. and we hope that the resistance will survive all these american and israeli bombings. i'm sure that the resistance fighters will make israel action that. israel has experienced retribution in the

and iran. thank you. >> thank you. >> great, thank you so much and thank you especially to haleh for this incredibly generous, both the opportunity and incredibly generous introduction which i will interpret as taruf rather than actual description of my role here and my role in this field. i was one of the great sort of thrills. the first time i ever came to washington under professional circumstance was to go to an iranian studies conference where i saw the greats of the field. they were sitting in the audience and it was my career ever since then has had that same sense of thrill to be with people who have not just incredible scholarship on this issue but also the benefit of firsthand experience during what i think was an incredibly critical juncture in the history of iran, the history of the region, history of u.s. policy toward the region. increasingly, ever more relevant today i think this particular episode. i'm going to try to quickly make four big points about the impact of the hostage

know anything about iran and iran/u.s. contacts, you know suzanne has played a very important role in thinking about it and sometimes helping nudge along behind-the-scenes conversations that have been important in the story of the run-up to the jcpoa. we'll see what suzanne wants to tell us about life since then. so, just to introduce our subject in a couple of sentences, just over a month ago, november 15th, a wave of protests of unusual intensity broke out in iran. the estimates of the people who'd been killed as the regime tried to crack down range from the most recent amnesty international figure i believe is 304 killed. the high end is a u.s. estimate of over a thousand. we'll ask our panelists for their own thoughts about this, what the right estimate is. it's clear that many hundreds of people had been killed. that probably thousands have been injured. thousands have been been arrestd imprisoned. this is, this is a big statement by iranians of their unhappiness with the regime and a tense and violent crackdown. comp

here on the iran help syria get ready for us to acknowledge iran because waster.iran has been supportive of the syrian people from the very start of this conflict and that hasn't changed we've been providing a large amount of aid to syria and the syrian government has been able to restore its position with the help that we are ready to do all we can to help drive us forces out of the country whenever this year and government decides to also help. the show on monday in israel consider a late night show me right in syria as they have done many times before me how. are they trying to target iranian troops. to. be in. i can say from experience that all of these. crimes committed by israel on syrian soil will not remain on the punished. people if syria and lebanon will strike back . people's a very patient really benchley israel will have to pay for its crimes. and we hope that the resistance will survive all these american and israeli bombings. i'm sure that the resistance fighters will make israel gretz is actually. israel has experience retribution in the past when

capital of iran.ike -- there are neighborhoods in rome this feels a lot like. after all this time, i finally had my chance to see a country i'd heard so much about. the weather's nice too. i don't know what i was expecting, but it's nice. a big blank spot on nearly every traveler's resume. merci. delicious! thank you. ♪ >> arianne: once upon a time there was an ancient kingdom where they found a lot of magical black stuff under the ground. but, two other kingdoms had the key to the magical black stuff, and when they wouldn't share, the people of the ancient kingdom got mad. they voted and their leader said, "the magical black stuff is ours to keep." but, the other kingdoms were afraid of losing all of the magical black stuff so they gave money to some bad men to get rid of the leader. they put back in power another leader, and they gave him money, too! to some he was a good king, but to others he could be very cruel. after many years, the people of the kingdom got mad, this time even madder, so they s

that are still in iran. so we have been condemning the regime for its harassment of journalists, they've jailed journalists and murdered journalists. and so when you look at the constitution of iran, it guarantees basic freedoms, freem of of assembly, freedom of press, freedom of speech. and the regime is not only not protecting them, they're violating them. what was your first again. >> about the internet. >> i've said as much as i can on the journalists. on the first thing, on the internet -- >> do we have any examples that -- >> i've said everything that there is to say on the subject. i've identified the media outlets by name. >> that's pretty impressive. everything? >> no, i'm saying that i have identified by name the media outlets and the journalists who are being harassed. it's very clear. i'm going to leave it as what i've said. and on the internet, yes, this was an unprecedented shutdown of the internet f one of the things that i'll point out is that iran is in a tough spot, because whenever they sh

