N-deal compliance wins back economic freedom for Iran

“This network obfuscated the end user of sensitive goods for missile proliferation by using front companies in third countries to deceive foreign suppliers”, read a release from the Department of Treasury, describing the group of companies and people who have looked to help Iran secure materials for a ballistic missile.

United Nations experts said in a report in December that the missile test in October violated sanctions banning Iran from launches capable of delivering nuclear weapons.

Obama said the settlement between the U.S. and Iran at The Hague would save United States money.

2 District Rep. Mike Simpson: “Congress has been urging the Administration to secure the release of Pastor Saeed Abedini and other Americans wrongly detained in Iran for far too long, and the failure to do so was among the many reasons I opposed the Iran nuclear deal. Iran has now fulfilled key commitments under the nuclear deal and perhaps most important of all we have achieved this historic progress through diplomacy, without resorting to another war in the Middle East”, Obama said. Still, he said the accord “doesn’t wipe away all of the concerns” of the worldwide community, and “verification remains, as it always has been, the backbone of this agreement”.

Presenting the draft budget for the next Iranian fiscal year, which begins in March, Rouhani told parliament the deal was a “turning point” for the economy of Iran, a major oil producer which has been virtually shut out of worldwide markets for the past five years.

Also Monday, Yukiya Amano, the head of the world’s nuclear watchdog, said Iran has agreed to strengthen its cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

A statement from the Swiss cabinet welcomed the implementation of the nuclear deal and congratulated the six world powers and Iran for their success in making it happen.

The latest sanctions won’t affect development and “we will show this in practice by revealing new missile achievements”, Iran’s Defense Minister General Hossein Dehghan said according to the semi-official Tasnim News Agency. Yet Tehran knows it can seize United States citizens on trumped-up charges, and Washington will free Iranian agents to get the hostages back.

A fifth American, Matthew Trevithick, was also released by Iran, though his release was not part of the negotiated prisoner swap. Iranian media say the military has test-fired several short-range missiles, including the type Palestinian militant Hamas group used to attack Tel Aviv last November.