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UN report says that if links with Iranian company are confirmed they could form breach of international sanctions

The UN has warned that trades by the commodity companies Glencore and Trafigura could have breached international sanctions by supplying a company linked to Iran's nuclear programme.

The Guardian reported in April that Glencore had traded $659m (£430m) of goods, including aluminium oxide, with Iran last year.

Glencore, which is run by the multi-billionaire Ivan Glasenberg, has admitted that some of its aluminium oxide ended up in the hands of the Iranian Aluminium Company (Iralco), which has provided aluminium to the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran (AEOI).

A confidential UN panel of experts report on Iran, seen by Reuters, states: "If confirmed, such transactions may reflect an avenue for procurement of a raw material in a manner that circumvents sanctions."

The report, which was complied by a panel of international experts and distributed to some members of the UN security council but which has not been published, says: "Iran continues to seek items for its prohibited activities abroad by using multiple and increasingly complex procurement methods, including front companies, intermediaries, false documents and new routes."

The panel listed 11 violations of sanctions since June 2012 and said it was investigating at least six possible sanction violations; one of those is thought to be Glencore's dealings.

The report calls on member states to show additional vigilance in order to "identify suspicious transactions".

Kodjo Menan, the Togolese ambassador to the UN and deputy chairman of the security council's committee on sanctions, confirmed to the Guardian that members were concerned about the reports of Glencore and Trafigura's dealings with Iran.

A spokeswoman for the British mission to the UN expressed concern that the report, or elements of it, might never be made publicly available if some members of the security council vetoed its publication.

Trafigura, which hit the headlines for dumping toxic oil waste in the Ivory Coast in 2006, has also admitted trading aluminium oxide (also known as alumina) with Iralco.

Dealing with AEOI has been banned by UN sanctions since 2006. Iralco has been subject to sanctions since December 2012. Both Glencore and Trafigura said their deals with Iralco were completed before sanctions came into force.

Glencore said it ceased transactions with Iralco immediately when it learned of its links to Iran's nuclear programme, and the last trade was in October 2012.

"Glencore complies with applicable laws and regulations, including applicable sanctions," a spokesman said.

Trafigura said: "No deliveries have been made or exports received since new EU sanctions were published in December 2012. Trafigura Group companies are compliant with national and international law where applicable."

The UN experts' report comes days after Gary Fegel, Glencore's head of aluminium, told friends that he planned to leave the company.

Fegel, 39, is the ninth-largest shareholder in Glencore, holding a stake in the company worth $800m. He was named as the world's 22nd youngest billionaire by Forbes magazine this year.

Galsenberg has begun a three-month review of Glencore's aluminium business. A company spokesman said that Fegel's exit from the firm and Glasenberg's review were unrelated to the possible sanctions breach allegations.

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Two big-budget biopics of the prophet in production – difficulties around presenting his image notwithstanding – have genuine blockbuster potential, and could promote cultural dialogue

"Be a bridge!" Those are the Turkish teacher's last words to the Bosnian boy he's just pulled out of a surging torrent, before he dives back into the river to reach a second pupil. Seconds earlier, the two teenagers had been locked together – Muslim v Orthodox Christian, a knife hovering between them. But the teacher, doggy-paddling against the current, knows that religion makes no difference when lives are at stake. There's a message from on high (and we're not talking Allah) about the dangers of division between men: overhead is Sarajevo's Latin Bridge, where Archduke Franz Ferdinand received his fateful 1914 gunshot.

Turkish religious hit Selam certainly doesn't shy away from the grand gesture. That's the climax to one of its three stories, which all focus on the altruistic deeds of pious teachers in different countries; in the other two segments, two lovers find themselves a world apart in Senegal and Afghanistan. The first Turkish work to be shot on three different continents, it was No 1 in that country for five weeks through April, taking nearly $8m so far.

But don't mistake Selam for a mere local concern. It may come in a Turkish flavour, but didactic and cheesy though it is, it's also internationalist in scope, a kind of Muslim Babel aiming outwards at the world. It has a proselytising zeal, dramatising missionary work and partaking itself by making a case for Islamic values in life. The Gülen movement – the progressive, possibly political, network that some people now rate as the most influential Muslim faith organisation worldwide – provided locations and casting support. And Selam is one of several projects currently aiming to make a piercing statement on behalf of Islam with cinemal, a medium – because of the nature of image-making – with which this religious tradition arguably has compatibility issues.

There are two big-budget biopics of Muhammad – one Shia, one Sunni – in the works, in addition to one other that seems to have fallen by the wayside. That qualifies as a glut, since the last similar live-action project was 1976's The Message, from director Moustapha Akkad – a major difficulty for the aspiring chronicler being the prohibition on depicting the prophet. Iranian director Majid Majidi, whose $30m biopic began filming in October, recently pointed out: "While there are 250 films on Jesus Christ, 120 films on Moses, 80 about the other prophets and 40 films on Buddha, there is only one on the life of Prophet Muhammad. Unfortunately, we [have] failed to introduce our prophet to the western world."