and then iran as iran stated many times. restores the observation of those obligations which it does here and exclusively or on a voluntary basis probably it would be an ideal resolution solution let's turn to the other use that a top iraqi militia leader has warned of a strong response against the us forces in iraq following airstrikes or a shia armed group that killed at least 27 people iran has condemned the u.s. attacks in iraq and syria calling it a terrorist acts and i 5 camps belonging to the iranian backed armed group captive hizbollah were hates 3 in iraq and 2 more in syria as we said at least $27.00 people were killed iraq's prime minister has cold's the attacks on the group or breach sovereignty but the u.s. calls it a decisive response to aggression against us troops in iraq by iranian backed forces and this warning of further action to come what we did was take a decisive response that makes clear what president trump has said for months and months and months which is that we will not stand for the islamic repu

to iran. now another headline news wiki leaks founder julian assange claims he's slowly dying in a u.k. jail as he's regularly tranquilize and is kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day in a phone call to his friend warren smith on christmas eve the jailed publisher made the disturbing revelations. rang me because he knew he spent christmas with me and my family in 2010 while on bail work time ago i think he simply wanted a few minutes of skate around to talk to us because of the memories he had about happy memories he was slurring his speech was slurred he was speaking slowly now julian is a highly articulate very clear person when he speaks and he's all for and it was very upsetting to head the idea of him being sedated has come from several people who visited him who clearly need the british government have been asked about it and they refuse to address that matter what they say is they're not mistreating him but clearly he's being kept in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day he soun

we sided the shah of iran in part because he crushed that communist dissent in iran. i don't think most american political elites thought too much about the islamic dissidents in that state. it was kind of off our radar. part of the reason i wrote the book i did called taken hostage which i was trying to get across how reasonably so but narrowly slow americans tended to look at our alliances in that part of the world. we didn't think of islam as a political force. we feared communism. we cheered on what we thought as capitalist development. we think didn't see the green revolution that was coming. the united states and iran have had a complicated relationship for a long time. really since the 1950s. up until the 1950s, iran was kind of a client state of great britain, but when world war ii ended and britain moved back from its colonial periphery, the united states stepped forward. one of the things we did is we became very involved, the iranians would say too much involved in their affairs. in 1953, the united states, using its brand-new cia helped engineer a coup in

airstrikes against iraqi militias ported by iran iran says the struggle violated softened so that it will not review relations with washington u.s. forces hit 5 targets belonging to a group called type hezbollah retaliating for a rocket attack that killed a u.s. civilian contractor at an american base. this hezbollah base near the border between iraq and syria was one of 5 targets of u.s. fighter jets they destroyed the iran backed militias weapons caches and command and control centers in iraq and syria the strikes are retaliation for friday's killing of a u.s. civilian contractor near the northern iraqi city of kirkuk. iran's foreign minister condemned the u.s. air strikes during a visit to moscow he said the targeted hezbollah was part of an alliance against the so-called islamic state terror group officially the iran backed militia is under the command of the iraqi army. but hello from because at the recent actions by americans in iraq are unacceptable while the u.s. does this iran and russia are making efforts to establish peace both in syria and in iraq i mean it will check it

this week: protests convulse iran, but also iraq and lebanon. how does all this unrest relate and where does it leave tehran?s dream for dominance of the region? nato leaders are due to meet this week, but how confidently can they predict 70 more years of ?all for one and one for all? 7 they predict 70 more years of "all for one and one for all"? and we?re getting close to make your mind up time in the uk election. so what exactly will make up voters? minds? my guests this week: iranian journalist nazenin ansari, italian film maker annalisa piras, and michael goldfarb, american host of the frdh podcast. we are one guest down this week due to illness, so the other three will have to do more heavy lifting for me. there are conflicting accounts of how many people have died and how many have been arrested in iran in the past fortnight. what started as a wave of protest against rising petrol prices seems to have turned into a wider howl of outrage against crushing inflation and unemployment. it's the biggest show of public defiance to iran's ayatolla

