Iran's announcement that it is planning to build a permanent base in the Indian Ocean demonstrates that, for all the setbacks Tehran has suffered as a result of the coronavirus pandemic and US-led sanctions, it has lost none of its appetite for expanding its military operations.
One of the founding pillars of the Iranian revolution in 1979 was the requirement to disseminate its own brand of radical Islam throughout the Muslim world, to the extent that its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has now established a truly global network of bases, ranging from Latin America to South-East Asia.
In the Middle East, Iran’s commitment to consolidating its military presence abroad has seen the IRGC extending its influence in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, a move that has put Tehran on a collision course with the Trump administration, which regards this expansionism as a threat to its interests in the region and those of its allies.
A worker of the Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA waves an Iranian flag as the Iranian-flagged oil tanker Fortune docks at the El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello, in the northern state of Carabobo, Venezuela. AFP
Workers on the 'Fortune' the Iranian ship with gasoline in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. EPA
Iranian-flagged oil tanker Fortune docked at the El Palito refinery after its arrival to Puerto Cabello, in the northern state of Carabobo, Venezuela. AFP
A worker of the state-oil company Pdvsa holds an Iranian flag during the arrival of the Iranian tanker ship "Fortune" at El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Reuters
Crew of the Iranian tanker ship "Fortune" are seen at the deck during the arrival at El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Reuters
Workers of the state-oil company Pdvsa holding Iranian and Venezuelan flags greet during the arrival of the Iranian tanker ship "Fortune" at El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Reuters
A Venezuelan oil worker holding a small Iranian flag attends a ceremony for the arrival of Iranian oil tanker Fortune at the El Palito refinery near Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. AP Photo
The Venezuelan industry minister Tareck El Aissami (C), speaks next to Venezuela's defence Minister Vladimir Padrino(R) after the Iranian oil tanker Fortune docked at the El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello, in the northern state of Carabobo, Venezuela. AFP
A worker of the Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA looks at the oil tanker Fortune as it docks at the El Palito refinery in Puerto Cabello in the northern state of Carabobo, Venezuela. AFP
Workers with the flags of Venezuela and Iran waiting for Venezuela Minister of Petroleum Tareck el Aissami in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela during his visit to the 'Fortune' Iranian ship. EPA
Venezuela Minister of Petroleum Tareck el Aissami in Puerto Cabello, Venezuela during his visit to the 'Fortune' Iranian ship. EPA
So this week's report by Iran's Fars news agency about an Indian Ocean base by the end of the year is likely to further exacerbate tensions with the US, which conducts regular naval operations in the area as part of its long-standing commitment to protect freedom of passage for Gulf shipping, especially through the bustling shipping lanes of the Strait of Hormuz.
Making the announcement, Admiral Alireza Tangsiri, the commander of the IRGC’s naval attachment, said that the base will be used to protect fishing and commercial vessels from piracy and “foreign ships”, a reference to the US-led multinational naval task force. “The deployment of the fleet by the IRGC navy to distant waters has been done in the past, and our second fleet was also sent to the waters of the Indian Ocean,” he said.
Iran has so far given no indication of where it intends to build the base. At present Iran's Chabahar Port in the Gulf of Oman – which is used, among other activities, for shipping goods to Afghanistan – is the nearest base Tehran has to the Indian Ocean, although attempts to develop it into a major import-export terminal with India's assistance have been hampered by US sanctions.
In this Wednesday, April 15, 2020, photo made available by the US Navy, Iranian Revolutionary Guard vessels sail close to US ships in the Arabian Gulf near Kuwait. All Photos supplied by US Navy
The Iranian vessels conducted unsafe and unprofessional actions, the US Navy said.
The US Navy said the IRGC vessels crossed the ships’ bows and sterns at close range.
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy vessels approach the USS Lewis B Puller in the northern waters of the Arabian Gulf.
The US Navy said that the US crew took action "deemed appropriate to avoid collision”.
The Revolutionary Guard was blamed after a Hong Kong-flagged ship was boarded in the Gulf of Oman on Tuesday.
The announcement comes against a background of increasing tensions between Iran and the US and its allies in recent months. Iran has been accused of conducting attacks on Gulf shipping, including targeting commercial vessels operating in UAE waters. Last summer, Iranian naval forces seized the British-registered Stena Impero, prompting a furious backlash from the British government.
In April, US President Donald Trump announced on Twitter that he had authorised the US Navy in the region to attack any Iranian boats that approached American military assets after US commanders accused Iran of harassing their ships.
The warning provoked a fierce reaction from Maj Gen Hossein Salami, the head of the IRGC, who threatened a “crushing response” to any American attacks against Iran. Accusing the Trump administration of “bullying”, he warned: “I have ordered our naval forces to destroy any American terrorist force in the Persian Gulf that threatens the security of Iran’s military or non-military ships.”
