FPI Overnight Brief: September 7, 2010

Iran

Foreign countries should not interfere in Iran's legal system and stop trying to turn the case of a woman sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery into a human rights issue, Tehran said on Tuesday. - Reuters

Iran would retaliate by striking Israel's nuclear facility if Israel attacked its nuclear activities, armed forces chief of staff Hassan Firouzabadi said on Friday - Reuters

Iran is steadily stockpiling enriched uranium, even in the face of toughened international sanctions, according to a U.N. inspection report that raises new concerns about the ability to monitor parts of the Islamic nation's nuclear program that could be used to make a bomb. – Washington Post

Any attack on Iran would lead to the destruction of the state of Israel as a political entity, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said during a visit to the Gulf Arab state of Qatar on Sunday - Reuters

The United Arab Emirates central bank is studying the economic impact of United Nations sanctions against Iran and has asked lenders in the U.A.E. to declare remittances sent to Iran on a monthly basis, bankers said Monday. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Iran's government used annual pro-Palestinian demonstrations Friday to renew its threat to wipe Israel off the map, while dissident leaders accused the regime of using verbal attacks on Israel to divert attention from its battle with domestic political opponents. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Iran has launched a fresh crackdown on human rights activists by arresting an outspoken Iranian lawyer and charging a young activist with "waging war against God", a crime punishable by death in Iranian law. – Guardian

Video uploaded to the Internet Friday purports to show pro-government henchman attacking the home of opposition leader Mehdi Karroubi, a 72-year-old cleric – Babylon and Beyond

Opposition activists linked to Iran's "green movement" have launched a new satellite TV channel, RASA TV, from Belgium as an alternative news source for discontented Iranians at home and abroad. – Babylon and Beyond

Conflicting statements have emerged over whether the remains of a 2,000-year-old Parthian fortress known as Tappeh Dokhtar, or the "Virgin's Mound," dating from Iran's pre-Islamic past were recently demolished in the Iranian city of Hamadan to make room for a mosalla, a Muslim prayer center often used by hard-line supporters of the government – Babylon and Beyond

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Sunday said the international community should be prepared to confront Iran with tougher sanctions, and possibly military action, in an effort to prevent Tehran from obtaining nuclear weapons, - Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

A mix-up over a photograph led to a sentence of 99 lashes for the Iranian woman whose earlier death sentence by stoning from Iranian authorities caused an international outcry, a lawyer for the woman said Sunday – New York Times

Italy

Gianfranco Fini, the former ally of Silvio Berlusconi turned bitter rival, made a fierce attack on the Italian prime minister Sunday but said he would avoid steps that could trigger an early election. - Reuters

Pakistan

Pakistani officials, diplomats and aid workers warn that while civil unrest has so far been averted, the aftermath of the worst-ever flooding in Pakistan could destabilize the country in the months to come and aggravate the already deep regional, sectarian and class fissures – New York Times

Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan's president, has warned that his country's very survival was under threat from the twin forces of extremism and flooding, as militants launched their third major strike in less than a week. – Telegraph

Pakistan's Taliban on Friday threatened to launch attacks in the United States and Europe "very soon" and dismissed a move by Washington to add the group to its terrorism blacklist - Reuters

A suicide bomber rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into a police station in northwest Pakistan on Monday, killing 19 people and injuring at least 46, according to officials and local news outlets. Among the dead were nine police officers, eight civilians and two children, according to local and provincial authorities. – New York Times

At least 65 people were killed after a suicide bomber attacked a Shiite rally in Pakistan's southwestern city of Quetta on Friday. The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility. A series of attacks in recent days by the Sunni militant group on Shiite Muslims, a minority sect in Pakistan, appear intended to further destabilize the government by fomenting sectarian tensions at a time when it is struggling to cope with devastating floods. – Wall Street Journal

Israel

The Israeli cabinet on Sunday confirmed Major General Yoav Galant, who directed Israel's 2008 to 2009 Gaza war, as armed forces chief the prime minister's office said. - AFP