despite iran's resilience to the u.s. sanctions their effect has taken its toll the last months of 2019 or more by protests across the country when gasoline prices skyrocketed due to the government's decision to cut fuel subsidies though the plan was to direct the additional funds to supporting over $60000000.00 people in need crowds it still took to the streets it was initially at peaceful rally but it quickly turned violent in some places and resulted in several deaths including a law enforcement officers now that story it's easy even put the country on its old school internet shut down to prevent the protests from spreading now let's guess who was the 1st to capitalize on iran's civil unrest the iranian people enjoy a better future when their government begins to respect basic human rights abandons its revolutionary. posture and its destabilizing foreign policy in the region and behave simply like a normal nation he's arabian can a poor jobs or eve dismiss that kind of support saying that it was the u.s. sanctions that

backing out of the iran deal? >> i think part of the challenge we see is the president came in with a very bellicose, strident tone against iran and that's the same architect of the iraq war. yon bolton, national security adviser. tweeted today making references to this reminds him of 1979. we need to take strong action against iran and went from an administration that was looking to really have diplomacy in the region bring everybody in to the fold of the international order to suddenly the united states launching those rhetorical bombs and iran is reacting accordingly. >> kevin, i'm reminded of mike flynn, the national security adviser short time talking to reporters from the white house podium and the press room early in 2017 saying iran, you're on notice. >> right. >> this is escalating now for sometime. >> it has. look. i'm going to bring caution to the discussion against connecting to anything in the past and reminding readers and viewers to the last few months. iraq is in turmoil as the reporters saying fig

iran to doing that. that's going to make it much harder to achieve our objectives. >> let me add a comment on sanctions. sanctions are in an effective tool if you outline clearly the behavior that you want to change. invi the current, long list of sanctions on iran, and i'm not an expert on iran, there is no desired behavior that is enunciated. in other words, we do have a clear policy what we want to do other than denuclearize generally. again, if you outline what you want to have those in behavior. let me add another point. in fine tuning, we are able to allow exceptions and allow certain things to go through, et cetera. but the intent is really for the behavior of the state to change. the trump administration as i just said has not enunciated exactly what it wants to achieve. so the pressure is felt. politically it is played up domestically, and the longer theyey run, the harder they hit. >> actually, i would take the same point and take it further, because the deepest lack of clarity, andnd this has

and how long it takes for pressure to build up in iran.enin can correct me, but in 2000 there were big protests at tehran university. the regime sent in the militia, and they were literally throwing kids out the window. several were killed. in 2009, you had the green revolution, now this. it seems like every ten years you get a new pressure point building up as people become young adults, a whole new generation, and it is the same repressive kind of religious totalitarian regime, although with more freedom than you might think. so, i don't want to say that this has much to do with this particular president or secretary of state — these pressures always exist. i think what is happening is that it is quite clear that the iranian regime has been trying to establish what we call in the west the shia arc of influence. you have had the same kinds of rights in baghdad. again, we have to look internally, certainly in iraq, and this also goes back to iran. the same kinds of riot. to control iraq rather than attending to its own domestic needs. in r

troops inside iran want to repeat that there are already u.s. troops inside iran the u.s. has long had its eyes set on trying to impact regime change in iran and much of what you've seen the u.s. doing with regards to iran has been on a covert level we've seen a report in new yorker by seymour hersh that a u.s. source told him that u.s. marines who are operating in the blue key missouri and kurdish regions of iran have you ever heard of that report i've never heard of the report i've never read the article nor do i intend to do you have any interest as to whether or not you as the u.s. ambassador i don't have any interest as to whether or not u.s. marines are actually operating in iran right now and i said i had not heard of the report and i didn't intend to read the article in the new yorker if i gave you this article right now walked it over would you look at it i don't think so honestly congressman because i don't i don't have time to read much fiction. we have teams inside iran and these include joint special operation forces most elite commando unit it has been given

