MANAMA: The US envoy for Iran warned Friday that Tehran was approaching the point of no return for reviving a nuclear deal after it boosted its stocks of enriched uranium before talks resume this month.
Robert Malley said Iran risked making it “impossible” to gain any benefit from resuming the agreement, which has been on hold since then president Donald Trump walked away in 2018.
This week, with Iran set for talks with world powers in Vienna on November 29, the International Atomic Energy Agency said Tehran had again increased its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
“The time will come if Iran continues at this pace with the advancements they’ve made, (it) will make it impossible even if we were going to go back to the JCPOA to recapture the benefits,” Malley told the Manama Dialogue conference in Bahrain.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was the agreement struck in 2015 under which Iran agreed to clear limits on its nuclear activities in return for an easing of sanctions.
“Iran’s advances are spreading alarm across the region... that’s what’s making the clock tick faster and making all of us say that the time is short for a return to the JCPOA,” Malley said.
On Wednesday, the US and its Gulf Arab allies accused Iran of causing a nuclear crisis and destabilising the region with its ballistic missile program and support for armed militias.
Malley said the US shared a “commonality of purpose” with rivals Russia and China “because we want to avoid that crisis, all of us, the crisis that would be sparked if Iran continues on its current path.”
“And I want to be clear, because there’s no ambiguity about what they seem to be doing now, which is to drag their feet on the nuclear talks and accelerate the progress in their nuclear program.”
The US envoy said he was not encouraged by the statements from the new Iranian government of President Ebrahim Raisi, which earlier on Friday accused Washington of conducting a “propaganda campaign” against the country.
“If they stick to their public pronouncements, unfortunately we’re not headed in the right direction... but let’s wait to see what happens,” he said, pledging that President Joe Biden would honor a revived deal.
“Our intent, our clear intent in coming back into the deal is to stick with the deal because we don’t want to see a nuclear crisis,” Malley said.
Iran had reacted angrily to a US pledge to take its Gulf Arab allies’ interests into account in any revived nuclear deal with their arch rival.
“The US government, which is responsible for the current situation after withdrawing from the nuclear deal, is once again trying to provoke a crisis,” foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh charged.
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Time shrinking for Iran nuclear deal, US envoy warns
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Time shrinking for Iran nuclear deal, US envoy warns
- Robert Malley said Iran risked making it “impossible” to gain any benefit from resuming the agreement
- This week, the IAEA said Tehran had again increased its stockpile of highly enriched uranium
In Sudan’s old port of Suakin, dreams of a tourism revival
- Inside the ruins of a mosque, a restoration crew is hard at work rebuilding this piece of Suakin, over a century after the city was abandoned
SUAKIN, Sudan: The mayor of Suakin dreams of a rebirth for his town, an ancient Red Sea port spared by the wars that have marked Sudan’s history but reduced to ruins by the ravages of time.
“It was called the ‘White City’,” for its unique buildings made of coral stone taken from the seabed, said mayor Abu Mohamed El-Amin Artega, who is also the leader of the Artega tribe, part of eastern Sudan’s Beja ethnic group.
Now the once-booming port and tourist draw languishes on the water, effectively forgotten for years as Sudan remains mired in a devastating war between the army and paramilitary forces.
But inside the ruins of a mosque, a restoration crew is hard at work rebuilding this piece of Suakin, over a century after the city was abandoned.
“Before the war, a lot of people came, a lot of tourists,” said Ahmed Bushra, an engineer with the association Safeguarding Sudan’s Living Heritage from Conflict and Climate Change (SSLH).
“We hope in the future, when peace comes to Sudan, they will come and enjoy our beautiful historic buildings here,” he told AFP.
Architecture student Doha Abdelaziz Mohamed is part of the crew bringing the mosque back to life with funding from the British Council and support from UNESCO.
“When I came here, I was stunned by the architecture,” the 23-year-old said.
The builders “used techniques that are no longer employed today,” she told AFP. “We are here to keep our people’s heritage.”
Abandoned
The ancient port — set on an oval island nestled within a lagoon — served for centuries as a transit point for merchant caravans, Muslim and Christian pilgrims traveling to Makkah and Jerusalem, and the regional slave trade, according to the Rome-based heritage institute ICCROM.
It became a vibrant crossroads under the Ottoman Empire, said Artega, 55, and its population grew to around 25,000 as a construction boom took off.
“The streets were so crowded that, as our forefathers said, you could hardly move.”
Everything changed in 1905, when the British built a deeper commercial port 60 kilometers (37 miles) north, to accommodate increased maritime traffic with the opening of the Suez Canal.
“Merchants and residents moved to Port Sudan,” the mayor said, lamenting the decline of what he calls “Sudan’s great treasure.”
But his Artega tribe, which has administered the city since the sixth century with powers “passed from father to son,” refused to leave.
