Spring of freedom

For the regime ruling Iran, there’s no escaping from the FATF crisis  The bills related to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) are still under review in Iran’s Expediency Discernment Council and proponents from both factions, as much as the opponents, are dragging the council to abide by their political position. Amid this fiasco, most evident is the fact that the Iranian regime Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei lacks both the power and authority to make a decision and accept the consequences and responsibility that come with it. On April 23, Keyhan newspaper, known as Khamenei’s semi-official mouthpiece, published an article titled, “The Expediency Discernment Council’s procrastination in disapproving the  FATF  is not expedient,” accusing the council members of leaving the Palermo and CFT bills in limbo. “After the FATF, in its recent statement, suspended Iran again from its blacklist for a period of four months, proponents of the FATF asked for this bills to be...

The FATF crises escalates more than ever, haunting the mullahs’ regime In Iran, the fate of bills related to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) remain a subject of controversy and infighting between the two factions of the political elite of the regime ruling Iran, while the  terrorist designation  of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps ( IRGC ) by the U.S. State Department has pushed the issue further in a crisis. Both factions argue the IRGC’s blacklisting proves that their particular approach is the best for the future of the ruling theocracy in Iran. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, a former member of the IRGC and former mayor of Tehran, who was previously opposed to the FATF bills, has now changed sides. Ghalibaf, a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, where the fate of the aforementioned bills is under review, acknowledged the current pressure on the ruling mullahs. “We can’t walk by the U.S. and other issues like FATF and ignore them. Their...

The checkmate situation of the Iranian regime The Financial Action Task Force, the world’s de facto standards body on money laundering and combatting the financing of terrorism, issued a stark warning to the Iranian regime last week. “If by June 2019, Iran does not enact the remaining legislation in line with FATF Standards, then the FATF will require increased supervisory examination for branches and subsidiaries of financial institutions based in Iran. The FATF also expects Iran to continue to progress with enabling regulations and other amendments,” FATF’s public statement from February 22 reads. And so, the already controversial remaining FATF bills have entered new levels of inner quarrels between the ruling elite. Behzad Nabavi, former deputy speaker of the Majlis (parliament) and one of the iconic figures of the so-called reformist camp, warns rival conservatives about the consequences of not passing the FATF bills into law and says: “Not passing FATF will bring the...

Iran’s deepening economic crisis A multi-dimensional economic crisis has paralyzed the Iranian regime. While the sanctions’ noose has tightened around the mullahs’ neck, the European mechanism has still yielded nothing of value to compensate for the U.S. sanctions due to the Iranian regime’s unwillingness to pass the FATF anti-money-laundering bills into law. Just a few days ago it was revealed that a deficit of about hundred thousand billion tomans has been hidden among other items in the budget bill in order to present a healthier face for the Islamic Republic of Iran. Tehran’s Friday prayer Imam Mohammad Hassan Aboutorabi Fard described the Iranian government’s budget bill a failed attempt and said: “Let’s look at how many steps have been taken to decrease the country’s dependence on oil income in the budget bill that is about to pass. How many steps have been taken to decrease the amount of energy dependence and management of consumption?” Referring to the impact of inte...

Iranian regime Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei   On Wednesday, the price of the U.S. dollar soared to 136,500 rials in the currency markets of Tehran, once again raising concerns about the regime’s destructive economic policies and unbridled corruption. According to the regime’s economic experts, the launching of a new round of talks by the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force ( FATF ) and the possibility of re-designating the Iranian regime in this international entity’s blacklist, along with the limbo status of FATF resolutions in the regime’s Expediency Council, are among the reasons behind this price hike. The  Expediency Council  decided to halt all evaluations of FATF resolutions and Iranian regime Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif failed to preserve the 2015 nuclear deal during his visit to Munich. As a result, Bahram Ghassemi, spokesperson for the regime’s Foreign Ministry, desperately called on the European Union to understand the regime’s status quo....