Oil prices fell on Friday, pressured by economic uncertainty ahead of a possible debt deal in Greece, concerns about China's sluggish manufacturing sector, and weak U.S. petroleum demand.
Just add China to the list of those not supporting Iran's efforts to develop nuclear weapons. Speaking at the end of a six-day visit to the Middle East, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao delivered a firm warning to Tehran against developing nuclear weapons.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday warned against military intervention in Iran, fearing that it would not stop the Islamic Republic's nuclear weapons program, but instead bring more chaos to the region.
Iran's foreign minister warned Arab neighbors on Thursday not to put themselves in a dangerous position by aligning themselves too closely with the United States in the escalating dispute over Tehran's nuclear activity.
Lavrov also criticized moves by the West to tighten the economic screws on Iran.
Iran said on Sunday it had received a letter from the U.S. government about the Strait of Hormuz, the crucial oil shipping lane that Tehran has threatened to close if sanctions prevent it exporting oil.
Iran's effort to recover some $1.75 billion frozen in a U.S. bank faces a new obstacle due to a law President Barack Obama signed last month, potentially further squeezing Tehran's economy and exacerbating tensions between the two countries.
Iran said on Saturday it had evidence Washington was behind the recent killing of one of its nuclear scientists, state television reported, at a time when tensions over the country's nuclear program have escalated to their highest level ever.
During his Latin American trip this week Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad met with former Cuba leader Fidel Castro.
Deputy Governor Safarali Baratloo said the killing was similar to previous attacks targeting Iranian nuclear scientists.
Both the United States and Israel have denied involvement in the assassination of a nuclear scientist in Iran on Wednesday. But is the claim enough for Iran?
Almost one-third of Iran’s oil exports go to China. Or, put another way, 11 percent of Chinese oil imports comes from Iran.
The symbolic Doomsday Clock calculated by a group of scientists was moved a minute closer to midnight on Tuesday, with the group citing inadequate progress on nuclear weapons reduction and climate change.
The Doomsday Clock, a symbolic measure of how near the human species is to self-destruction, probably as a result of nuclear weapons programs or climate change, was adjusted, on Jan. 9, to five minutes to midnight - or doomsday!
The Doomsday Clock, a clock face used as a symbol of imminent apocalypse, has been moved one minute closer to midnight because of inadequate progress on stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and continuing inaction on climate change.
The hands of a symbolic doomsday clock fell back one minute Tuesday to five minutes to midnight, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a group that monitors global threats such as climate change, nuclear proliferation and human-caused disasters.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad started his four-nation Latin American tour Sunday with a pit stop in Venezuela for a powwow with his ally, President Hugo Chavez, who defended his counterpart by saying Iran is facing U.S. warmongering threats amid tensions over its nuclear program.
The International Atomic Energy Agency -- the United Nations' atomic watchdog -- said that Iran has started enriching uranium at a fortified underground site in Fordow, near the city of Qom.
Amir Mirzai Hekmati, an American of Iranian descent, “confessed” to espionage before the court in Teheran.
Iran will in the near future start enriching uranium deep inside a mountain, a senior official said Sunday, a move likely to further antagonize Western powers that suspect it is seeking nuclear weapons capability.
China has publicly rejected new U.S. sanctions on Iran.
The latest threat comes days after U.S. President Barack Obama signed into law sanctions against Iran's central bank which processes most of the country's oil-export payments. Obama and other leaders, including European Union foreign ministers set to meet in Brussels on Jan. 30 to consider a oil-export ban on Iran, hope more sanctions will slow the country from further developing its nuclear weapons program.