His ancestor, he said, scolded the British: “You found a port as prosperous as a fine hen — you took its eggs, plucked its feathers and now you spit its bones back at us.”
As proof of the Artega’s influence, he keeps at home what he says are swords and uniforms gifted to his ancestors by Queen Victoria during the British colonial period.
The rise of Port Sudan spelled disaster for Suakin, whose grand public buildings and elegant coral townhouses were left to decay, slowly eaten away by the humid winds and summer heat.
But the 1990s brought new hope, with the opening of a new passenger port linking Suakin to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.
Today, the Sudanese transport company Tarco operates daily crossings, carrying around 200 passengers per trip from the modern port of Suakin, within sight of the ancient city and its impoverished environs.
Lease to Turkiye
The city’s optimism grew in 2017 when then-president Omar Al-Bashir granted the old port to his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, under a 99-year lease for touristic development.
A Turkish company restored the old governor’s palace, customs house and two mosques, but the project stalled in 2019 after Bashir fell from power in the face of mass protests.
Then, in April 2023, the cruise passengers and scuba divers who once stopped in Suakin completely vanished when fighting erupted between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
A rusting cargo ship now lies stranded on a sandbank in the blue lagoon, where only a handful of fishing boats float around.
But Bushra, from SSLH, remains optimistic. He hopes to see the mosque, which houses the tomb of a Sufi sheikh, host a traditional music festival when the renovation is complete, “in five months.”
“When we finish the restoration, the tourists can come here,” he said.
“It was called the ‘White City’,” for its unique buildings made of coral stone taken from the seabed, said mayor Abu Mohamed El-Amin Artega, who is also the leader of the Artega tribe, part of eastern Sudan’s Beja ethnic group.
Now the once-booming port and tourist draw languishes on the water, effectively forgotten for years as Sudan remains mired in a devastating war between the army and paramilitary forces.
But inside the ruins of a mosque, a restoration crew is hard at work rebuilding this piece of Suakin, over a century after the city was abandoned.
“Before the war, a lot of people came, a lot of tourists,” said Ahmed Bushra, an engineer with the association Safeguarding Sudan’s Living Heritage from Conflict and Climate Change (SSLH).
“We hope in the future, when peace comes to Sudan, they will come and enjoy our beautiful historic buildings here,” he told AFP.
Architecture student Doha Abdelaziz Mohamed is part of the crew bringing the mosque back to life with funding from the British Council and support from UNESCO.
“When I came here, I was stunned by the architecture,” the 23-year-old said.
The builders “used techniques that are no longer employed today,” she told AFP. “We are here to keep our people’s heritage.”
Abandoned
The ancient port — set on an oval island nestled within a lagoon — served for centuries as a transit point for merchant caravans, Muslim and Christian pilgrims traveling to Makkah and Jerusalem, and the regional slave trade, according to the Rome-based heritage institute ICCROM.
It became a vibrant crossroads under the Ottoman Empire, said Artega, 55, and its population grew to around 25,000 as a construction boom took off.
“The streets were so crowded that, as our forefathers said, you could hardly move.”
Everything changed in 1905, when the British built a deeper commercial port 60 kilometers (37 miles) north, to accommodate increased maritime traffic with the opening of the Suez Canal.
“Merchants and residents moved to Port Sudan,” the mayor said, lamenting the decline of what he calls “Sudan’s great treasure.”
But his Artega tribe, which has administered the city since the sixth century with powers “passed from father to son,” refused to leave.
His ancestor, he said, scolded the British: “You found a port as prosperous as a fine hen — you took its eggs, plucked its feathers and now you spit its bones back at us.”
As proof of the Artega’s influence, he keeps at home what he says are swords and uniforms gifted to his ancestors by Queen Victoria during the British colonial period.
The rise of Port Sudan spelled disaster for Suakin, whose grand public buildings and elegant coral townhouses were left to decay, slowly eaten away by the humid winds and summer heat.
But the 1990s brought new hope, with the opening of a new passenger port linking Suakin to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.
Today, the Sudanese transport company Tarco operates daily crossings, carrying around 200 passengers per trip from the modern port of Suakin, within sight of the ancient city and its impoverished environs.
Lease to Turkiye
The city’s optimism grew in 2017 when then-president Omar Al-Bashir granted the old port to his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, under a 99-year lease for touristic development.
A Turkish company restored the old governor’s palace, customs house and two mosques, but the project stalled in 2019 after Bashir fell from power in the face of mass protests.
Then, in April 2023, the cruise passengers and scuba divers who once stopped in Suakin completely vanished when fighting erupted between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
A rusting cargo ship now lies stranded on a sandbank in the blue lagoon, where only a handful of fishing boats float around.
But Bushra, from SSLH, remains optimistic. He hopes to see the mosque, which houses the tomb of a Sufi sheikh, host a traditional music festival when the renovation is complete, “in five months.”
“When we finish the restoration, the tourists can come here,” he said.
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