Diplomatic Briefing, Or Conspiracy? Memo Reveals 2018 US-Zarif Meeting

Demanding the immediate release of the seized ship and its confiscated cargo, the Iranian foreign ministry’s department for American Affairs said in a statement on Friday, “The Swiss chargé d'affaires was summoned to convey Iran’s concern and strong protest over the continued violation of international laws and maritime conventions concerning free navigation and trade by the US administration.”

According to the statement, the Swiss envoy assured that he would convey Iran’s message to American officials.

On Wednesday, the Islamic Republic summoned the Greek chargé d'affaires to protest the seizure of the vessel carrying Iranian crude.

The Russia-flagged aframax Lana, formerly named Pegas, was detained on April 15 by Greek authorities and had been waiting at Karistos port pending a court ruling. On Monday afternoon, a tanker owned by Dynacom Tankers Management, called Ice Energy, was chartered by the US Department of Justice and started a ship-to-ship transfer of the US-sanctioned Iranian crude on the basis of Russian sanctions.

The operation, first reported by watchdog group United Against Iran, was verified using Lloyd's List intelligence data.

Lana, which arrived off Greece early in April with reports of a possible mechanical failure and anchored south of the Greek island of Evia, was identified as the Russian-flagged Pegas and the assumption at the time was that it was laden with Russian crude.

The unnamed official told Reuters that some progress has been made in talks with Teheran but "it's not enough".

He made the comment in reaction to Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian who said earlier on Thursday that he may meet his Saudi counterpart soon in a third country.

"Iran must build confidence for future cooperation, and there are several issues that can be discussed with Tehran if it has the desire to de-escalate tensions in the region," the official said.

Amir-Abdollahian said at World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in the Swiss city of Davos that the Islamic Republic has made "minimal but good progress" in relations with Saudi Arabia.

The White House said on Thursday that two senior US officials – namely Brett McGurk, Biden's top White House adviser on the Middle East, and Amos Hochstein, the State Department's energy envoy -- visited Saudi Arabia this week for talks that included global energy supplies, Iran and other regional issues.

"I will confirm that Brett McGurk and Amos Hochstein were in the region to follow up on conversations on a range of issues including Iran’s destabilizing activities, ensuring stable global energy supplies and other regional issues," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.

Earlier in the week, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister reiterated that there had been some progress in talks with Iran but "not enough" and that the kingdom's hands remain outstretched to Tehran.

Sunni power Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran, which are locked in proxy conflicts across the Middle East, have held five rounds of talks hosted by Baghdad.

“The unilateral cancelation of the Iran-Canada match by Canada Soccer once again showed that the motto of non-political athletics is a cover towards [realization of] Western countries’ interests,” Ehsan Kalhor, deputy sports minister, tweeted Thursday, adding that the Iranian Football Federation will pursue a $ 10 million compensation through legal channels based on its contract with Canada Soccer.

Kalhor’s response was made shortly after Canada Soccer announced, also in a tweet, that it had canceled the match which was planned to be held in Vancouver on June 5. Canada Soccer said additional details would be provided to all ticket purchasers later.

Saeed Khatibzadeh, spokesperson for Iran's foreign ministry, on Tuesday accused Canada of politicizing the upcoming match and said Canada Soccer would be held responsible for any violations of its agreement with Iran’s football federation if the match was canceled.

The match, which was part of the Canadian men’s team’s preparation for World Cup in Qatar later this year, was called off in the face of growing criticism of Canada Soccer by activists who allege that soccer in Iran is controlled by the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC).

Critics also say the IRGC was responsible for the death of their loved ones when it fired two missiles at a Ukrainian airliner over Tehran in January 2020. Of the 176 onboard, all of whom died in the crash, 55 were Canadians of Iranian origins and 30 more were permanent residents. Iran has not allowed an independent and transparent investigation into the crash in more than two years, claiming the missiles were fired “by human error”.

Since the disaster more than two years ago, Iran has refused full cooperation with countries affected by the incident, including Canada and Ulraine, and to conduct a transparent investigation, as well as a clear expalanation of who ordered the attack on the civilian airliner.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last week said the invitations by Canada Soccer “wasn’t a very good idea”.

The Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims and its spokesman, Hamed Esmaeilion, who lost his wife and young daughter in the crash, spearheaded the call for the cancelation of the match.

Esmaeilion who called the Canadian invitation a “slap in the face” of everyone who has been affected by the tragic crash of Flight PS752 has welcomed Canada Soccer’s decision.