The Palestinian Authority (PA) will be able to finance its budget without the need for foreign aid by 2013 thanks to improved tax collection and cost-cutting, the prime minister said - Reuters

Arab countries are stepping up efforts to pry open Israel's nuclear program, according to letters by diplomats accompanying a new report by the International Atomic Energy Agency – Los Angeles Times

Palestinian and Israeli leaders expressed satisfaction and hope on Sunday in their first public utterances after the opening round of Middle East peace talks in Washington last week – New York Times

Israel's hard-line foreign minister said Monday that his party will try to block any extension of Israel's settlement slowdown, a move that could derail the recently launched Mideast peace negotiations. – Associated Press

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, hosting a U.S. congressional delegation in Jerusalem on Monday, implored Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas not to abandon Washington-brokered peace talks following threats Abbas made to leave the process – The Hill

Palestinian and Israeli commentators were mostly pessimistic on Friday in assessing [last] week’s meeting of their leaders in Washington. Many described it as political theater — dark suits, cordial handshakes and lofty speeches — offering little chance to end the conflict. – New York Times

Deadly drive-by shootings by Hamas gunmen this week proved that the Palestinian militant group can still operate in the West Bank when its leadership demands, despite a sustained crackdown by Israel and the Palestinian Authority. – Washington Post

Recent Palestinian attacks on West Bank settlers, which are likely to increase in response to re-launched peace talks, pose one of the biggest challenges yet to U.S.-trained Palestinian security forces and their uneasy alliance with the Israeli military. – Los Angeles Times

Cuba

Stephen Johnson writes: Since they came to power in 1959, the Castro brothers' goal has been the survival of their socialist dream. Adaptability has been the key to success, retreating at critical junctures without altering the regime's basic structure. Such measures often looked like signs of change because we wanted to see them as such. On close inspection, they were skillful maneuvers to get through a crisis.  A number of congressmen and business groups are now saying that Raúl is sending friendly signals to Washington like crazy. Perhaps. But it would be crazy for us to believe he would admit that a life spent building a repressive police state was just a mistake. Rather, we would be better off dealing with new leaders willing to take Raúl's retreats to the next level by guaranteeing human rights and civil liberties, respecting ordinary citizens' right to choose their leaders, and allowing a market economy to flourish. – Shadow Government

Afghanistan

U.S. military commanders in Afghanistan are developing a strategy that would tolerate some corruption in the country but target the most corrosive abuses by more tightly regulating U.S. contracting procedures, according to senior defense officials. – Washington Post

The U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan has requested another 2,000 troops for the foreign force fighting the Taliban insurgency, despite waning support for the war in troop-contributing nations, NATO officials said - Reuters

A $250 million program to lure low-level Taliban fighters away from the insurgency has stalled, with Afghans bickering over who should run it, and international donors slow to put up the money they had promised. – New York Times

Taliban threats, shuttered polling centers and warnings of widespread fraud are clouding hopes for Afghanistan's September 18 parliamentary election, a key test of an already fragile democracy, observers have warned. - Reuters

The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said the planned burning of Qurans on Sept. 11 by a Florida church could put the lives of American troops in danger and damage the war effort. – Wall Street Journal

The number of foreign troops killed in Afghanistan this year has reached at least 500, compared with 521 in all of 2009, according to an independent monitoring site on Monday and a tally compiled by Reuters. - Reuters

In briefings for news media over the past two weeks, senior U.S. and NATO officers repeatedly have laid out a series of ambitious targets for the coming year, including recruiting more than 140,000 Afghans to the police and army — a number greater than the current size of the nation's entire military. – Washington Times

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has ordered an investigation into the brutal killing of a prominent Afghan television journalist, Karzai's office said on Monday. - Reuters

The Taliban push for implementing Shari'a law has sparked a debate about whether the Western withdrawal from Afghanistan -- set to begin in July 2011 -- and Kabul's drive for reconciliation with the Taliban will encourage conservative Islamic clerics and hard-line Islamists, including the moderate elements of the Taliban, to push for the implementation of a harsh justice system that would directly contradict the human-rights guarantees enshrined in the current Afghan Constitution – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty

