Vatanka Reports
News and Analysis on the Greater Middle East 
 

Iran’s cryptic hard-liners are once again on the minds of US policymakers.

Tehran is increasingly nervous about a potential bid by Iraq’s Kurds for independence.

The swift and violent rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) continues to rattle the cages of power in Tehran.

This week’s visit to Tehran by the Kuwaiti emir, Sheik Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, is about more than Iranian-Kuwaiti relations.

Geography alone should make the Arab world Iran’s key foreign policy focus.

The crisis in Ukraine has rightly sparked concerns over a possible cut in Russian natural gas to Europe. Europe receives roughly 30 percent of its gas supplies from Russia, and more than half of the Russian natural gas delivered to Europe travels through Ukraine.

Since he was elected president of Iran in June 2013, Hassan Rouhani has been striving to say the right things in order to convince the international community that Tehran is changing course.

As the Western world is drawn in by the recent events in the Crimea, nations on the periphery are seeing a chance to use the widening gulf between Russia and the United States/EU to further their own aims.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu famously lambasted the November interim nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1 as a "historic mistake."

President Obama met his top Afghanistan commanders in the Oval Office on February 4 to discuss his decision to reduce the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, he received a compliment from an unlikely source.

Only five months in office and President Hassan Rouhani of Iran secured himself a top speaking slot at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani won a convincing victory in the June 2013 elections.