Speaking to Iran International Thursday, Javad Soleimani, who also lost his newly-wed wife Elnaz Nabi in the crash, said he was happy that the match was canceled because the match was designed by the Iranian side for “sportswashing” – using sports to improve a country’s tarnished reputation -- and “whitewashing [its] crime [of downing the plane].”

But not everyone condones the moves that led to the cancelation of the game. “This is an own goal for diaspora opposition groups. Politicizing sports and targeting people to people diplomacy will not result in peace, democracy or human rights. Banning Iranians because they are Iranian will only come back to haunt all of us,” President of the Washington-based National Iranian American Council (NIAC), Jamal Abdi, tweeted.

Ukraine’s ambassador-designate to Canada, Yulia Kovaliv has called on Canada Soccer to have a friendly match with Ukraine's soccer team instead. In a tweet Thursday, she said the $400,000 dollars which Canada Soccer had reportedly agreed to pay Iran’s football federation could then be used for humanitarian needs of Ukrainians affected by Russia's war. “I guess it’s win-win.”

Fars news agency, close to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, cited the Defense Ministry on Thursday that investigations into the cause of the Wednesday evening “industrial accident” were underway.

“On Wednesday evening, in an accident that took place in one of the research units of the Defense Ministry in the Parchin area, engineer Ehsan Ghadbeigi was martyred and one of his colleagues injured,” the ministry said.

The ministry did not elaborate on the accident or provide further details, but identified the engineer who died as Ehsan Ghadbeigi. IntelliTimes blog said that he specialized in mechanical engineering at Sheriff University and worked in materials-related fields, that could integrate with Iran's missile or nuclear programs.

Located 60 kilometers (37 miles) southeast of Tehran, Parchin is a sensitive military site housing several industrial and research units, where Western security services believe Iran carried out tests related to nuclear bomb detonations more than a decade ago. It is also closely linked with the Khojir missile production complex.

The International Atomic Energy Agency previously said it suspected Iran conducted tests of explosive triggers that could be used in nuclear weapons at the site.

In 2015, Tehran allowed the UN nuclear watchdog to take environmental samples at the military site to make an assessment of "possible military dimensions" of the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.

Iran’s missile and space programs have suffered a series of mysterious explosions in recent years. In 2020, a giant explosion occurred in the area of Parchin at a gas storage facility, rattling the capital and sending a massive fireball into the sky near Tehran.

Iran has accused Israel of carrying out several attacks on facilities linked to its nuclear program and of killing its nuclear scientists over the past years.

Last April, Natanz nuclear facility in the central province of Esfahan was hit by what Iran described as "sabotage" a day after it unveiled feeding gas to several centrifuges. A blackout that seemed to have been caused by a deliberately planned blast hit the nuclear facility, causing damage to the electrical distribution grid.

Iranian officials, including the then-head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Ali Akbar Salehi, as well as several Israeli media said this operation was a cyber-attack carried out by the Mossad intelligence service.

"Condemning this despicable move, the Islamic Republic of Iran emphasizes the need for the international community and the International Atomic Energy Agency to deal with this nuclear terrorism," Salehi said, adding that "Iran reserves the right to take action against the perpetrators."

Israel publicly rejected to confirm or deny any responsibility for the incident. The attack included a cyber-warfare known as the Olympic Games that involved the use of the Stuxnet computer virus, destroying hundreds of centrifuges.

The match planned to take place in Vancouver on June 5 was part of the Canadian men’s team’s preparation for World Cup in Qatar later this year.

Earlier in May as news emerged that Iranian football officials with ties to the country’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) were to accompany the team, many Canadian-Iranians launched campaigns to cancel the match.

At the forefront of the movement were families of victims who died when the IRGC shot down a Ukrainian airliner over Tehran in January 2020, killing all 176 onboard.

Hamed Esmaeilion, the chief spokesperson for the Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims, in an opinion piece for Canada’s Globe and Mail last week said that soccer in Iran is controlled by the IRGC, which is expected to send members to accompany the Iranian team and said it is shocking that Canada Soccer is inviting the Iranian national team.

Later, a photo emerged showing the Iranian team’s manager Hamid Estili with a man in Tehran in April who is wanted by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for involvement in an alleged kidnapping plot of a New York-based Iranian activist.

The decision by Canada Soccer will be seen as a victory by Iranian human rights activists who have become much more vocal and effective in Europe and North America in recent years.