Visiting Afghanistan, the Defense secretary says he and Karzai have agreed on the need for stepped up collaboration between NATO-led forces and the Pakistani military to eliminate insurgent sanctuaries. – Los Angeles Times

Since 2001, one of the unquestioned premises of American and NATO policy has been that ordinary Afghans don’t view public corruption in quite the same way that Americans and others do in the West. Diplomats, military officers and senior officials flying in from Washington often say privately that while public graft is pernicious, there is no point in trying to abolish it — and that trying to do so could destroy the very government the West has helped to build. – New York Times

Dov Zakheim writes: It is critical that Washington continue to assist with the restructuring of the Afghan banking system in general, and with sorting out Kabul Bank's problems in particular. A healthy banking system is critical to the strength of the Afghan economy, which in turn is a necessary condition for winning the war against the Taliban and other insurgents that plague the country.  Nevertheless, before any American money is funneled into the Afghan banking system, that system needs to be completely overhauled – Shadow Government

U.S. Marines and British civilian advisers are waging two wars in the hilly northern half of Helmand province: They're fighting the Taliban, and they're quarreling with each other – Washington Post

Afghan President Hamid Karzai announced Sept. 4 that he had set up a council to pursue peace talks with the Taliban, who have been waging an insurgency in Afghanistan for nine years. - AFP

Afghanistan's government inched closer to bailing out the country's largest bank, setting aside hundreds of millions of dollars that could be used to keep Kabul Bank solvent, officials said. – Wall Street Journal

NATO commanders were overly optimistic when they predicted quick success last winter in taking the town of Marja from the Taliban, the outgoing deputy commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan said Saturday. – Associated Press

The U.S. is pressing Afghan authorities to investigate allegations of financial improprieties at Afghanistan's largest bank, fearing that anything short of a thorough inquiry will further undermine President Hamid Karzai's credibility. The Karzai administration has deep ties to Kabul Bank, which depositors have thronged since last week, after news leaked that its two top executives—who are also its two largest shareholders—had resigned and been replaced by a central-bank official. The president's brother is Kabul Bank's third-largest shareholder. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

The United States expects to spend about $6 billion a year training and supporting Afghan troops and police after it begins pulling out its own combat troops in 2011, the Associated Press has learned. – Associated Press

Afghanistan's top financial officials insisted Monday that the ailing Kabul Bank remains solvent and does not require a government bailout, despite persistent crowds demanding their deposits back. – Washington Post

Iraq

Ernesto Londono reports: During his final days in Iraq, Odierno and his aides watched the violence with trepidation and monitored political deal making for any sign of a breakthrough. The general worries that the United States could wash its hands of Iraq too quickly. He became alarmed earlier this year when U.S. lawmakers pushed back on the Obama administration's Iraq funding requests for next year. –Washington Post

American soldiers helped Iraqi troops battle insurgents in downtown Baghdad on Sunday, repelling a major attack in the heart of the capital five days after President Obama declared an end to U.S. combat operations. – Los Angeles Times

After months of bickering, a main political rival of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki named a candidate to head the next Iraqi government, a move that poses a new obstacle to the incumbent and is likely to further complicate formation of the government – Los Angeles Times

Russia

A suicide bomber drove a car packed with explosives into a military installation in a Muslim region of southern Russia early Sunday, killing three soldiers and injuring more than 30 others, officials said – New York Times

Russia's defense chief said Monday that lax security at a military base in southern Russia enabled a suicide attacker to crash its gates with a bomb-laden car, killing four soldiers and wounding 35 others in a blast officials blamed on the country's long-running Islamic insurgency. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who subjected President Barack Obama to a tirade last year during their only meeting, offered unusually warm words for the American leader Monday, calling him a "deep, profound person" whose "sincerity is not in question." "We have a good and similar perspective on global problems," he said of Mr. Obama. "Probably this is the best prerequisite for a higher level of relationship with the United States." – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

