Free Republic

Iran has expanded the tunnels it uses to hide a major part of its nuclear weapons program to a network covering a large area of southeastern Tehran, an Iranian exile who opposes that nation's Islamic government said Monday. Alireza Jafarzadeh said the secret construction of missiles extends well beyond Parchin, a military zone 20 miles southeast of the Iranian capital. Jafarzadeh told reporters in September about the Parchin tunnels.

A study by a Washington think tank that closely follows the Iranian nuclear program, the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), concludes that Iran could have tested a nuclear trigger in a device at the disputed Iranian site of Parchin. AOL Defense obtained a copy of the draft report. The Iranian military testing ground of Parchin has emerged as the front line in the continuing struggles between the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and Iran. Iran has refused to let inspectors from the IAEA visit the site, some 30 kilometers southeast of Tehran, where they suspect...

Neither the November 24th P5+1 "deal" nor the White House summary of the subsequent agreement to continue the process deals effectively with Iran's efforts to have nuclear weapons. NOTE: I tried to address much of what follows when writing earlier about the Iran Scam and have difficulty understanding why there is very little public or even official interest in the problems the deal raises. Please let me to elaborate here a bit more on why the P5+1 "deal" is a scam, why it matters and to offer some hypotheses about the lack of interest.The text of the English language version of...

The first preliminary nuclear deal the six world powers (US, Russia, China, UK, France and German) signed with Iran before dawn Sunday, Nov. 24, at the end of a four-day marathon, failed to address the most questionable aspects of Iran’s nuclear program, i.e. its clandestine military dimensions. The accord confined itself to aspects of uranium enrichment and stockpiles. UN inspections were expanded – but not applied, for instance, to Iran’s concealed nuclear sites - or even the Parchin military base where Iran is suspected of having tested nuclear-related explosions. Israel, the Gulf States and others are therefore highly dubious of...

Report: Series of explosions rip through Iranian military site By Yossi Melman, Haaretz Correspondent tags: military, Iran A series of explosions blasted through a crucial Iranian military industrial site last Tuesday, according to a statement released by "The National Opposition Council of Iran." According to the statement, the explosions were in Parchin, about 30 km south of Tehran, and sparked a large fire which caused some injuries to personnel at the site.

VIENNA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. official says satellite photographs of a suspected nuclear industrial site in Iran demonstrated its intention to develop atomic weapons, an allegation Tehran has dismissed as "a new lie". A prominent international expert said on Wednesday that new satellite images showed the Parchin military complex southeast of Tehran may be a site for research, testing and production of nuclear weapons. Iran denies having an atomic bomb programme. "This clearly shows the intention to develop weapons," a senior U.S. official told Reuters on condition of anonymity on Thursday. He also accused the U.N. nuclear watchdog...

Tuesday/Wednesday, November 13/14 - about 4 a.m. Sources inside and outside Iran. A series of explosions rocked the Parchin Military Site (where missiles, including "cruise" type missiles, are manufactured) at Varamin south of Tehran. The Shahab 3, 4 and more recently Shahab 5 solid fuel missiles at the site are hidden in old salt mines in the mountain face in the area, further excavated and furbished for development and manufacture. The main purpose of this Ministry of Defense site, established by the late Shah's father - Reza Shah Kabir - in the early 1900's and taken over by the IRGC,...

Tehran’s trickery and tactics of misdirection were on full show Saturday, April 19, when Iran’s Vice President Ali Akbar Salehi offered “to redesign” the controversial Arak reactor so that it produces one-fifth of the plutonium initially planned and his claim that this concession had “virtually resolved” Iran’s controversy with the West. But the giveaway was his mock-innocent comment: “We still don’t know why they [nuclear watchdog inspectors] want to visit Parchin for a third time…” Debkafile: For three years, Tehran has denied monitors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to this military facility to investigate suspected nuclear explosive...

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director Yukiya Amano declared Friday, May 4, that “Parchin (the suspected site of nuclear-related explosion tests) is the priority and we start with that,” he may have missed the boat. As he spoke, Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak said it was possible that Iran was already putting in place the infrastructure for building a nuclear bomb in 60 days. In this regard, debkafile’s military sources disclose that Iran had by the end of 2009 early 2012 completed the construction of a new chain of underground facilities deep inside the Dasht e-Kavir (Great Salt Desert) -...

A U.S. non-proliferation expert said on Tuesday he has identified a building at the Parchin military site in Iran suspected of containing, currently or previously, a high-explosive test chamber the UN nuclear watchdog wants to visit. David Albright, founder of the Institute for Science and International Security, said he studied commercial satellite imagery and found a building located on a relatively small and isolated compound at Parchin that fit a description in the November 2011 International Atomic Energy Agency report.

