Posts tagged : "Iran"

Kourosh Ziabari - Iran Review: The introduction of the new contract model for Iran’s upstream oil and gas projects, dubbed IPC (Iran Petroleum Contract), has generated a great deal of enthusiasm among the energy experts and analysts who’ve been monitoring Iran’s market fluctuations following the imposition of sanctions on the country’s energy sector in 2011 and 2012 and the termination of those sanctions on the day of the implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action earlier in January. Iran has unveiled a new package of incentives for the International Oil Companies (IOCs) to bring their capital and technology into its money-spinning energy projects, and revised the terms of the old buyback contract model set...

Kourosh Ziabari - Middle East Eye: Former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is still being harshly criticised in public, especially by the pro-reform, outspoken officials of President Hassan Rouhani's administration. Rouhani, a centrist cleric, has himself opted to keep a restrained, inconspicuous stance in regard to the policies of the previous administration. However, several high-profile figures in Rouhani’s cabinet do not shy away from candidly chiding Ahmadinejad over a number of issues: from his adventurous, outlandish foreign policy to his economic mismanagement, which pushed the country to the brink of bankruptcy. The First Vice-President of Iran Eshaq Jahangiri has said Ahmadinejad squandered $950 billion of...

Kourosh Ziabari - Middle East Eye: Tensions between Iran and the Arab world – not just Saudi Arabia – are spiralling out of control. The execution of the prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr by the Saudi government and the subsequent eruption of anger in Iran, the largest Shia country in the world, marked by the unwarranted assault by a mob of hardliners on the Saudi Embassy in Tehran and its consulate in northeastern city of Mashhad, has resulted in a dismal diplomatic rupture distancing Iran from the Arab world further. In response to the violent attack on the Saudi diplomatic offices in Iran, in which the fanatics – described by President Hassan Rouhani as "a group of headstrongs"– caused destruction to the...

Kourosh Ziabari - Your Middle East: To millions of Iranians worn out by almost a decade of economic sanctions imposed on them over the country’s controversial nuclear program, Mohammad Javad Zarif appears like a treasure; he was basically unearthed by Hassan Rouhani, the pragmatist, moderate cleric and former diplomat who won the June 14, 2013 presidential elections owing to the promise he had made to the nation that he would put an end to the nuclear standoff and relieve the economic pressures the people were suffering. Upon his election, it was initially Rouhani’s plan to appoint either Mahmoud Vaezi or Sadegh Kharrazi as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. The former is a U.S. and Poland-educated electrical engineer and...

Kourosh Ziabari - Huffington Post: Iran's vice-president and the head of Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization has recently given an interview to The Associated Press, where he presented eye-opening statistics on Iran's tourism sector, promising that the country should get ready for a "tsunami" of foreign tourists in the coming months and years. Like almost every aspect of Iranian life and economy, tourism was also hit hard by the tormenting sanctions that the United States and the European Union slapped on the country over its contentious nuclear program. Traveling to Iran had become an aching challenge as many European airliners had suspended their flights to Iran's major cities, the hardline government of...

Kourosh Ziabari - Huffington Post: The 2015 federal election in Canada marked an inspiring moment in the nation's race towards moderation, and prompted international acclamation as the "change" which the Liberal Party had pledged came to be set in motion. Known for his bellicose foreign policy and antagonistic approach towards those world leaders with whom he couldn't come to an agreement peacefully, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, having ruled the nation since 2006, concocted new enemies for Canada and alienated those newly-found foes toughly, qualifying himself as a hawk rapidly blasted by the media and opposition figures at home and abroad. The nine years of Conservative rule in Canada were punctuated with conflicts,...

Kourosh Ziabari: A world-renowned British adventurer, filmmaker and Guinness World Records holder believes that the mainstream media don’t offer a fair and objective view of the world to their audience. Graham David Hughes said the mass media should not withhold truth from the public, but they are doing so in an unjust manner. “nternet should allow us all to research what we read in the news and learn about the background of any given story, but “research” for most people means simply finding a blog site or YouTube video that spoon-feeds their own preconceived opinions back to them!” Graham David Hughes who has set the record of visiting every country on earth without flying or a personal vehicle believes that Iran is one of...

Kourosh Ziabari: As Iran’s tourism industry grows steadily, the corporate media’s stereotypical portrayal of Iran becomes unpopular and sometimes ridiculed by the Western citizens. With the influx of foreign tourists into Iran, especially from the European countries, more people are getting familiar with the unseen face of Iran as a country with an ancient culture, civilization and several natural and cultural magnets unknown to the world. An Italian journalist and photographer, who has traveled to Iran in the recent years three times, says the media’s clichés about Iran are obsolete and tiresome. Angela Corrias believes that Iranians are civilized and educated people and hospitality is a significant part of their culture and...

Kourosh Ziabari - Iran Review: On the sunny spring afternoon of Monday, April 13, I got to the Istanbul Bilgi University’s central campus with a tram which took me from the Aksaray neighborhood in the Fatih District to the Kabatas quarter where the shuttles for the Santral Campus, available every 30 minutes, would pick up the students and drop them at the entry gate of the university. Istanbul Bilgi University, founded in 1996, is ranked among the top 10 institutions of higher education in Turkey. Although I arrived at my appointment with some 45-minutes delay, Prof. Ilter Turan, one of Turkey’s leading political scientists and the former rector of the Istanbul Bilgi University, received me warmly, and after a few minutes of...

Kourosh Ziabari: The Persian New Year has just started and the Iranians, Persian-speaking nations and many people across the Middle East and Central Asia are celebrating the arrival of spring and Nowruz. Nowruz is an ancient Iranian festival that marks the beginning of Vernal Equinox and the solar New Year. It’s observed by some 12 nations as well as Iranian Diaspora in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia and elsewhere. Nowruz is a time for amicable family gatherings, exchanging of gifts, tasting special sweetmeat and cuisines, paying tribute to the dead, and visiting the holy shrines and practicing specific religious rituals including the recitation of a special prayer at the moment of the transition of the year. A...

Kourosh Ziabari - International Policy Digest: Italy’s former culture minister, Massimo Bray, has just concluded his second trip to Iran which he believes has been one of the most delightful and charming experiences in his lifetime. When Massimo Bray visited Iran in January of this year, he was a member of the cabinet of Prime Minister Enrico Letta; however, following the growing criticism of the prime minister’s economic policies and his tensions with the left-wing Secretary of the Democratic Party, Matteo Renzi, Letta resigned and the cabinet was reshuffled. Subsequently, Dario Franceschini replaced Massimo Bray. However, Bray’s enchantment with the Iranian culture and history and his fascination with the delicacy and...

Kourosh Ziabari: Prof. Sheila Blair, a prominent Islamic arts scholar, says the sense of hospitality is what makes the Iranian people distinctive in their deportment and demeanor than the other nations of the world. Prof. Sheila Blair, who is a Norma Jean Calderwood University Professor of Islamic and Asian Art at the Fine Arts Department of the Boston College, says that Iranians have always been creative and innovative people and that is why the Iranian arts are so unique, subtle and delicate. “Since Iran was often the bridge from regions further east to Arabia and beyond, Iranians quickly learned of the latest in artistic and technological innovations elsewhere, and people elsewhere learned of those things that had developed in...