| US defies world to say Iran UN sanctions back in effect Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:33 PM PDT  The United States unilaterally proclaimed on Saturday that UN sanctions against Iran are back in force and promised to punish those who violate them, in a move that risks increasing Washington's isolation but also international tensions.
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| US says all UN sanctions on Iran restored, but world yawns Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:00 PM PDT |
| Janusz Walus: Why far-right Polish football fans idolise a murderer in South Africa Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:36 PM PDT  Janusz Walus killed anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani in 1993, sparking fears of a racial civil war.
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| GOP senators confront past comments on Supreme Court vote Posted: 19 Sep 2020 02:22 PM PDT  Republican senators weighing what to do about the vacancy on the Supreme Court are facing questions about their own past comments amid complaints by Democrats that their views have shifted with changing political reality. President Donald Trump on Saturday urged the GOP-run Senate to consider "without delay" his upcoming nomination to fill the seat vacated by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday. A look at what key Republican senators were saying in the past — and what they are saying now — about filling a seat on the Supreme Court during an election year.
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| Virus measures targeted by protesters despite case spikes Posted: 19 Sep 2020 01:28 PM PDT  Demonstrators took the streets of London, Tel Aviv and other cities on Saturday to protest coronavirus restrictions, decrying how the measures have affected daily life even with infection rates rising in many places and the global death toll approaching 1 million. The government recently banned social gatherings of more than six people in the hopes that it would help reverse a steep rise in COVID-19 cases and suggested that tougher restrictions could be coming. Saturday's protest in Trafalgar Square, which was themed "Resist and Act for Freedom," ended in clashes between demonstrators and London police, as officers tried to disperse hundreds of people holding banners and placards scrawled with anti-restriction messages such as "This is now Tyranny."
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| Pandemic retools diplomacy as world leaders gather virtually Posted: 19 Sep 2020 12:45 PM PDT  With COVID-19 still careening across the planet, the annual gathering of its leaders in New York will be replaced this year by a global patchwork of prerecorded speeches, another piece of upheaval in a deeply divided world turned topsy-turvy by a pandemic with no endpoint in sight. As U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres put it: "The COVID-19 pandemic is a crisis unlike any in our lifetimes, and so this year's General Assembly session will be unlike any other, too." This is the first time in the 75-year history of the United Nations that there will be no in-person meeting.
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| 'I loved her to pieces,' retired Justice Souter says of RBG Posted: 19 Sep 2020 11:41 AM PDT  The remaining eight Supreme Court justices, and two former colleagues, are speaking out about their colleague Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday at age 87. The justices all spoke of her undying devotion to the law and her grace as a colleague.
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| Global White Cement Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 11:27 AM PDT |
| Global Wide-Bandgap Power (WBG) Semiconductor Devices Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 11:07 AM PDT |
| Libyan official: Sarraj opposes oil deal with rival Hifter Posted: 19 Sep 2020 11:01 AM PDT  Libyan officials said Saturday that the leader of the U.N.-supported government would not support a deal with his primary rival in the country's civil war to lift a monthslong blockade on its vital oil trade. According to an official at his office, Prime Minister Fayez Sarraj opposed the final deal struck with commander Khalifa Hifter, whose east-based forces led a failed yearlong siege to take the capital, Tripoli, from the U.N.-backed government. "The prime minister did not give his approval to the final version of the deal," the official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity.
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| McConnell's legacy: Wielding majority power to reshape court Posted: 19 Sep 2020 10:43 AM PDT  Fulfilling the Supreme Court seat left vacant by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before the fall election is as much about McConnell's goal of securing a conservative majority on the court for decades to come as it is about confirming President Donald Trump's upcoming nominee. For better or worse, this will be how McConnell's tenure as a Senate leader will be measured. "Sen. McConnell already has played a huge role in shaping the Supreme Court for decades to come," said Edwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Berkley School of Law.
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| Global Search Engines Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 10:27 AM PDT |
| Ginsburg's death draws big surge of donations to Democrats Posted: 19 Sep 2020 10:19 AM PDT  Democrats raised more than $50 million in the hours after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death, demonstrating how the liberal icon's passing and the contentious nomination fight that lies ahead have already galvanized the party's base. The jaw-dropping sum was raised by 4 p.m. Saturday after news of her death broke late Friday, according to a donation ticker on the website of ActBlue, the party's online fundraising platform. The 2020 campaign, which will decide control of the White House and the Senate, had already delivered record-shattering fundraising totals for the Democrats, a sign of the motivation within the party to rebuke President Donald Trump on Election Day.
