Tehran is set to host the first exclusive exhibition of Syrian goods with the aim of introducing the economic capacities of the Arab nation and promoting Iran-Syria trade relations. According to Mohammed Hamoud, the Syrian official in charge of the event, the exhibition is the result of a free trade agreement signed between Tehran and Damascus in March.

He added that Iran and Syria have good economic relations and signing the free trade agreement has further improved the ties.

The United Arab Emirates, angered by the Iranian president’s visit to a Gulf island both countries claim, warned yesterday that the dispute could not “go on forever” and urged Tehran to agree to talks or international arbitration. More >

The UN and Arab League (AL) joint special envoy Kofi Annan arrived in Tehran on Tuesday for talks on the Syrian situation, the semi-official Fars news agency reported. During his stay in Iran, Annan will hold talks on Syria with some Iranian officials including Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi, said the report.

Annan on Tuesday urged the Syrian authorities to “seize the opportunity to make a fundamental change of course” by immediately implementing a peace plan proposed by Annan and accepted by Damascus.

Iran should forge better ties with Saudi Arabia to counter Western sanctions on Iranian oil, a former president who now chairs an advisory body to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged yesterday. “If we had good relations with Saudi Arabia, would the West have been able to impose sanctions (on Iran’s oil)?” Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani asked in the latest issue of the International Studies Journal, a three-monthly Iranian publication. “Only Saudi Arabia could fill the void left by Iran. (All they need do is) produce oil within their Opec quota, and then no one would be able to harass us,” he said.

Authorities have interviewed at least 13 people since 2005 with ties to Iran’s government who were seen taking pictures of New York City landmarks, a senior New York Police Department official said Wednesday.

Mahdasht, Iran Iran opened a key space facility to visiting journalists for the first time Wednesday in an apparent effort to show its willingness to allow glimpses at sensitive technology even as Tehran and UN inspectors trade accusations about access to nuclear sites and experts.

The press tour of the Alborz Space Centre, about 70 kilometres west of Tehran, also sought to showcase Iran’s advances in aerospace sciences less than a month after it announced another satellite was launched into orbit.

There was little in the Iranian media on Wednesday to reflect the disappointment of international nuclear experts that their latest mission to Tehran, wound up the previous day, had ended in failure. The two-day visit by a high-ranking panel of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the second this year, was billed outside Iran as a “last chance” for Tehran to avoid further economic sanctions – or worse – by coming clean on the full extent of its nuclear program.

In Iran itself, the presumed make-or-break nature of the I.A.E.A.’s second visit this year was roundly ignored.

There’s a Persian saying used to describe an under-the-radar political effort: “Driving at night with the lights off.” Allies of embattled President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may be doing just that as they campaign in Iran’s hinterlands in hopes of scoring a comeback in next month’s parliamentary elections.

The voting March 2 should — momentarily, at least — shift attention from Iran’s international standoffs over its nuclear program back to the country’s internal power plays: The ruling system striking back against perceived runaway ambitions by Ahmadinejad and his inner circle