Iran's continued commitment to expanding its military activities comes at a time when the regime is contending with the twin challenges of combating the pandemic and the impact of US sanctions on the Iranian economy.
It has been the worst-affected country in the Middle East by Covid-19, not least because the regime has been accused of trying to cover up the true extent of the outbreak when the virus was first identified in the country.
Moreover, the economy has suffered a precipitous decline. The rial, the national currency, has suffered sharp declines. Inflation and unemployment are both registering in double figures. Attempts by the European Union to find a financial mechanism for continuing to trade with Tehran have failed to make any material difference to Iran’s plight because too many European multinationals remain concerned that, if they maintain their trading ties with Tehran, they could find themselves subjected to punitive measures by Washington, and denied access to the far more lucrative American market.
An Iranian sanitary worker disinfects Qom's Masumeh shrine on February 25, 2020 to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. AFP
Iranian Firefighters disinfect streets in the capital Tehran in a bid to halt the wild spread of coronavirus on March 13, 2020. AFP
A nearly empty Hazrat Masumeh Shrine in Qom, Iran on March 1, 2020. AFP
Iranian Deputy Health Minister Iraj Harirchi (left) wipes the sweat off his face, during a press conference with the Islamic republic's government spokesman Ali Rabiei in the capital Tehran on February 24, 2020. AFP
An image grab of footage obtained from Iranian State TV IRINN on February 25, 2020, shows Iran's deputy health minister Iraj Harirchi speaking in a video apparently shot by himself, regarding being infected with coronavirus. AFP
Iran's Azadi (Freedom) Tower is lit up with flags and messages of hope in solidarity with all the countries affected by the coronavirus pandemic, in Tehran on March 31, 2020. AFP
Iranian workers set up a makeshift hospital inside the Iran Mall, northwest of Tehran, on March 21, 2020 amid the coronavirus outbreak. - Iran said that 123 more people had died from coronavirus, raising the official death toll to 1,556 in the Islamic republic, one of the world's worst affected countries. AFP
Volunteers wearing protective clothing, take part in disinfecting a village during the coronavirus outbreak, in the outskirts of the city of Ghaemshahr, in north of Iran, on Wednesday, April 29, 2020. AP Photo
Shoppers clad in protective gear, including face masks and shields and latex gloves, due to the coronavirus pandemic, walk through the Tajrish Bazaar in Iran's capital Tehran on April 25, 2020. AFP
A customer wears a protective masks at a pharmacy in the Iranian capital Tehran on February 24, 2020. AFP
A Tehran Municipality worker cleans a bus to avoid the spread of Covid-19 on February 26, 2020. AFP
A man stands by the closed gate outside the Imamzadeh Saleh in the Iranian capital Tehran's Shemiran district on April 25, 2020 . AFP
Labourers unloading medical equipment and coronavirus testing kits provided by the World Health Organisation, from a UAE military transport plane upon their arrival at Mehrabad International Airport in Iran's capital Tehran. AFP
Yet, to judge by the recent activity Iran has taken on the military front, the regime’s domestic woes have not prevented it from maintaining an ambitious military programme.
Iran has long considered America's heavy military presence in the Middle East a threat to its own security. In response to Washington's unilateral withdrawal from the nuclear deal, Iran is reported to have resumed work on its uranium enrichment activities, and in April Tehran announced it had launched its first satellite into orbit. In addition the IRGC says work is continuing on developing its arsenal of ballistic missiles.
US security officials warn that Iran’s base plans need to be seen in the context of its wider military build-up. There are concerns that this could have an impact on the jointly administered US-UK base on the island of Diego Garcia, one of the Pentagon’s most important military assets in the region.
At the height of the tensions over the Trump administration’s assassination of IRGC commander Qassem Suleimani in January, the Pentagon dispatched a fleet of B-52 nuclear-armed bombers to Deigo Garcia, which is well beyond the range of Iran’s existing arsenal of ballistic missiles.
By establishing its own base in the Indian Ocean, therefore, Tehran would be hoping to mount yet another challenge to Washington’s military dominance in the region.
Con Coughlin is the Telegraph’s defence and foreign affairs editor
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A UK report on youth social media habits commissioned by advocacy group Volteface found a quarter of young people were exposed to illegal drug dealers on social media.
The poll of 2,006 people aged 16-24 assessed their exposure to drug dealers online in a nationally representative survey.
Of those admitting to seeing drugs for sale online, 56 per cent saw them advertised on Snapchat, 55 per cent on Instagram and 47 per cent on Facebook.
Cannabis was the drug most pushed by online dealers, with 63 per cent of survey respondents claiming to have seen adverts on social media for the drug, followed by cocaine (26 per cent) and MDMA/ecstasy, with 24 per cent of people.