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| Rights group: More than 300 detained at Minsk women's march Posted: 19 Sep 2020 10:18 AM PDT  Police in the capital of Belarus cracked down sharply Saturday on a women's protest march demanding the authoritarian president's resignation, arresting more than 300 including an elderly woman who has become a symbol of the six weeks of protest that have roiled the country. More than 2,000 women took part in the march in Minsk. Officials said President Alexander Lukashenko won a sixth term in office with 80% support in that vote but opponents and some poll workers say the results were rigged.
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| Jailed Iranian rights lawyer hospitalized amid hunger strike Posted: 19 Sep 2020 10:03 AM PDT  A leading Iranian human rights lawyer has been hospitalized a month after launching a hunger strike seeking better prison conditions and the release of political prisoners amid the pandemic, her husband said Saturday. Reza Khandan said that healthcare professionals decided to hospitalize his wife, Nasrin Sotoudeh, because of heart and respiratory problems as well as low blood pressure. Khandan said Sotoudeh was transferred to a hospital in north Tehran from the notorious Evin Prison earlier on Saturday.
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| Alexei Navalny shares photo, speaks of initial 'despair' when waking from coma Posted: 19 Sep 2020 09:50 AM PDT  Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posted a photo of himself walking on stairs and spoke about his recovery after being poisoned last month. Navalny, the most high-profile opponent of Russian President Vladimir Putin, is recovering in a German hospital after falling ill on Aug. 20 on a flight out of a Siberian city where he and his team were conducting a corruption investigation. On the insistence of his family, Navalny was flown to Berlin, where the German government said he had been poisoned by a military-grade nerve agent.
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| Is 8 enough? Court vacancy could roil possible election case Posted: 19 Sep 2020 09:47 AM PDT  Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death has left the Supreme Court shorthanded during a polarizing presidential campaign in which President Donald Trump has already suggested he may not accept the outcome and the court could be called on to step in and decide the fate of the nation. The Supreme Court's role, then, could be vital in deciding a contested election, as it was in 2000 when its 5-4 ruling effectively handed the presidential election to Republican George W. Bush. Just moments after Ginsburg's death the prospect of a disputed election and the role of the court in deciding it was already causing anxiety across the political spectrum.
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| Official: Toilet display mocking mail-in voting is a crime Posted: 19 Sep 2020 09:46 AM PDT |
| Ginsburg to be remembered with statue in her native Brooklyn Posted: 19 Sep 2020 09:03 AM PDT  A statue of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will be built in her native Brooklyn, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Saturday. Ginsburg died Friday of complications from metastatic pancreatic cancer at age 87. Cuomo, a Democrat, said that he'll appoint a commission to choose an artist and oversee the selection of a location for the statue.
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| Minneapolis to name stretch of street for George Floyd Posted: 19 Sep 2020 08:49 AM PDT  A stretch of a Minneapolis street that includes the place where George Floyd was killed will soon be named in his honor. Although the street will still be called Chicago Avenue, the city will refer to the blocks between 37th and 39th streets as George Perry Floyd Jr. Place, the Star Tribune reported. The City Council approved the naming Friday, and Mayor Jacob Frey's office said he would likely sign off on it as well.
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| Ethiopia charges opposition figures with terrorism Posted: 19 Sep 2020 08:36 AM PDT  The group, who will appear in court on Monday, faces charges related to deadly violence in June.
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| Alexei Navalny announces he can now walk with a 'tremble' Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:58 AM PDT  Alexei Navalny, Russia's leading opposition figure, revealed on Saturday that he is now able to walk following his suspected poisoning with Novichok nerve agent. The Putin critic posted a photograph to Instagram of himself walking down the stairs, captioning it that he could now walk with a "tremble". "Quite recently, I did not recognize people and did not understand how to talk," Navalny wrote. "Every morning the doctor came to me and said: Alexey, I brought a board, let's figure out which word we can write on it. This drove me to despair because although I understood in general what the doctor wanted, I did not understand where to get the words from. "Now I'm a guy whose legs are shaking when he walks up the stairs, but this guy thinks: 'Oh, this is a staircase! People get up on these. Perhaps we should look for an elevator.' And before, I would have just stood there and stared at it blankly," the post added.
