Iran Renews Ultimatum To Kuwait Over Oil Field Rights
Iran has reiterated its ultimatum to Kuwait concerning the disputed Arash gas field.
Iran has reiterated its ultimatum to Kuwait concerning the disputed Arash gas field.
Iran's vice president for legal affairs, Mohammad Dehghan, emphasized Iran's position, stating, "We will not grant unilateral extraction rights without considering our country's interests to any country."
He stated, "Under no circumstances will the Islamic Republic of Iran retreat from its 'acquired right' in the Arash gas field."
The Arash field, also known as Durra or Dorra by Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, has become a focal point of contention. In 2022, a Kuwaiti-Saudi Arabian development agreement concerning the field drew criticism from Iran, which claims a stake in it. Durra is estimated to hold around 20 trillion cubic feet in proven reserves.
Discovered in 1967, the offshore field boasts substantial reserves, including approximately 310 million barrels of oil and significant gas reserves.
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait's recent statements regarding the energy reserve field have intensified tensions, with demands for Iran to demarcate its maritime borders in the region.
In 2001, Iran deployed drilling equipment into the field, leading Kuwait to file complaints with international organizations. Subsequently, Iran halted its preparations for exploitation, and Kuwait also put on hold its plans in the region with Saudi Arabia.
Iran's access to international companies for the development of its oil and gas fields has been hampered by sanctions over its nuclear program. As a result, Iran has turned to allies like Russia to advance its oil field projects. China remains its biggest customer.
Warning of a worsening economy in the coming months, Tehran economist Morteza Afghah told local media that the roots of the problem lie in the regime’s non-developmental strategy that prioritizes ideological and political agendas over economic progress.
“The reality is that over the past three decades since the end of the [Iran-Iraq] war, the country's economy has been mismanaged. Economic problems have multiplied, and economic and social indicators have deteriorated,” he said. “The reason for this is deeper than even economic policies,” Afghah stressed.
He noted that the problems facing the country are primarily manifested through economic challenges, but their roots are non-economic, criticizing the government for wasting resources of the country with inefficient decision-making.
Despite having a large number of qualified, young, patriotic, educated, and skilled human resources, as well as valuable natural resources, Iran is suffering from poverty, unemployment, and inequality, leading to various social challenges such as addiction, child labor, unsupported women, and theft, he said.
“The main root of the current situation is philosophical and influenced by the non-developmental value system of the decision-makers,” Afghah noted, explaining that such an approach “prioritizes ideological, jurisprudential, and political issues, and does not give due importance to economic well-being and people's livelihood.”
He decried the current practices and government's attempts to address the symptoms rather than the root cause of multiple crisis.
"The Iranian government has used a variety of measures to cover its budget deficit, including selling bonds, state assets, and state-owned companies; eliminating subsidized dollars; spending the National Development Fund; raising taxes; increasing the prices of goods and services," and printing money.
Describing the US withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear deal as a heavy blow that exacerbated Iran’s economic problems, Afghah said that former US president Donald Trump’s decision was the result of Iran’s wrong policies. He also rebuked Iran’s hardliners for welcoming US and international sanctions and disregarding their impacts on the country. He quoted former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who famously called UN resolutions “useless pieces of paper” and dared the Security Council to keep issuing them over Iran over its nuclear program.
The economist argued that the government has no choice but to negotiate with the US in order to lift the sanctions. Additionally, Tehran has to resolve its issues with the International Financial Task Force (FATF), which has kept Iran on its financial ‘blacklist’ in recent years for not adhering to transparency and international conventions against money laundering and financing of terrorism.
If the Iranian government is unable to reach an agreement to lift the sanctions and resolve the FATF issue, and regional tensions continue, the economic and social conditions in Iran will deteriorate significantly, he said.
“The hardline Principlists, who dominate the new parliament and the government, prioritize ideological and political issues over solving the economic and social problems of the country. The possibility of Donald Trump's re-election further increases the uncertainty and the economic risk. As a result, we can expect the Iranian currency to lose more value, rising prices and worse economic indicators, more emigration and brain drain, and the flight of capital,” the economist said.
However, he argued that even if the sanctions are lifted, the Iranian economy will not improve significantly. “In the best-case scenario, the situation will not get worse, but it will not get much better either."
Iranian lawmaker Masoud Pezeshkian echoed similar concerns on Monday, highlighting that the main reason for the government’s failure in fulfilling its economic promises is not employing experts for the jobs. “The administration had promised to reduce inflation to less than 10 percent, now it is hovering around 50 percent. It had promised to build one million housing units, but they cannot do it even if eight years at office."
Pezeshkian went on to say, “We always try to say everything is fine and not address the issues we have. As a result, when people protest about the problems, we claim that they are wrong, and we have achieved success."
After years of debate, the new study said the human species, who emerged in Africa more than 300,000 years ago and migrated out of the continent 60,000 to 70,000 years ago, have lingered for thousands of years in a geographic hub that spanned Iran, southeast Iraq and northeast Saudi Arabia. These bands of hunter-gatherers then went on to settle all of Asia and Europe starting roughly 45,000 years ago.
Their findings were based on genomic datasets drawn from ancient DNA and modern gene pools, combined with palaeoecological evidence that showed that this region would have represented an ideal habitat, because of its capacity to support a larger population compared to surrounding areas in West Asia.
"Our results provide the first full picture of the whereabouts of the ancestors of all present-day non-Africans in the early phases on the colonization of Eurasia," said molecular anthropologist Luca Pagani of the University of Padova in Italy, senior author of the study published in the journal Nature Communications, opens new tab.
Anthropologist and study co-author Michael Petraglia, director of the Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution at Griffith University, said the study "is a story about us and our history - our goal was to unravel some of the mystery about our evolution and our worldwide dispersal." "The combination of genetic and paleoecological models allowed us to predict the location where early human populations first resided as soon as they exited Africa," Petraglia added.