As if the summer’s brutal heat, forest fires and drought were not enough, this country is now suffering through one final bit of weather-related misery, a scarcity of a beloved staple that is causing a kind of national time warp. Russians are falling back on scrounging habits honed under Communism. And not liking it – New York Times

For months, Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin has done nothing to dampen speculation that he is seriously considering a bid to return to the presidency in the 2012 election. On Monday night, he offered another hint at his plans by referring to the political career of a former president of a different country: Franklin D. Roosevelt. – New York Times

Editorial: Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin must be disappointed in his police force. True, Moscow police responded roughly on Tuesday when hundreds tried to demonstrate peacefully in favor of freedom of assembly. But the police apparently didn't beat anyone with clubs, as Mr. Putin had urged them to do. We hope he shows some leniency toward the force despite its lack of total brutality. – Washington Post

Three senior Volgograd regional officials resigned Monday over their handling of wildfires after coming under criticism from the Kremlin – Moscow Times

Early campaigning for next month's regional and municipal elections has been tarnished by dirty electioneering by United Russia and public apathy, the country's only independent elections watchdog, Golos, said Monday. – Moscow Times

Belarus

Belarus has been urged by the European Parliament to conduct an independent investigation into the death of a leading journalist and opposition activist. - Telegraph

Australia

Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard secured a wafer thin parliamentary majority on Tuesday, ending a political impasse but hardly cheering investors worried about the fragility of her government and its plans to tax mining profits - Reuters

China

Beneath the gloss and mercantile buzz of Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang region, there is a palpable unease that neither tens of thousands of surveillance cameras nor the patrolling squads of black-shirted police officers can completely assuage. – New York Times

China is seeking to expand its influence in South Asia at India's expense, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh warned in rare public criticism of his country's main rival for regional resources and geopolitical clout. - Reuters

China wants to quell tensions with the United States through quiet talk, not shouting matches, a top diplomat told White House advisers on Tuesday, aiming to pave the way for a visit by President Hu Jintao early next year - Reuters

At a time of tension in U.S.-China relations, a three-day visit by senior U.S. officials to Beijing began Monday with signs that Chinese leaders want to smooth over some key frictions. – Washington Post

Daniel Blumenthal writes: Today the balance of power in Asia is shifting…China has arguably gained conventional supremacy around its periphery. Without remediation this could become a hard fact. China's growing short-range missile arsenal (maybe up to 1,500) and fleet of modern aircraft could not only be used to destroy much of Taiwan, but could also be used to strike devastating blows against U.S. forces in Japan. Together with its fast-growing submarine fleet, the Chinese missile force will, within the next decade, be able to cause serious harm to U.S. carriers steaming into the region. – Shadow Government

China risks a backlash from the U.S. Congress unless it becomes more responsive to international concerns about its currency value and trade practices, a top U.S. State Department official warned. – Wall Street Journal

Europe/Russia

Belgium plunged back into political crisis on Saturday as the politician trying to broker formation of a government quit, almost three months after an election - Reuters

European trade commissioner Karel De Gucht drew fire for comments about Jews he made in a radio interview as the Mideast peace talks began in Washington. – Wall Street Journal

Egypt

The Muslim Brotherhood is engaged in a delicate dance. Despite all efforts to marginalize the Islamist organization by the United States and its close ally, the Egyptian government, it remains the most credible opposition group. Some of its members want the Brotherhood to fight the government head on, but the Islamist leadership has other goals: freedom to proselytize and organize in neighborhoods, and in the long term, a lifting of the official government ban on its activities. – New York Times

In what became known as the posters/cyber war among supporters of potential candidates for the 2011 presidential elections in Egypt, the chief of intelligence Omar Suleiman appeared as the latest figure urged to succeed Hosni Mubarak. – Babylon and Beyond

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will go to Egypt later this month for the second round of the Obama administration's Mideast peace talks. – The Hill

Defense

Uncle Sam wants to give free, no-strings-attached money to about 145,000 troops who were involuntarily kept on duty after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but is having trouble persuading them that it's not a gimmick. – Washington Post