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| Police, protesters clash as London eyes tighter virus rules Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:52 AM PDT  Police in London clashed with protesters Saturday at a rally against coronavirus restrictions, even as the mayor warned that it was "increasingly likely" that the British capital would soon need to introduce tighter rules to curb a sharp rise in infections. Scuffles broke out as police moved in to disperse hundreds of demonstrators who gathered in London's central Trafalgar Square. Stricter localized restrictions have also been introduced in large parts of England's northwestern cities, affecting some 13.5 million people.
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| Global Biotechnology/Pharmaceutical Services Outsourcing Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:47 AM PDT |
| Coronavirus-wary Bavarians kick off toned-down Oktoberfest Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:31 AM PDT  Oktoberfest celebrations got underway Saturday in Munich with the traditional tapping of a keg and the cry of "O'zapft is!" — "It's tapped!" — but this year's festival is very non-traditional and highly regulated due to coronavirus concerns. The official Oktoberfest has been cancelled, so there's no huge tents full of people or hundreds of stands selling food. Former Mayor Christian Ude got the party started, hammering a tap into a 20 liter (5 gallon) keg — a tenth of the size of the Oktoberfest norm — at the Schillerbraeu beer hall while dressed in Bavarian lederhosen leather pants and wearing a protective mask.
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| Iran vows 'hit' on all involved in U.S. killing of top general Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:22 AM PDT  The chief of Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened Saturday to go after everyone who had a role in a top general's January killing in Iraq.
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| Navalny shows early stages of recovery from poisoning Posted: 19 Sep 2020 07:21 AM PDT  Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny on Saturday posted a photo to his Instagram account in which he is walking down a flight of stairs as part of his recovery after he was poisoned last month.In the photo's caption, Navalny, one of Russia's most prominent Kremlin critics, wrote that he has a "clear path" to recovery, but suggested it will be a long one. He was removed from a ventilator five days ago and said he is still having trouble climbing stairs, pouring water, and using his phone. Still, he has apparently made significant progress since, he said, he was previously considered only "technically alive."Navalny fell ill in August while in Siberia and was airlifted to a hospital in Berlin while in a coma. Multiple labs in Europe have confirmed he was poisoned by a Soviet-era nerve agent called Novichok. His supporters suspect Russian President Vladimir Putin was behind the assassination attempt, but Moscow has denied any involvement and has accused Navalny's aides of removing evidence, jeopardizing the official inquiry into the poisoning. Read more at Deutsche Welle and The Guardian.More stories from theweek.com How a productivity phenomenon explains the unraveling of America How the Trump-Russia story was buried The conservatives who want to undo the Enlightenment
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| Central African Republic: Ex-officer arrested for war crimes Posted: 19 Sep 2020 06:54 AM PDT  Eric Danboy Bagale, a guard under ex-President François Bozizé, was arrested by French police.
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| 10 things you need to know today: September 19, 2020 Posted: 19 Sep 2020 06:53 AM PDT |
| Wanted: Bilingual poll workers who reflect U.S. diversity Posted: 19 Sep 2020 06:52 AM PDT  The national Mi Familia Vota organization has long been involved in voting rights issues and other matters of civic engagement, but this year it's added a new initiative: Recruiting bilingual poll workers. The Phoenix-based group is joining advocacy organizations, nonprofits and even businesses across the U.S. in trying to persuade younger people to work at polling places, especially those who are bilingual. The coronavirus has upended how elections officials recruit poll workers, who are typically older and thus more susceptible to becoming seriously ill from COVID-19.
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| Coronavirus has forced us to care more about others, Europe's chief Rabbi says Posted: 19 Sep 2020 06:45 AM PDT  Smartphones have made us more selfish, Europe's chief rabbi has suggested, but coronavirus has forced us to care more about others. Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, Chief Rabbi of Moscow and President of the Conference of European Rabbis, made the comments as the world's Jewish community celebrate Rosh Hashanah this weekend. Speaking to The Telegraph, Rabbi Goldschmidt said: "We live in a postmodern generation, an individualistic generation, where the individual usually takes precedence over the public or society and everything we do is with iPhone, iPod, everything is 'I' and I think this challenge which was brought to us, this pandemic, [it shows that] if something is happening thousands of miles away in a Chinese province it can affect us. "Humanity has to stand together and strive for each other." His comments come as the UK Government issued unprecedented guidance for Jews preparing to celebrate the festival, including keeping two metres apart from fellow worshippers in synagogue. New regulations imposed on blowing of shofar – or ram's horn – were imposed in effort to stop the spread of coronavirus, meaning that it cannot be shared, must be blown in the opposite direction from congregants and those who blow the horn must bring their own. Jews consider it to be a good deed to hear the shofar being blown during the prayer service on Rosh Hashanah. The Torah does not specify why the shofar must be blown on Rosh Hashanah. However, it has been speculated, among other reasons, that its trumpeting call heralds the exciting event of the Jewish New Year. Rabbi Goldschmidt also spoke about the ongoing Brexit negotiations, and said that if the UK decided it would rejoin the European Union, it would be "a miracle". "I think very much that this divorce will not extend into a tragic comedy," he said. If the divorce is going to be final, it should be final." However he added: "I hope we can still put some sense into some people and if we get back together, it would be a miracle and I hope we would do it."