here is iran for you. we are turning over iran to our enemies.o i think the problem was that the administration perhaps thought it could have its cake and eat it too, too. we can admit the shah and we can preserve this foothold with iraq with its anti-soviet goals. >> is it a fair assessment? >> it is. in my book i'm very candid about mistakes and this was the single worst intelligence failure before or since, in my opinion. the cia which had reinstalled the shah in 1953 and who was our key ally in the region did not know that for five years he was secretly getting cancer treatment for incurable lymphoma. they didn't realize that his domestic support rested on quicksand. they didn't appreciate that ayatollah khamanei, the leader of the radical revolution, exiled outside of paris that the cassettes he was sending back were stirring ape revolution. they didn't understand khamanei himself and they didn't know the unacceptable intelligence failure and the head of the cia apologized and it is we did not give them and the key answer is why didn't he al

yeah, so iran poll. independent company focusing on opinion polling, only on iran but from toronto, canada. hello to canadian consulate people here. we're based in toronto. that is one of our call centers in toronto. scientific polling from iran has been proven to be reliable, scientific. as an example, in the last presidential election in iran in 2017, when president rouhani, the current president was selected, iran poll was able to predict the results of the election. we send the results to economists. they published it web day befone the election. our prediction was accurate between two percentage points of the official results. it is something that could be reliably used, as is with any other polling. so the polling i'm presenting today is used by exact same methodology. 1,000 sample size. it was conducted by telephone. it was conducted in october 2019. it is very fresh. going into it, iranians say the economy is bad and it is getting worse. interestingly, they blame their own government more than th

in iran. we thought about that and sided with the shah of iran in part because he crushed that communist dissent in iran. i don't think most person political elites thought too much about the islamic disdents in that state. it was just kind of off the radar. part of the reason i wrote the book i did was i was really trying to get across how reasonably so but nair rowly americans looked at alliances in that part of the world. we didn't think of islam as a political force. we feared communism. we cheered on what we thought as capitalist developed. we hoped for democratic development we didn't see the islamic, the green revolution that was coming. the united states and iran have had a complicated fraught relationship a long time. really since the 1950s. up until the 1950ss iran was a client state of great britain. but when wourmd ended and britain moved back to the colonial periphery .united states stepped forward. one of the things we did is we became very involved, irans would say very, very to

these empty threats they went to are iran is a powerful state in israel does not dare attack iran they dare not attack has. if they attack lebanon hezbollah will burn israel to the ground imagine what would happen if they attacked a wrong israel is not capable of going through with this all these statements and nothing but propaganda. a military operation has been launched in the northern syrian province of do you support. the regional plan was for the syrian government to liberate and make it free of terrorists. over the past few years syrian troops that cleared most of syria's territory from terrorists and they were. they will do the same. this area of strategic importance will be cleared of terrorism just like aleppo not the syrian cities before. let's not talk about iran's relations with saudi arabia and the gulf cooperation council can. i months foreign minister yourself you know are we in a to visit to say our mission. is excellent in the law we has been foreign minister of amman for over 30 years now throughout this time relations between iran and amman have been developing cons

for the valuable nationals to iran?ere from 30 to a0 dual in foreign nationals who are arbitrarily detained and iranian prisons, they usually have nationality with the west and the very strong implications is that they're being very strong implications is that they‘ re being ta ken very strong implications is that they're being taken in, even if they're being taken in, even if they're just they're being taken in, even if they'rejust academics they're being taken in, even if they're just academics very non—politicized individuals, they are detained to be used as a political lever in negotiations and we see that there are british iranian dual nationals, there are french iranian dual nationals and their other types of nationals. australian academic who have been sentenced to ten years in prison and been held there for more than a year 110w. been held there for more than a year now. thank you very much for that. thank you. the headlines on bbc news. the online forum reddit says it believes leaked government documents, detai

