Iran's Oil Revenue Loses Green Sheen, Turns to Gold

It is a bit ironic that the EU plays this US game, as it currently buys around 20 percent of Iran's oil exports.

New Western sanctions seek to prevent other countries from importing Iran's crude oil.

(SALEM / TEHRAN) - It has been on its way for a long time, and many of us have been able to see it all along. The desires of U.S. politicians to punish and starve Iran, a nation whose highly imperfect leaders live in the gun sights of Israel, hits the epic-fail stage this week.

Per Iran's request, India has agreed to begin paying the price of crude oil it imports from Iran in gold. It is the first country to strike this deal with ancient Persia, however others will reportedly follow.

According to a report published by DEBKAfile news website, unnamed sources have stressed that China is also expected to follow suit.

Fort Knox Blues

Americans know that their own supply of gold, stored historically at Fort Knox, is just a tiny fraction of its national and world debt.

Press TV in Tehran reports that about a million barrels of oil a day are exported from Iran to India and China. This accounts for about 40 percent of Iran's total exports of 2.5 million barrels of oil, and both countries have huge reserves of gold.

This new arrangement comes just as the European Union prepared to impose an oil embargo on Iran, and to freeze Iran's assets in the Central Bank. The deal struck with New Delhi and Beijing, enables Tehran to bypass the upcoming freeze on Central Bank's assets and the oil embargo which the European Union's foreign ministers agreed to impose on Monday, 23 January.

It is a bit ironic, as the EU currently buys around 20 percent of Iran's oil exports.

It Only Gets Worse

Even though Iran has been open to inspectors, and everyone of significance agrees that Iran is not "plotting" to build a nuclear bomb, the rhetoric remains in place. Israel has had a plan for many years to tap into the U.S. military for support in a preemptive war on Iran.

This, as Israel illegally sits atop hundreds of undeclared nuclear warheads pointed at its neighbors and there is no reason to expect they aren't also directed toward the United States- the nation that illegally provided the nukes to Israel in the first place. It isn't just a joke, it is a really serious threat.

This arrangement has been too much for people to accept throughout the world, however Americans are kept on a diet of filtered, pro-Israel news and they don't adequately utilize the Internet to find the real stories... the ones published outside of the US.

And now experts say, the huge sums of money that will be gleaned from these new deals in gold, are expected to boost the price of gold and also depress the value of the dollar on world markets.

“An Indian delegation visited Tehran last week to discuss payment options in view of the new sanctions. The two sides were reported to have agreed that payment for the oil purchased would be partly in yen and partly in rupees. The switch to gold was kept [in the] dark,” the DEBKAfile report stated.

India, Iran's second largest customer after China, has spent about $12 billion a year a year for Iran's oil. This accounts for about 12 percent of India's total consumption.

The report explains that Delhi is to execute its transactions through two state-owned banks: the Calcutta-based UCO Bank, and Halk Bankasi (Peoples Bank) which is Turkey's seventh largest bank- owned by the government.

When US President Barack Obama signed new sanctions against Iran into law, on 31 December 2011, the goal of Obama and his American cohorts, was to penalize other countries for importing Iran's oil or doing transaction with Islamic Republic's Central Bank. In typical fashion, like blind mice lining up behind their mother, EU foreign ministers in Brussels recently imposed their own sanctions on Iran's oil imports. These involve an immediate ban on all new oil contracts with Iran and a freeze on the assets of the country's Central Bank within the EU.

Tehran has warned that the embargo will have negative consequences, such as increasing the oil price.

It seems clear that Americans have decided that war is a business, and also that the supposed "land of the free" backs every racist, apartheid government that comes along. For so long it was South Africa, now Israel wears the racism crown as its victim's crown lays in the dirt, crying.

Special thanks to Press TV for information in this report.

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Tim King, summer 2008, covering the Iraq War

Tim King: Salem-News.com Editor and Writer

Tim King has more than twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor. Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines. Tim is a former U.S. Marine.

Tim holds awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Silver Spoke Award by the National Coalition of Motorcyclists (2011), Excellence in Journalism Award by the Oregon Confederation of Motorcycle Clubs (2010), Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), First-place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several others including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting. Tim has several years of experience in network affiliate news TV stations, having worked as a reporter and photographer at NBC, ABC and FOX stations in Arizona, Nevada and Oregon. Tim was a member of the National Press Photographer's Association for several years and is a current member of the Orange County Press Club.

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