White House warns Over 320,000 Iran’s Ashourzadeh and Iran box office Congress to stand old cars scrapped Khodabakhshi claim gold revenues soar 2 down on Iran talks 4 in Iran 9 medals in Dutch Open Taekwondo12 NATION ECONOMY SPORTS ART&CULTURER T&CULTU R E WWW.TEHRANTIMES.COM I N T E R N A T I O N A L D A I L Y 12 Pages Price 5000 Rials 36th year NO.12231 Monday MARCH 16 2015 Esfand 25 1393 Jumada Al Awwal 25 1436 GOP senators favor Israel over U.S.: Kharrazi 2 South Pars Iran and U.S. resume nuclear talks biggest Zarif says it won’t be difficult to reach nuclear solution if other side shows ‘political will’ phase to TEHRAN — Foreign Min- Iran and the 5+1 group have set end- day for a new round of nuclear talks. most important issues in this round of talks Political Desk ister Mohammad Javad March as a deadline to reach a framework This round of talks is headed by Zarif and which is expected to last until Friday. come on Zarif has said if like Iran the 5+1 group has agreement. his U.S. counterpart John Kerry. Europe- In order for both sides to draft an agree- “political will”, it will not be difficult to agree The deadline for a final deal is June 30. an Union deputy foreign policy chief Helga ment solutions should be “written precisely stream by on a framework agreement in this round of Zarif, heading Iran’s negotiating team, ar- Schmid is also present in the talks. and in details”, he stated. talks, IRNA reported on Sunday. rived in Lausanne city in Switzerland on Sun- Zarif described sanctions as one of the Contd. on P. 11 Mar. 20 TEHRAN — Economic Desk Iran will inaugu- Rouhani says rate the biggest phase of the South Pars gas field, namely the phase 12, Iran, Indonesia by March 20, the IRNA news agency reported on Sunday. can introduce President Hassan Rouhani will officially inaugurate the project, ‘true and which cost over $7 billion to be im- moderate’ Islam plemented. Rasoul Fallahnejad, the project TEHRAN — Pres- manager of the phase 12, has said that Political Desk ident Hassan the phase 12 will inject about 75 mil- Rouhani has said that Iran and In- lion cubic meters (mcm) of gas into donesia can present a “true and the national gas network per annum. moderate” Islam which stands Iran is currently producing 300 against violence and terrorism. mcm per day of gas from the South He made the remarks during a Pars. meeting with Alwi Shahab, the In- The project will bring in about donesian president’s special envoy, $10 billion annually, which ac- in Tehran on Sunday. counts for three percent of the The president also said, “Iran and country’s GDP. Indonesia have paid a high cost in The South Pars gas field covers fighting against terrorism and ex- an area of 9,700 square kilometers, tremism.” 3,700 square kilometers of which Contd. on P. 2 are in Iran’s territorial waters in the President.ir Persian Gulf. Contd. on P. 4 Kerry: U.S. should negotiate with Assad NEWS ‘Washington, allies exploring options to bring Assad back to the table’ NEWS Worshippers The United States will have to negotiate him of various kinds in order to do that,” the “That’s under way right now. And I am Netanyahu offers with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for secretary of state said. convinced that, with the efforts of our allies killed in Pakistan a political transition in Syria and is explore “We’ve made it very clear to people that and others, there will be increased pressure finance ministry ways to pressure him into agreeing to talks, we are looking at increased steps that can on Assad.” church bombings U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has said. help bring about that pressure,” he added. Syria sank into civil war after a peace- to rival days At least 14 people In the interview broadcast on CBS News The U.S. led efforts to convene a UN- ful street uprising against four decades before election on Sunday, Kerry did not repeat the stand- backed peace talks in Geneva last year be- of Assad family rule began in March 2011. killed, dozens more ard U.S. line that Assad had lost all legitima- tween Western-backed Syrian opposition The revolt turned into an armed insur- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Net- cy and had to go. representatives and a government delega- gency, which has deepened with the anyahu, trailing in opinion polls two wounded in bombings “We have to negotiate in the end,” Kerry tion. The talks collapsed after two rounds rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and the days before a parliamentary elec- targeting two churches said. “We’ve always been willing