Interest on this side of the planet about the subject matter has probably never been higher, but there is also an untapped market of 1.62 billion Muslims worldwide who could push this kind of project into blockbuster territory. The rival Sunni offering is working with that economy of scale in mind: produced by Qatari company Alnoor Holdings, it's not one film, but a projected celestial franchise of five to seven instalments aiming to highlight the common ground between the Abrahamaic religions, with a combined budget of $1bn; Barrie Osborne, producer of The Matrix and Lord of the Rings, is on board in an advisory capacity.

Producer Azahar Iqbal, a former climate scientist who grew up in Birmingham, England, says he is partly inspired by Hollywood's superhero films, but aims those kinds of pyrotechnics at the service of more universal, ethical concerns, to show that "power is not concentrated in one individual – but in every individual".

Islamophobia aside, these grandstanding Muhammad epics, as well as the likes of Selam, have the potential to raise the same kind of cynical responses from atheists as Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ. After all, you don't have to take the direct route to promote "Muslim values" – and there are plenty of Muslim film-makers who have used less strident methods. But even if you're uncomfortable about these new projects' proselytising side, they also have a healthy focus on interfaith cooperation and cultural dialogue. Iqbal says that Alnoor's series will feature Jesus and other non-Muslim figures, and that it won't be targeted solely at religious communities. Similarly Levent Demirkale, Selam's director, stresses that he was motivated by bigger things than his own religion: "What really affected us were the humanist universal values, such as cooperation of different religions and beliefs, living for other people's happiness, loving human beings, and making sacrifices for others."

You'd have to be naïve to think money wasn't also a factor at play in faith films, as well as the prestige sought by competing countries for successfully putting the cinematic gloss on Muhammad's story. But that story always been subject to reinterpretation and debate, from the hadith forwards. And with Islam now so prominent in global affairs, there's renewed room to pick at this bundle of history and legend once again.

Historian Tom Holland ran into some of the attendant difficulties with his recent revisionist history of the religion's birth, but perhaps doing the job in a medium largely unused for the purpose, partly for a less familiar western audience, will reinvigorate the telling and the truth of it. Iqbal claims his team have an innovative "concept" in mind for the prophet's person and role, radically different to The Message's unsettling gimmick of using POV camera for a Muhammad's-eye-view. This could be an origin story with some actual revelations in it.

• Next week's After Hollywood will focus on the Weinsteins' influence over world cinema. Which global cinematic stories would you like to see covered in the column? Let us know in the comments below.

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Zahra Mostafavi, whose father founded Iran's Islamic republic, calls on supreme leader to reverse guardian council's decision

The daughter of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of Iran's Islamic republic, has protested against the disqualification of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani from next month's presidential election.

Zahra Mostafavi has written to the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling on him to reinstate Rafsanjani in order to prevent the forming of a dictatorship.

Neither Rafsanjani, a confidant of Khomeini and the opposition's favoured candidate, nor President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's close ally Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei were among the eight candidates approved by the guardian council to enter the ballot out of at least 680 people who registered this month.

Ahmadinejad expressed dissatisfaction with the decision against Mashaei, describing it as an act of oppression. He promised to raise the issue with Khamenei.

"In my opinion there will be no problem with the supreme leader and I will take up this issue until the last moment with him," Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday. "I am hopeful the problem will be solved."

The guardian council, a powerful body of six jurists and six clergymen, vets all candidates to make sure they have sufficient loyalty to the Islamic republic and its principles, but critics say the group's function is undemocratic.

It does not publicly give reasons for its decisions but Rafsanjani, 78, is said to have been barred because he was considered too old and Mashaei for being a nationalist figure. Rafsanjani's moderate support for the opposition Green movement is also believed to have counted against him.

Unlike Mashaei's rejection, which was widely expected, Rafsanjani's exclusion has come as a surprise to many, especially supporters of the Islamic republic who regard him as one of Iran's great political survivors, formerly serving as president for two consecutive terms.

Rafsanjani's supporters see many ironies in his disqualification, not least that he is currently head of the expediency council, which mediates between the guardian council and parliament. Two of the guardian council's members are older than Rafsanjani, and Khomeini was not much younger when he took power in 1979.

In Mostafavi's letter – published on Jamaran.ir, a website close to Khomeini's family – she wrote: "Unfortunately I see that the guardian council has blocked him [Rafsanjani] for presidency … This act has no meaning other than creating a separation between two companions of the imam [Khomeini] and a disregarding of the enthusiasm and interest of the people towards the system and the elections,"

She wrote that Khomeini had thought of Rafsanjani as a potential candidate to succeed him as supreme leader, and cited a saying by her father with the message that the supreme leader should prevent any occurrence of dictatorship.

