May 20, 2022
Kuwait has said it plans to develop a gasfield in the Persian Gulf, setting Tehran into a fury and adding yet another issue to the agenda between the two countries.
Kuwait has announced periodically over the years that it planned to develop what it calls the Arash gasfield, which Iran calls Dorra. Iran complains angrily every time, saying that Kuwait can’t do anything at the field because its spans the dividing line between Iran and Kuwait. Until now, Kuwait has agreed the field is split between the two countries.
Kuwait is now saying the gasfield lies entirely within the Kuwait-Saudi Neutral Zone, a large bloc of land and water the two countries decided decades ago to share, splitting equally any oil and gas produced there. Kuwait now asserts that Iran has no say in what happens to Arash/Dorra but adds that it would like Iran to finally sit down and negotiate the exact boundaries between Iran and the Kuwait-Saudi Neutral Zone.
Iran said May 1 that it was ready to open talks, but none have been scheduled yet. Furthermore, Iran has said flatly that Kuwait may do nothing in the field until a demarcation line has been agreed to. However, Iranian Oil Minister Javad Oji said April 1 that Iran would begin drilling soon in the field, despite denying Kuwait the right to do so.
According to Iranian state broadcasting, the Islamic Republic says 70 percent of Arash/Dorra lies in Iranian waters, while Kuwait says 100 percent lies in the waters of the Neutral Zone. The field was discovered in 1962, so it has now gone undeveloped for 60 years.
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WILDLIFE – A hungry leopard, running through the streets of Qaemshahr in Mazandaran Province seeking food, panicked local residents. It was killed by police officers. Some reports said the police fired two shots after the leopard attacked and mauled a police officer. Other reports said a police officer fired a tranquilizer at the animal in an effort to capture it alive, but the animal later died. Here the leopard is seen relaxing on a window sill. Moments later, the animal jumped down and began running up and down the street as residents, who had been watching it relax, panicked and raced for cover.