here is iran for you, and we are turning over a iran to our enemies. so, i think that the problem was that the administration perhaps thought that it could have the cake and eat it, too. we can admit the shah and we can preserve this foothold in iran with its anti-soviet goals. is that a fair assessment? >> it is. and in my book, i am very candid about the mistakes, and steve, this is the single worst intelligence failure in american history before or since in my opinion, and the cia which had reinstalled the shah in 1953 and who was our key ally in the region did not know that for five years he was secretly getting cancer treatment for incurable lymphoma, and they did not realize that the domestic support rested on quick sand and they did not appreciate that the ayatollah that was living in exile and the cassettes he was sending back was stirring a domestic revolution, and they did not understand the politics of iran and it is unacceptable intelligence failure, and in my book, the head of the cia did apologize and say that they did not give the presid

this is the world news from al-jazeera iran has set free an american student in return for a scientists in a rare prisoner swap between the 2 countries. but. fighters loyal to libya's u.n. recognized government say they have shot down a fighter jet belonging to the. 6 saudi nationals held for questioning over the deadly shooting at a u.s. naval base in florida. over the mountains of me and clinics for heroin addicts are proving to be controversial. all over one is starting in iraq where there has been a dramatic escalation of violence in what's already been a chaotic 2 months of antigovernment unrest an attack by unidentified gunmen on protesters in baghdad has killed at least $23.00 people raising new security concerns they stormed one of the main protest sites in killarney square on friday night 24 hours after that gunfire was again heard in the capital on saturday sending people running for cover and in what looks like a related event there are reports my home was hit by a drone strike but the influential shia cleric is said to have been away at the time but. live in baghdad for us s

iran seizing control of a british oil tanker u.k. is accusing iranian boats of trying to intercept a british oil tanker and they seem to be no end to this escalation washington and everyone with a warship or regiment to spare seem to be rushing into the persian gulf i mean wasn't the nicest neighborhood to begin with what with saudi arabia and iran mortal enemies facing off across that tiniest of channels. and when it seemed like things couldn't get worse they did. the attack was launched from the north and was in question a response of by iran and made all the calls for deescalation iran has now launched an unprecedented attack on the world center g supply having failed at max pressure secretary poland players turning to max to seek blaming iran won't end disgust or right at the edge of the precipice cooler heads prevailed things calmed down somewhat everyone's fingers still in the trigger but it's more a diplomatic battle now for example trump still pressing on with his sanctions trying to force iran to abide by a nuclear deal that

no there is no possibility of direct for ike and the war against iran and between iran and iran to states because the situation on the ground here in new in the region is in a way that fight would being favor if you were on your own would be the absolute winner off any any tension in the region immediate attention on me so there is no possibility of any fighting because this the americans are the most one. player in the region because of their bases and because of the facilities and the troops that they have in the region so they would have any direct conflict between iran and the united states how many columns are there joining us from tehran thank you for that well the russian and iranian foreign minister is a both condemning the u.s. military action in iraq and syria so again lavrov hosted mohammad java zarif for talks in moscow they're also looking at salvaging the 2015 nuclear deal that was high on their agenda to discuss conflicts across the middle east and said they were keen to increase the cooperation. despite the fact that americans are now thousands of miles away from their bor

development between russia and iran and other neighbors of iran to your region economic. union and other regional partners about us from russia and iran and azerbaijan cooperate in an r g we transit energy. i mean a and b. if you're. wrong there's a big giant have transportation orders about electronic multilateral relations with our neighbors very good. a happy to be able to say this today really new russian relations. are. important and historic perspective as to the regional agenda as my counterpart said just now. we have achieved good cooperation and to really trying to put an end to the suffering of the syrian people through. these a times. leds so the creation of the as to now for months a very successful 4 months to. bring stability to this country and this and. these here we have launched the constitutional committee it was a very successful effort and we out that the palace if i decide this committee will be able to achieve great success in russia and other partners in turkey have done a lot to promote this initiative as to it later i would like to say the situat