The gap between homeland security and more traditional missions performed by the U.S. Coast Guard increased from 10 percent to 12 percent in 2009 over the previous year, but the service projects that gap will narrow in 2010. – Defense News

Blackwater Worldwide created a web of more than 30 shell companies or subsidiaries in part to obtain millions of dollars in American government contracts after the security company came under intense criticism for reckless conduct in Iraq, according to Congressional investigators and former Blackwater officials. – New York Times

The Pentagon and Lockheed Martin should wrap up negotiations for the upcoming batch of 32 early production F-35 Joint Strike Fighters in weeks, U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Norton Schwartz told Defense News on Sept. 2. – Defense News

Korean Peninsula

North Korea's closed borders, state-controlled media and authoritarian rule make divining its leaders' and citizens' thoughts largely a guessing game. North Koreans who traveled to Dandong last week for business declined to speak of conditions in their country. But Chinese traders and recent defectors from North Korea, who have spoken recently with residents, say the backdrop of the coming meetings appears to be hunger with an edge of martial restlessness. Some of these people say that as fall approaches, North Korea is in the midst of its worst food crisis since its late 1990s famine. – Wall Street Journal

Workers’ Party delegates from across North Korea were converging in Pyongyang, the country’s state media reported on Monday, as children and soldiers there rehearsed a celebration for their country’s biggest political gathering in 30 years – New York Times

A U.S.-South Korean naval exercise aimed at deterring North Korea following its alleged attack on the South Korean corvette Cheonan has been postponed due to an approaching typhoon, according to a report Sept. 4. - AFP

South Korea and the U.S. will hold joint antisubmarine exercises in another show of force against North Korea, officials said Friday, as Pyongyang renewed threats against the war drills. – Associated Press

North Korea will release seven crew members detained since last month after their fishing boat was captured in the East Sea, Pyongyang's news agency said Monday. The Korean Central News Agency said that the fishermen apologized for trespassing in North Korean waters, and were released with the "compatriotic and humanitarian points of view." – Washington Post

Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan of South Korea offered to resign on Saturday amid allegations that his ministry bent its regulations to hire his daughter during a period of high unemployment. – New York Times

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will probably use an upcoming meeting of party elites to introduce his heir apparent, initiating the Stalinist dictatorship's second hereditary power transfer, U.S. and South Korean experts and officials say. – Washington Post

Southern Africa

South African public-sector unions announced a return to work Monday after an acrimonious three-week strike marked by violence against several nurses who continued to work – Los Angeles Times

Syria

This country, which had sought to show solidarity with Islamist groups and allow religious figures a greater role in public life, has recently reversed course, moving forcefully to curb the influence of Muslim conservatives in its mosques, public universities and charities. – New York Times

Middle East

Bahrain's human rights record came under fresh scrutiny on Tuesday after British peers linked the kingdom's arrest of two prominent opposition figures to their attendance of a seminar in the House of Lords. - Telegraph

Bahraini officials announced on Saturday that they were charging 23 people, most of them activists from the Shiite majority, with coordinating a violent campaign to overthrow the minority Sunni government. – New York Times

Brazil

Perhaps more than any other challenge facing Brazil today, education is a stumbling block in its bid to accelerate its economy and establish itself as one of the world’s most powerful nations, exposing a major weakness in its newfound armor. – New York Times

Germany

The threat of Islamist attacks in Germany is growing as numbers of people returning from militant camps on the Afghan-Pakistan border rise, a senior police official said. - Reuters

Southeast Asia

Four months after their marathon Bangkok street protests ended in a bloody crackdown, Thailand's antigovernment Red Shirt protesters are testing the limits of what political and military leaders will allow, with a large fund-raising concert in this bawdy seaside resort and another rally planned for Bangkok – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Venezuela

Roger Noriega writes:  If the polls are reliable, it seems that Chávez will be tested on September 26. For the defenders of Venezuelan democracy, the test will come the morning after. – The American

Opposition parties have put the soaring national murder rate seen under President Hugo Chavez squarely at the heart of their campaign for September 26 legislative elections in which they expect to slash the socialist's parliamentary majority - Reuters