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| Underwater and on fire: US climate change magnifies extremes Posted: 19 Sep 2020 06:06 AM PDT  America's worsening climate change problem is as polarized as its politics. The already parched West is getting drier and suffering deadly wildfires because of it, while the much wetter East keeps getting drenched in mega-rainfall events, some hurricane related and others not. Climate change is magnifying both extremes, but it may not be the only factor, several scientists told The Associated Press.
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| Court weighs allowing courtroom cameras in George Floyd case Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:59 AM PDT  The trial of four former Minneapolis police officers charged in George Floyd's death will generate massive public interest when it begins in March, but as it stands, most people who want to watch the proceedings will be out of luck. Supporters of audio and visual coverage say the high-profile nature of Floyd's death, the outrage that led to worldwide protests, and courtroom restrictions caused by the coronavirus pandemic make this the right time and case to allow cameras in court. "I just can't think of a situation where it's more important than a case like this for the public to see what's actually transpiring in the courtroom," said Jane Kirtley, director of the Silha Center for the Study of Media Ethics and Law.
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| A new book offers a rare glimpse inside North Korea's frozen-in-time tourist hotels Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:53 AM PDT |
| AP FACT CHECK: Trump's virus revisionism; Biden on the hoax Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:44 AM PDT  President Donald Trump would have you believe Americans are already living that success story, even as the death toll approaches 200,000 and infections spread by the tens of thousands a day. Trump's latest revisionism on the pandemic came during a week when he unleashed a torrent of misbegotten claims about mail-in voting, a monthslong preoccupation growing more intense with the approach of the Nov. 3 election. While Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden laid out a broad and largely supported case that Trump has underplayed the severity of the pandemic, the devil was in the details: No, Trump did not call the coronavirus a hoax.
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| Evangelicals at base of Trump hopes for Pennsylvania repeat Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:10 AM PDT  President Donald Trump's homestretch push to repeat his razor thin victory in Pennsylvania four years ago won't happen without white evangelicals, and there are signs that critical component of his coalition hasn't lost the faith. It's a group that has often made the difference for Republicans on the Pennsylvania ballot. Trump's policies have helped keep in the fold evangelicals who otherwise might have been discomforted by his style.
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| What Does QAnon Stand For? Posted: 19 Sep 2020 05:00 AM PDT  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- When asked about QAnon last month, President Donald Trump said: "I don't know much about the movement, other than I understand they like me very much, which I appreciate. But I don't know much about the movement."This has been mocked as a faux naïve response, but it has the ring of truth — the president doesn't know about a lot of things, and it seems safe to say that a relatively obscure conspiracy theory is among them. With QAnon growing in size and visibility, however, it's worth asking what the movement is really about.To be clear, I am a QAnon outsider and a non-believer in conspiracy theories. Nonetheless, I think it's necessary to do more than regard QAnon with either incredulity or scorn. America needs to understand it, and part of that is acknowledging that conspiracy theorizing has exerted a significant influence on American history.The American Revolution was in part based on a (mostly untrue) conspiracy theory about the desire of the British Empire to take away American liberties, and much of 19th-century politics was based on tales of cabals and intrigue. It's a useful exercise to approach QAnon with the same dispassionate spirit used to analyze those historical eras.One place to start is to ask whether any part of QAnon is true. According to Wikipedia, the movement is "a far-right conspiracy theory alleging that a cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles running a global child sex-trafficking ring is plotting against President Donald Trump, who is battling them, leading to a 'day of reckoning' involving the mass arrest of journalists and politicians." The next sentence reads: "No part of the theory is based on fact."That second sentence makes me makes me slightly uncomfortable. It is not reproduced on the pages for the world's major sects and religions, for instance, nor can it be found in the Wikipedia entry for the Book of Revelation of the Bible, which shares with QAnon an apocalyptic spirit.Part of my approach, you may have noticed, is to consider that for many adherents, QAnon is more about a set of beliefs than a set of facts. One of those beliefs seems to be that child abuse is both widespread and underreported, and the latest statistics appear to support that. But then there are many falsehoods and exaggerations piled on top.At any rate, I wonder how many QAnon adherents are motivated not primarily by opposition to child abuse, but by frustration with elites. Certainly the positive portrayal of Trump, and the corresponding negative depiction of many journalists and politicians, seems designed to offend elite coastal opinion.But it's necessary to dig deeper still. Is outrage at elites really the central