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The figure was broadly flat immediately before the Covid-19 pandemic, standing at 216,000 in the year to June 2018 and 224,000 in the year to June 2019.
It then dropped to an estimated 111,000 in the year to June 2020 when restrictions introduced during the pandemic limited travel and movement.
The total rose to 254,000 in the year to June 2021, followed by steep jumps to 634,000 in the year to June 2022 and 906,000 in the year to June 2023.
The latest available figure of 728,000 for the 12 months to June 2024 suggests levels are starting to decrease.
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
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Citizenship-by-investment programmes
United Kingdom
The UK offers three programmes for residency. The UK Overseas Business Representative Visa lets you open an overseas branch office of your existing company in the country at no extra investment. For the UK Tier 1 Innovator Visa, you are required to invest £50,000 (Dh238,000) into a business. You can also get a UK Tier 1 Investor Visa if you invest £2 million, £5m or £10m (the higher the investment, the sooner you obtain your permanent residency).
All UK residency visas get approved in 90 to 120 days and are valid for 3 years. After 3 years, the applicant can apply for extension of another 2 years. Once they have lived in the UK for a minimum of 6 months every year, they are eligible to apply for permanent residency (called Indefinite Leave to Remain). After one year of ILR, the applicant can apply for UK passport.
The Caribbean
Depending on the country, the investment amount starts from $100,000 (Dh367,250) and can go up to $400,000 in real estate. From the date of purchase, it will take between four to five months to receive a passport.
Portugal
The investment amount ranges from €350,000 to €500,000 (Dh1.5m to Dh2.16m) in real estate. From the date of purchase, it will take a maximum of six months to receive a Golden Visa. Applicants can apply for permanent residency after five years and Portuguese citizenship after six years.
“Among European countries with residency programmes, Portugal has been the most popular because it offers the most cost-effective programme to eventually acquire citizenship of the European Union without ever residing in Portugal,” states Veronica Cotdemiey of Citizenship Invest.
Greece
The real estate investment threshold to acquire residency for Greece is €250,000, making it the cheapest real estate residency visa scheme in Europe. You can apply for residency in four months and citizenship after seven years.
Spain
The real estate investment threshold to acquire residency for Spain is €500,000. You can apply for permanent residency after five years and citizenship after 10 years. It is not necessary to live in Spain to retain and renew the residency visa permit.
Cyprus
Cyprus offers the quickest route to citizenship of a European country in only six months. An investment of €2m in real estate is required, making it the highest priced programme in Europe.
Malta
The Malta citizenship by investment programme is lengthy and investors are required to contribute sums as donations to the Maltese government. The applicant must either contribute at least €650,000 to the National Development & Social Fund. Spouses and children are required to contribute €25,000; unmarried children between 18 and 25 and dependent parents must contribute €50,000 each.
The second step is to make an investment in property of at least €350,000 or enter a property rental contract for at least €16,000 per annum for five years. The third step is to invest at least €150,000 in bonds or shares approved by the Maltese government to be kept for at least five years.
Candidates must commit to a minimum physical presence in Malta before citizenship is granted. While you get residency in two months, you can apply for citizenship after a year.
Egypt
A one-year residency permit can be bought if you purchase property in Egypt worth $100,000. A three-year residency is available for those who invest $200,000 in property, and five years for those who purchase property worth $400,000.
Source: Citizenship Invest and Aqua Properties
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One showed 28 per cent of female students at a Dubai university reported symptoms linked to depression. Another in Al Ain found 22.2 per cent of students had depressive symptoms - five times the global average.
It said the country has made strides to address mental health problems but said: “Our review highlights the overall prevalence of depressive symptoms and depression, which may long have been overlooked."
Prof Samir Al Adawi, of the department of behavioural medicine at Sultan Qaboos University in Oman, who was not involved in the study but is a recognised expert in the Gulf, said how mental health is discussed varies significantly between cultures and nationalities.
“The problem we have in the Gulf is the cross-cultural differences and how people articulate emotional distress," said Prof Al Adawi.
“Someone will say that I have physical complaints rather than emotional complaints. This is the major problem with any discussion around depression."
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How to apply for a drone permit
Individuals must register on UAE Drone app or website using their UAE Pass
Add all their personal details, including name, nationality, passport number, Emiratis ID, email and phone number
Upload the training certificate from a centre accredited by the GCAA
Submit their request
What are the regulations?
Fly it within visual line of sight
Never over populated areas
Ensure maximum flying height of 400 feet (122 metres) above ground level is not crossed
Users must avoid flying over restricted areas listed on the UAE Drone app
Only fly the drone during the day, and never at night
Should have a live feed of the drone flight
Drones must weigh 5 kg or less
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