to negoti- and no fresh talks have been scheduled. Levant (ISIL) terrorist group and other tion, publicly offered on Sunday the ate in the context of the Geneva I process,” Russia convened some opposition and armed groups. Finance Ministry portfolio to a po- in Lahore he added, referring to a 2012 conference government figures in January for talks on Assad seems more likely to survive tentially king-making rival. which called for a negotiated transition to the crisis but they yielded little progress and the Syrian crisis than at any point since Facing possible upset defeat in A Punjab Police spokesperson told end the conflict. the main opposition coalition boycotted it began. the March 17 vote, Netanyahu has Al Jazeera that a Roman Catholic Kerry said the U.S. and other countries, them. The war has killed more than 220,000 launched a media blitz to counter Church and a Christ Church in La- which he did not name, were exploring ways “To get the Assad regime to negotiate, people and displaced close to half the pop- what appears to be a rising tide of hore’s Youhanabad area were hit in to reignite the diplomatic process to end the we’re going to have to make it clear to him ulation, according to the UN. Damascus ac- support for his main opponent, the Sunday’s suicide attacks. conflict in Syria which is now in its fifth year. that there is a determination by everybody cuses its Western and Persian Gulf Arab op- center-left Zionist Union. At least 70 people were wound- “What we’re pushing for is to get him to seek that political outcome and change ponents of seeking to destroy the country Moshe Kahlon, a former mem- ed, said Zahid Pervez, the provincial [Assad] to come and do that, and it may re- his calculation about negotiating,” Kerry by providing aid to rebel groups. ber of Netanyahu’s Likud party director general of health. quire that there be increased pressure on said. (Source: agencies) whose newly formed centrist party Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a Pakistani Tal- could be a deciding factor in who iban (TTP) splinter group, claimed becomes prime minister, dismissed responsibility for both the attacks. ISIL used chlorine gas as chemical weapon the offer as pre-election spin. The group appeared to have No party has ever won a majority timed the attacks to cause max- against peshmerga forces: Kurdish authorities in Israel’s 120-seat Knesset, and the imum devastation, as the two party leader with the best chance of churches were packed with Chris- Kurdish authorities in Iraq say ish forces fired a rocket at the House said it could not confirm the Badr armed group and the forming a majority coalition is tasked tians attending Sunday services they have evidence that the Is- vehicle carrying the explosives, the allegations but would be spokesman of the volunteer with leading the new government. when the bombs went off. lamic State in Iraq and the Le- so the only casualty was the lor- closely monitoring the situa- Popular Mobilization unit, said The latest opinion polls predict A spokesman for the faction vant (ISIL) terrorists used chlo- ry’s driver. tion and found the allegations he estimates that about 60 to the Zionist Union taking between said it was the work of two suicide rine gas as a chemical weapon However, about a dozen “deeply disturbing”. 70 ISIL fighters are holding out 24 and 26 seats in the election, com- bombers. against their peshmerga forces. peshmerga soldiers experi- A U.S. defense official said in the city. pared with 20-22 seats for Likud. “The Tehreek-e-Taliban Ja- The Kurdistan Region Security enced symptoms of nausea, that the use of chemical weap- He told AFP that the city But even if Likud is outnumbered, maat-ur-Ahrar accepts responsi- Council (KRSC) said in a statement vomiting, dizziness or weak- ons could indicate ISIL’s “grow- would be considered liberat- Netanyahu is counting on a larger bility for the suicide attacks on the on Saturday that EU-certified lab- ness, the source said, which ing desperation”. ed only once a path had been right-wing block to support his bid churches in Lahore,” Ahsanullah oratory tests showed that soil and could be attributed to exposure Chlorine is a toxic “choking cleared through the thousands for another term, and Kahlon, with Ahsan, a spokesman for the Taliban clothing samples collected from to chlorine. agent” whose use is banned un- of improvised explosive devices around 10 seats in the polls, could ‘Attacks’ in Tikrit faction, said in a statement emailed the remnants of an attempted su- der the 1997 Chemical Weapons (IED) in the city.