trained by iran and by iran so actually what happens today is it's actually. a struggle between the united states and iran. after iran employed the iraqi soil for its interests but it does seem as if u.s. forces are using iraq as a battlefield here to mr trump a set to get revenge on iran does retaliation against the really impact militias justify u.s. strikes on iraq and syria among to deaths that they call. look. this is not alone we also. the iranian expansion over the syria. lebanon as well as you know hizbullah and lebanon is also controlled by iran and if you take yemen another good example you can actually see the grape which is to end goals. jordan israel. taking over iraq syria lebanon into northern tentacle while the southern one to call. yemen over and they're trying to crack everything which is in between which is how the abio is and in jordan this is the picture which we all have to build in mind and now the united states but lo and behold doesn't like it so would what you see today is actually the struggle between iran or the expansionism of iran

for iran.an, welcome back to the newshour. why did the u.s. launch the strikes? >> well, i think, over the last couple of months, you'veksad eleven atton iraqi bases that are hosting coalition forces which include american forcesprandident trump has shown a great deal of restraint over a number of months in the face of various iranian cations, but, during tha time, he's made very clear that we will attack, in self-defense, if we are attacked, and on december 27th, an american was killed and a number of soldiers were injured in one of the bases, and this was an attack by an iranian proxy, and, so, the presidentacook decisivon and conducted strikes against targets in syria and iraq. >> schifrin: iran has vowed to fight theeaximum press campaign to have the u.s. administration with maximum resistance. are you worried these could start an escalation, a cycle of escalation if iran responds with its own attack? >>well, iran has been escalating for some time, and i think what we're trying to do is sen

iran's foreign minister mohammad. agreed with the russian counterpart adding that both iran and russia hold the same position regarding this agreement now he called iran nuclear deal a balanced international initiative but said that the u.s. pretty much trying to sabotage the fruits made by other countries to same. this deal and also trying to impose their own version onto the decisions of the other countries. to be the united states is trying to impose its will in other countries and make them violate international norms and standards as for the european position on the. politically they support it but in part this they do not do enough to counter the us function we think the europeans should stick to their commitments . the iran nuclear deal or please true strictures on the iranian nuclear program in exchange for lifting international sanctions on iran and also allowed for the nation's nuclear sites to be inspected by the international it's make energy agency now the us love imposed several batches of these the sanc

we asked the thames question on iran's infidelity. a founding member of the international labor organization but the regime steals money and drains their pensions. the money is taken from the citizens for their use to take care of their families and turn it into shell casings in the sand and yemen. labor organizers are rounded up, imprisoned and tortured. the universal declaration of human rights states that no one shall be subject to torture or to arbitrary exile but think of the sunni minorities or even nonreligious persons in iraq who continually face prison and torture and execution for their fate -- their faith in the belief system. iran is party to the international convention on civil and political rights. it sounds ironic almost to say it yet iran permits the use of the death penalty. girls starting at age nine and boys at age 13. two, 17-year-old boys were secretly executed just this past year. we have seen protesters come down at random on the streets in just the last 30 days. we grieved to see a callous and corrupt and disr

iran's human rights violations are worse than unacceptable. they're evil and they're wrong because they fundamentally repress the entrepreneurship and spirit of one of the world's great peoples so today we call on the iranian regime to treat your people with basic dignity to which every member of the family of mankind is entitled . uphold your commitments under your own constitution and act like normal country. your people's back their potential. we urge this out of true principle, but also as a message of common sense to the regime . true prosperity will only come to iran when you cease terrorizing your people and i -- and jailing them. indeed, i would urge the regime to follow the words of the persian poet, award who lays -- poet, a lord who lays waste will only see the prosperity for his domain. today, i'm announcing several new actions in support of the iranian people. first, i have re-designated as iran a country of particular concern the world should know one of the worst violators of basic fundamental religious freedoms today the treasu