The following remarks were delivered by Christian Saunders, the Senior Defense Intelligence Analyst for Iran, Defense Intelligence Agency.

One of the reasons behind IMF’s gloomy picture of Iran’s economy is linked to the Trump administration’s decision not to extend its waiver for Iran’s eight biggest oil buyers; China, India, Greece, Italy, Taiwan, Japan, Turkey and South Korea.

It is an irony that not even the most devoted supporters of the ayatollahs can ignore that a country such as Iran, that prides itself on being one of the world’s largest oil producers, is unable to produce enough fuel to satisfy the needs of its own population.

The Gaza-based Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement says it is holding fire after the regime in Israel accepted its key demands, including stopping targeted killings, as part of an Egypt-mediated truce aimed at ending the military confrontation between the two sides.

China’s second aircraft carrier, the first to be domestically built, appears to have left the Dalian Shipyard on Thursday for its ninth sea trial, where it might receive fighter jets before its official commissioning, reports said.

The United States and other members of the coalition to defeat the Islamic State failed to reach consensus on what to do with captured foreign fighters, one of several issues threatening to reverse gains made against the terror group in Syria and Iraq.

Iraq’s prominent Shia cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has called on legislators to promptly introduce a fair electoral law that would restore people’s faith in elections in the wake of weeks of protests in the capital Baghdad and a host of southern cities.

The statement comes days after Indian Navy chief Admiral Karambir Singh highlighted the requirement of three aircraft carriers for the Navy to overcome critical capability voids during a naval commanders’ conference in New Delhi.

Two Lithuanian men convicted of spying in Russia “have been reunited with their families” after they were released as part of a spy swap, the chief of Lithuania’s counterintelligence, Darius Jauniskis, announced on November 15.

They claim since force cannot impose democracy, it was wrong for the US to invade Iraq and dislodge Saddam Hussein. They ignore the fact that though force cannot impose democracy, impediments to democracy can, and have been, removed by force.