"The gradual separation between the two of you [Khamenei and Rafsanjani] will be the biggest blow to the revolution and the system," she wrote. "The imam always said: 'These two are good when they are together.'"

Rafsanjani has yet to respond to his disqualification but Eshaq Jahangiri, the head of his official campaign, told the Isna news agency that he would not object.

Not all of Rafsanjani's supporters were upset with his disqualification. One said it showed "the empress has no clothes", referring to how Khamenei was tightening his grip on Iranian politics.

Abolhassan Banisadr, Iran's first post-revolution president, who now lives in exile, told the BBC's Persian service that Rafsanjani's last political gamble had paid off by exposing the establishment's increasing dogmatism.

Karim Sadjadpour, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, tweeted: "Increasingly looking like Iran's presidential election will be one man, one vote. That one man's name is Ayatollah Khamenei."

Wednesday's newspapers in Tehran largely avoided the disqualifications and instead focused on the eight men allowed to stand.

Tehran residents on social networking websites reported a heavy presence of security forces on the streets on Tuesday night as the final candidate list was announced on state-run TV, and complained of an increase in online censorship and slower internet connections.

The final list of candidates includes few reformist figures but they seem to have little chance of victory. Tehran's mayor, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, and Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, who is seen as Khamenei's favourite candidate, are on the list.

Ali Motahari, a Tehran MP whose father was a prominent revolutionary figure, objected to Jalili's candidacy, saying he had little experience in executive positions.

Many analysts believe that the disqualifications have smoothed the path for Jalili to potentially succeed Ahmadinejad. Mehdi Khalaji, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said on Tuesday that Khamenei was sending a message that Tehran would not compromise over its nuclear programme.

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IAEA reports Iranian heavy water reactor approaching completion but Tehran stays well under red lines set by Israel

While the presidential election campaign gets underway in Iran, the International Atomic Energy Agency has produced its latest quaterly report on the country's nuclear programme, which does so much to shape the backdrop to Iranian politics - and not in a good way.

The IAEA Safeguards Report has been leaked, as tradition dictates, and is available online here courtesy of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS).

The most important single indicator that tells us how close to a conflict we might be, shows there is still breathing room for talks when the elections are over. The report says that Iran's stockpile of 20% enriched (a half-way house between low enriched uranium for nuclear power stations and weapons grade stuff for bombs) is now 182kg, which is up 15kg from the last report three months ago but still well below the 240-250kg that would be enough to make an initial warhead, if the Iranians decided to go for making nuclear weapons. That threshhold is where Binyamin Netanyahu lay down Israel red lines before the UN General Assembly last September.

The Iranians have made a total of 324kg of this medium enriched uranium, but continues to process much of what it makes into oxide fuel, which is less of a proliferation concern, so it is not counted as being part of the critical stockpile.

The rest of the report, however, makes clear that there is plenty more to worry about. It goes into particular detail about the heavy water reactor under construction in Arak. That has not been in the spotlight much until now because the uranium enrichment programme has been seen as a far more direct route to making a nuclear weapon.

It still is. The Arak heavy water reactor, when operational, could produce plutonium if the spent uranium fuel was reprocessed, and plutonium can be used to make smaller, even more powerful nuclear warheads than weapons-grade uranium. To make it, however, Iran would need to build a reprocessing plant and there is so far no sign of that. But the reactor is getting closer to completion. A huge reactor vessel has arrived at the site but has yet to be installed, but a lot of other things have been put in place.

[T]he following major components have been installed at the IR-40 Reactor: the containment overhead crane; the moderator and primary coolant heat exchangers, circuit piping and purification systems; the moderator storage tanks; and the pressurizer for the reactor cooling system.

The Iranians predict the reactor, which they say is for research purposes, will be operational by the third quarter of 2014. Most observers don't think they will make that deadline. There is still a lot of stuff to be built, like the control room, the mechanism for refuelling the reactor and the cooling pumps. Still, by next year, if work proceeds at the current pace it is easy to see Arak become an serious source of international friction.

The report also notes that IAEA inspectors have not been allowed to visit the production plant - which will supply the deuterium oxide (heavy water) for the reactor to function - since August 2011, and since then the agency has had to rely on satellite images.

The IAEA goes into more detail that usual about its disagreement with Iran over when the government is supposed to tell the agency about new nuclear facilities. Under the original IAEA rules, a country only had to tell the agency about a new plant six months before nuclear material was due to be delivered for the first time. This was called Code 3.1. In the 1990's a modified Code 3.1 was introduced which said a new facility had to be reported as soon as the decision to built it had been taken.

In 2003, Iran agreed to the new Code 3.1, but in 2007, it suspended its implementation, and now refuses to abide by it. You can read more about it here.