Spain

Spain’s interior minister said Monday that he did not trust a cease-fire announcement from ETA, the Basque separatist group, dismissing speculation about whether the country’s long fight against terrorism had come to an end – New York Times

Basque armed separatist group ETA has declared a cease-ire after several months in which political parties close to ETA have been calling on it to renounce violence. In the statement published Sunday by Gara, a frequent mouthpiece for the group, ETA said "it made the decision several months ago to not carry out armed actions." – Wall Street Journal

India

India and South Korea have inked a five-year defense cooperation agreement as part of New Delhi's "Look East" policy. – Defense News

A bill approved last week by the Indian Parliament that holds suppliers of nuclear reactors and raw materials liable in the event of an accident is raising concerns that it will scare away foreign businesses from India's lucrative energy market. – Washington Times

Obama Administration

For much of her tenure as secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton has been less an architect than an advocate for the Obama administration’s Middle East policy. With the resumption of direct talks last week, she now has no choice but to plunge into the rough and tumble of peacemaking. – New York Times

Turkey

Turks vote on Sept 12 on plans to reform a constitution rooted in an army coup exactly 30 years earlier. The referendum, though, is as much a vote of confidence in Erdogan, who came to power in 2002 and is likely to seek a third term in 2011. - Reuters

The United States has no intention of pulling out heavy equipment and weapons from Iraq through Turkey, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman said Sept. 4. - AFP

Turkey, which in 2003 damaged relations with the United States by refusing to allow Americans troops to invade Iraq via its southeast border, has agreed in principle to allow the United States to move technical and logistical military equipment through the country as part of the withdrawal from Iraq. – New York Times

Ideas

Tony Blair writes: Defeating the visible and terrifying manifestations of religious extremism is not enough. Indeed I would go further: This extremism won't be defeated simply by focusing on the extremists alone. It is the narrative that has to be assailed. It has to be avowed, acknowledged; then taken on, inside and outside Islam. It should not be respected. It should be confronted, disagreed with, argued against on grounds of politics, security and religion. – Wall Street Journal

Mexico

The Obama administration said Friday that Mexico has met enough human-rights requirements for the U.S. to release $36 million in previously withheld funds that were part of the $1.4 billion Merida Initiative. But a State Department spokeswoman, Virginia Staab, said the U.S. should withhold another $26 million in new funding until it sees additional progress on "some aspects of Mexico's human rights effort." – Associated Press

Edgar Valdez Villarreal was arrested after a 14-month manhunt involving 1,200 Mexican federal police and an unknown number of U.S. agents. He faces multiple indictments in the United States for importing tons of cocaine. Mexican authorities say he is a kidnapper, torturer and murderer - as well as a major trafficker of marijuana and cocaine. – Washington Post

Forced to defer production and curtail drilling and maintenance in a region that spreads through some of Mexico's most dangerous badlands, the world's seventh-largest oil producer has become another casualty of the drug war. – Los Angeles Times

Japan

Japan's ruling party prepares to vote on a new leader, its two candidates—Prime Minister Naoto Kan and opponent Ichiro Ozawa—went head to head in televised debates, exchanging different views on how to pay for planned policies and other key issues.  The nation is closely following the race, because the winner of the Democratic Party of Japan's Sept. 14 leadership election will almost automatically become the next prime minister – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

With less than two weeks remaining before the ruling Democratic Party of Japan's leadership election, local polls show that Prime Minister Naoto Kan and challenger Ichiro Ozawa are locked in a tight race to win support from their own party members. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

The War

U.S. officials see [Sharif] Mobley as one of a growing cadre of native-born Americans who are drawn to violent jihad…Mobley's defenders acknowledge that he associated in Yemen with individuals hostile to the United States but say he never conspired to commit an act of terrorism. – Washington Post

Lebanon

Lebanon's prime minister said he was wrong to accuse Syria of killing his father, Rafik al-Hariri, in 2005 and said the charge against Damascus had been politically motivated - Reuters