issue? There is good evidence that believers in conspiracy theories tend to think society is changing too fast, and that their world is beyond their control. Maybe the anti-elitism is a convenient marketing device, a way to make the doctrine focal and appropriate for 2020, but not really the driving motivation behind QAnon support.I would like to know how the incomes and social indicators of QAnon adherents compare to those of the rest of the country. A lot of the doctrine is so complex, including figures not famous in America such as George Soros and Angela Merkel, that it seems designed to appeal to people with at least some degree of education. And educated Americans have been doing OK with respect to income and social indicators over the last few decades. Maybe QAnon is a kind of luxury product, one that turns out to have special resonance on the internet in 2020.There is the related possibility that QAnon's main appeal is in the sheer complexity of the conspiracy itself, rather than the details. QAnon is often described often as a rabbit hole, offering users an initially simple story that gradually becomes more complicated. Some evidence suggests that conspiracy theories need to offer "uniqueness" to their adherents — that is, the promise of exclusive knowledge. The more complex and detailed the theory, the more likely that uniqueness becomes, and thus the greater the appeal. But just how big a factor is that?Which leads to the central question, the one that we outsiders are radically uncertain about: What exactly are the doctrines of QAnon that are most appealing and persuasive to its adherents? The temptation is to focus on the facts, many of which are absurd if not reprehensible. And merely disproving QAnon's claims may not prove very useful, especially if its followers are motivated by a desire to belong to a special and unusual movement. If the goal is to limit the influence of QAnon, or (if possible) to steer it in a healthier direction, the question of what its followers really believe needs a better answer.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Tyler Cowen is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is a professor of economics at George Mason University and writes for the blog Marginal Revolution. His books include "Big Business: A Love Letter to an American Anti-Hero."For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Walmart, Amazon among donors to QAnon-promoting lawmaker Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:58 AM PDT  Walmart, Amazon and other corporate giants donated money to the reelection campaign of a Tennessee state lawmaker who had used social media to amplify and promote the QAnon conspiracy theory, according to an Associated Press review of campaign finance records and the candidate's posts. The corporate support for a QAnon-promoting politician is another example of how the conspiracy theory has penetrated mainstream politics, spreading beyond its origins on internet message boards popular with right-wing extremists. Unlike state Rep. Susan Lynn, who chairs the Tennessee House finance committee, few are incumbents who can attract corporate PAC money.
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| Global Pregnancy Care Products Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:47 AM PDT |
| Russia's Navalny says he's now more than 'technically alive' Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:37 AM PDT  Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny said he is recovering his verbal and physical abilities at the German hospital where he is being treated for suspected nerve agent poisoning but that he at first felt despair over his condition. Navalny, the most visible opponent of Russian President Vladimir Putin, fell ill on a domestic flight to Moscow on Aug. 20 and was transferred to Germany for treatment two days later. A German military lab later determined that the Russian politician was poisoned with Novichok, the same class of Soviet-era agent that Britain said was used on a former Russian spy and his daughter in England, in 2018.
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| China's economy remains resilient despite external risks, says Xi Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:20 AM PDT  China's economy remains resilient and there are ample policy tools at Beijing's disposal despite rising external risks, President Xi Jinping said in remarks published on Saturday. The world's second-largest economy has steadily recovered from a virus-induced slump, but analysts say policymakers face a tough job to maintain stable expansion over the next several years to turn China into a high-income nation. "The basic characteristics of China's economy with sufficient potential, great resilience, strong vitality, large space for manoeuvre and many policy instruments have not changed," Xinhua news agency quoted Xi as saying.
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| Global Advanced Sintering Technologies Equipment Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:07 AM PDT |
| Germany plans reform to avoid bankruptcy wave due to corona Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:02 AM PDT  Germany would relax insolvency rules under proposals set out on Saturday to help avert a wave of bankruptcies in Europe's biggest economy, provided companies hit by the coronavirus crisis have a robust business model. Keen to avoid bankruptcies and mass layoffs, Chancellor Angela Merkel's government has launched a range of stimulus and relief measures as Germany braces for its biggest slump since World War Two, having shrunk by an unprecedented 9.7% in the second quarter. "Companies that can show creditors a realistic prospect of restructuring should be able to implement their concept outside insolvency proceedings," said Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht in a statement.