Experts continue to debate whether the explosion at an Iranian military base at Parchin earlier in the week was an act of sabotage. The New York Times notes that the satellite images of the incident showed evidence “reminiscent of pictures of a missile-development site 30 miles west of Tehran that was virtually destroyed during a test in November 2011 that killed 17 people, including Gen. Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, the leading force behind Iran’s advanced missile efforts.” Nonetheless David Albright, head of the Institute for Science and International Security, told the Times that it “could have been an accident.” However, Hussain...

At least two are reported dead after a lethal explosion Sunday evening at or near the Parchin military compound near Tehran, the Iranian Student News Agency (ISNA) reported. Quoting the Iranian Defense Industries Organization, ISNA reported, “Unfortunately, due to the incident two workers of this production unit lost their lives.” No further details were provided. The blast occurred in a unit where explosive materials are produced at the nuclear facility, news reported said.

The incident occurred at the Parchin military compound, not far from the Iranian capital, according to the Iranian Students News Agency. Two workers were killed in an explosion that took place at a military explosives factory southeast of Tehran, near the suspected nuclear reactor in Parchin, IRNA, the official Iranian news agency, reported Monday. The agency quoted Iran’s Defense Industries Organization, which said a fire occurred Sunday night, killing two people. The agency did not provide additional information. The semi-official ISNA news agency also reported that an explosion occurred at a military base near Tehran, killing two people. “Unfortunately, two...

If you read this post on Tuesday, you’ll want to read this one too. Did something happen a few days ago at the Parchin military base, where Iran has been accused of testing components for atomic bombs? Iranian state media reported that there was a fire at an “explosives producing facility” east of Tehran that killed two people; an Iranian dissident group countered that it wasn’t just any facility that had burned, it was an area on the Parchin base. And it wasn’t just a fire that had occurred, it was a gigantic explosion that shattered windows miles away....

With Washington pressure rising, secretary of state heads to Vienna next week as target date for agreement on curbing Tehran atomic program nears America’s top diplomat is plunging back into Iranian nuclear talks, keeping one eye on the longtime US adversary and the other on political developments at home, as pressure rises in Washington for a deal ensuring the Islamic Republic cannot become a nuclear state. The prospect of a Republican takeover of the Senate means Secretary of State John Kerry will be on a tight leash with a late-November deadline approaching for an agreement. Kerry, European Union negotiator Catherine...

Russia is moving tactical nuclear weapons systems into recently-annexed Crimea while the Obama administration is backing informal talks aimed at cutting U.S. tactical nuclear deployments in Europe. Three senior House Republican leaders wrote to President Obama two weeks ago warning that Moscow will deploy nuclear missiles and bombers armed with long-range air launched cruise missiles into occupied Ukrainian territory. “Locating nuclear weapons on the sovereign territory of another state without its permission is a devious and cynical action,” states the letter signed by House Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R., Calif.) and two subcommittee chairmen....

ISIS commander Tarkhan Batirashvili--aka, "Omar the Chechen"--warns that Russia will soon be targeted by the Islamist group. According to The Moscow Times, "Batirashvili has gained a fearsome reputation throughout the conflict in Syria." Bloomberg News reports that he now seeks "revenge" on Russia over Moscow's support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He gave voice to plans for this revenge while talking on the phone with his father, who lives in Georgia's Pankisi Gorge. He told his father: "Don't worry dad, I'll come home soon and show the Russians... I have many thousands following me and I'll get more. We'll have...

It is still unclear what happened on Sunday night at Iran’s illicit nuclear installation at Parchin. According to Iranian sources, there was a large explosion that rocked the area within a 15-km. radius of the facility. Two people were reportedly injured. According to the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency and Israel, the Parchin facility is a key component of Iran’s suspected military nuclear program. It is at Parchin that Iran is allegedly building a nuclear explosive device – that is, a nuclear warhead. The timing of the blast is notable. On Monday night, a delegation from the IAEA landed in...

RT Spanish started broadcasting in Argentina on Thursday, which makes it the first foreign TV channel on national television in the Latin America country. It will be available for over 80% of the country’s 42 mln population. A joint initiative of the two countries was made possible by the presidents of Russia and Argentina, Vladimir Putin and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who inaugurated the 24/7 broadcast during a video conference. President Putin said he was sure that “the launch of a Spanish-language Russian channel in Argentina will make Russia much more understandable and will promote the further rapprochement between the...

Ethnic Kurds clashed overnight with alleged members of a hardline Islamist movement in Hamburg last night, as ISIS clashes spread far from Syria. Police in the northern German city say 14 people were injured overnight in the violence involving hundreds of demonstrators before riot police were able to quell the disturbance. Police spokesman Karina Sadowsky said this morning that fighting began after hundreds of Kurds held a protest against the Islamic State group... ...Last night's violence in Germany came as at least nine Kurdish demonstrators were killed by police in Turkey as demonstrations against the government's failure to help Syrian...