This is important because of the suspicion that Iran could be building secret facilities. If tomorrow it was discovered that Iran had built a new underground enrichment plant like the one revealed at Fordow in 2009, Tehran would argue it was completely in its rights as it was not bound by the new Code 3.1. Thus the refusal to agree to the new code increases suspicion that there might be a parallel covert nuclear programme under construction. This uncertainty is heightened by the fact that various Iranian officials have announced in recent months that Iran is building four new research reactors, ten new enrichment plants and 16 new nuclear power stations, without saying where any of these facilities are located.

All this, along with a complete lack of progress on agreeing guidelines for the IAEA's investigation into Iran's alleged past weaponisation work, adds up to a fairly negative report. It's not bad enough to get the war drums beating again, but sufficiently worrying to underline the importance of reaching some kind of compromise on the Iranian programme soon after the election is over.

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The nuclear question and Iran's role in Syria could remain unresolved and unclear even after the polls next month

The field of 700 candidates has been winnowed down to eight men acceptable to the guardians of the revolution in Tehran, and those men must now compete for an office that was stripped years ago of the power to make strategic foreign policy decisions.

Yet the outcome of next month's Iranian presidential elections could still have an impact beyond the country's borders, on long-stalled nuclear negotiations and the intractable conflict in Syria.

It is the supreme leader, the ageing Ali Khamenei, who ultimately makes those decisions but he does not make them in a vacuum and must take into account the other power-brokers in the system. One of those is the president – who can at least claim a popular mandate, however circumscribed the rules of the electoral game – unlike the clerics and generals around the table.

Some Iranian analysts and diplomats argue that the political struggle between Khamenei and the current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has been so all-consuming that it has paralysed Tehran and rendered it all but incapable of making the choices necessary to strike a bargain with the west and the Arab world.

Not only have the venomous political disputes soaked up the time and energy of the leadership, they have also given the protagonists an incentive to stymie bold foreign policy initiatives lest they bring political capital and legitimacy to their domestic opponents.

"When it comes to the nuclear issue, there are forces in Tehran who did not want any kind of deal under Ahmadinejad for which he could claim credit, even if it had nothing to do with him," said Mohammad Ali Shabani, the editor of the Iranian Review of Foreign Affairs. "It is very difficult for the senior leadership to turn around on these issues as long as Ahmadinejad is in his post, as they risk being seen as backing down. The election will present an opportunity for a change of position. It may be softer or harder, but it will change."

Shabani added: "It is much easier for the west to deal with someone else other than Ahmadinejad, after what he has said about Israel and so on. It is not just about Iran saving face; it is about the west saving face."

Diplomats from the six-nation group that has been negotiating with Iran over its nuclear programme have kept up contacts with Tehran in the runup to the election. The group convenor, the EU foreign policy chief, Lady Ashton, met the Iranian chief negotiator, now considered the establishment-approved frontrunner in the election, Saeed Jalili, in Istanbul last Wednesday. But diplomats involved in the talks, aimed at striking a bargain exchanging sanctions relief for curbs on Iranian uranium enrichment, said that if Iran is prepared to make a deal they do not expect it to happen until after the elections.

"Everything has really been on hold on the nuclear file until after the elections. Then we'll see," a western diplomat said.

The same is likely to true about Syria, where Iranian revolutionary guards are advising the regime, training Syrian troops, and supporting the Lebanese Shia militia, Hezbollah, which is taking a leading role in the fighting.

The US state department under Hillary Clinton was adamant that Iran not take part in talks at the first Geneva conference on Syria last year, and Saudi Arabia also refused to allow it to take part in regional discussions on the conflict. But Russia is pressing for Tehran to be included in the next Geneva round, due to take place in June. State department officials say that Clinton's successor, John Kerry, does not exclude Iranian involvement in future negotiations, but has said that the US is waiting to see the outcome of the election.

For some Iranian analysts and diplomats, however, the belief that the elections will augur a new approach from Tehran represents merely the triumph of hope over experience.

"As long as Ayatollah Khamenei remains supreme leader a different president is unlikely to alter Iran's nuclear policies, its support for the Assad regime in Syria, or its 'resistance' against the US and Israel," said Karim Sadjadpour, at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

He added that the appearance of a new face in the presidency could perhaps have an impact on Iran's image, but that may not be an advantage for the west or Israel.

"While countries that are interested in a nuclear deal with Tehran may welcome a new Iranian president, the person who may well miss Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the most is Bibi Netanyahu. Ahmadinejad's bombast helped earn Iran six UN security council resolutions and an international sanctions regime that is almost unprecedented in terms of its breadth and depth," Sadjadpour said.

"I think many officials in both Israel and the west would say that if Iran is going to have a hardline president, better that he be someone who offends the world and brings negative attention to Iran, rather than someone who is soft-spoken and boring."

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