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| Trump’s 'maximum pressure' peaks just before election Posted: 19 Sep 2020 04:00 AM PDT  The president is promoting himself as a Middle East peacemaker just as he amps up pressure on Iran after dismantling a landmark international agreement with the country.
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| Germany plans reform to avoid bankruptcy wave due to corona Posted: 19 Sep 2020 03:59 AM PDT |
| Global Surgical Procedures Industry Posted: 19 Sep 2020 03:27 AM PDT |
| After wildfire smoke clears, protests resume in Portland Posted: 19 Sep 2020 03:19 AM PDT  Police declared an unlawful assembly Friday night in a neighborhood near a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building where protesters had marched, according to a police statement. Demonstrators participated in criminal activity and threw items at officers, police said, leading to 11 arrests. Photos show that smoke was used to clear the crowd, and it appeared that tear gas was deployed.
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| Iran vows 'hit' on all involved in US killing of top general Posted: 19 Sep 2020 02:40 AM PDT  The chief of Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened Saturday to go after everyone who had a role in a top general's January killing during a U.S. drone strike in Iraq. U.S. President Donald Trump warned this week that Washington would harshly respond to any Iranian attempts to take revenge for the death of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, tweeting that "if they hit us in any way, any form, written instructions already done we're going to hit them 1000 times harder." The president's warning came in response to a report that Iran was plotting to assassinate the U.S. ambassador to South Africa in retaliation for Soleimani's killing at Baghdad's airport at the beginning of the year.
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| US to break with UN security council and reimpose Iran snapback sanctions Posted: 19 Sep 2020 02:30 AM PDT  Officials says they will launch new measures on Monday despite overwhelming oppositionThe US will break with almost every other UN security council member state including its closest allies on Saturday night by declaring UN sanctions back in effect on Iran.Administration officials say they will launch a raft of new punitive measures on Monday, which some observers believe may be aimed at seeking to provoke a confrontation with Tehran in the run up to the US election.The Trump administration has said it will consider UN sanctions, mostly involving the arms trade, as having resumed at midnight GMT on Saturday night, and has threatened to take new measures to enforce them.The sanctions were suspended in 2015 following a multilateral nuclear deal with Iran in July that year. The US walked out of the deal in 2018, but this summer claimed to be still a participant for the purposes for reimposing sanctions. Thirteen out fifteen members of the UN security council disagreed and rejected the US position, saying it was no longer a participant in the 2015 agreement and had no standing to trigger a sanctions "snapback".The overwhelming majority of UN member states see the Saturday night deadline as being meaningless, and intend to ignore it.Donald Trump is expected to shrug off US isolation when he addresses the UN general assembly by video on Tuesday."We will return to the United Nations to reimpose sanctions so that the arms embargo will become permanent next week," secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said this week. "We believe deeply that this is good for the peoples of all nations."Elliott Abrams, the US special envoy on Venezuela and Iran, said there would be a major announcement on Monday about the scale of US actions."The arms embargo will now be re-imposed indefinitely and other restrictions will return, including the ban on Iran engaging in enrichment and reprocessing-related activities, the prohibition on ballistic missile testing and development, and sanctions on the transfer of nuclear and missile-related technologies to Iran," Abrams said.Analysts said they expected the US to unveil sanction threats against companies or countries trading arms with Iran. Russia and China, in particular, are expected to defy that threat, but may defer major new weapons sales until under the US election."I think what we're going to see is an instance of where US sanctions policy is reaching its exhaustion because the whole premise of the snapback was to try isolate Iran on the political stage … which it hasn't done so far," said Ellie Geranmayeh, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.New sanctions on arms trading are likely to have little real impact on Iran. However, some experts suggest the US could try to go further, and seek to stop and search ships in international waters ostensibly in search for weapons being shipped to or from Iran.Trita Parsi, co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft in Washington and author of three books on US-Iranian relations, said this more aggressive approach is being driven by hawks in the administration who want to provoke Iran into reacting in a way that will make it impossible to salvage the 2015 nuclear deal, even if Trump loses the November election."For that specific faction that I think is playing Trump, this may be the last couple of weeks that they can do anything," Parsi said "So now is not the time to save your last bullet, now's the time to just throw everything you have."
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