Top UK Brass Plan For US Strike On Iran

By Michael Carmichael

April 10, 2006

The Planetary Movement Unlimited

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=CAR20060410&articleId=2239

Immediately after Condoleezza Rice's visit to the north of England for a series of secret meetings and public appearances with Foreign Minister Jack Straw, the UK top brass held their own secret meeting Monday in London to prepare Britain for what they now describe as the "inevitable" U.S. military strike against Iran.

Chief of the Defense Staff Gen. Sir Michael Walker; Chief of Defense Intelligence Lt. Gen. Andrew Ridgway, and Assistant Chief of the General Staff Maj. Gen. Bill Rollo were scheduled to attend the secret meeting along with top-ranking civilian officials from Downing Street and the Foreign Office.

Experts confirm that the U.S. strike against multiple targets in Iran is positively in the pipeline; only its date remains uncertain. Current White Hall speculation is that the U.S. will strike Iran's nuclear sites at some obscure date vaguely described as sometime later this year or next.

The UK government's most loyal supporters in the British media have reported plans for the secret meeting of the top brass and begun the process of preparing the UK public for what will be a very unpopular U.S. military intervention.

In a candid lead editorial, the Sunday Telegraph pointed to the oil factor as one of the primary objectives driving U.S. policy in the region and a key element in its plan to bomb multiple targets in Iran.

In Britain, there are grave concerns that the U.S. strike will have a cascade effect and will produce deeply negative reactions across the board in Iraq, the Middle East, and throughout the world. One risk that is being weighed very heavily in White Hall is that the U.S. bombing campaign will strengthen the hand of Iran's controversial president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Anticipating massive political repercussions throughout the region, observers are predicting the eruption of strident and violent anti-American protests in Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia. Some British officials will argue against any visible UK involvement in what is being seen by many as yet another foolish move on the international chessboard by Bush and Rice ­ one that follows a revealing reference to "thousands of mistakes" in Iraq that were openly confessed by Secretary Rice during her latest high-profile visit to Britain.

Planetary Movement has been informed that the timing of the U.S. strike will be synchronized with the political cycle in Bush's America.

Political intelligence experts based in Washington, D.C., advise that the U.S. strike against Iran will likely occur between Labor Day (Sept. 4) and election day (Nov. 6) ­ although it could come earlier if the president's popularity continues its precipitous decline. The political spin of the U.S. action is now being designed by Karl Rove and his minions to strengthen the weakening hand of a deeply unpopular presidency and to stave off a drastic defeat for the Republicans in this year's midterm elections by galvanizing the American voters with the bombing campaign that will be ballyhooed as"essential for national security."

After their public appearances in the north of England, Rice and Straw unexpectedly boarded Rice's 757 and flew overnight to Baghdad for a face-to-face confrontation with Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari, whom they hope to convince to abdicate his office for a more malleable replacement.

Adel Abdul Mahdi is a Shi'ite politician deemed by Rice and Straw to be a somewhat more reliable pair of hands than Jaafari. Rice and Straw view Mahdi as a political operative who might be somewhat less hostile to U.S. objectives in the region than Jaafari.

In Baghdad, the pair met with President Jalal Talabani and the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, to arrange the ouster of Jaafari and his replacement by Mahdi. The imminent regime change in Baghdad is merely a first step in their preparations for the U.S. air strike against Iran, which will create massive political pressures on the U.S.-backed government in Iraq.

The West Can't Let Mullahs Have the Bomb

April 11, 2006
Telegraph
Con Coughlin

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With each week that passes, Iran's ayatollahs move closer to their goal of building an atom bomb.

This is not misinformed propaganda pumped out by trigger-happy yahoos on the wilder fringes of America's Republican Party. This is the opinion of the dedicated teams of nuclear experts attached to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, whose task it is to sift through the highly complex science surrounding Iran's nuclear programme and to provide a considered judgment to the UN Security Council on the Iranians' ultimate objectives.

During three years of painstaking negotiations with Iran, Mohamed ElBaradei, the Nobel peace laureate who heads the IAEA, went out of his way to play along with the charade that Iran's nuclear ambitions were entirely peaceful and designed to develop an indigenous nuclear power industry. This, after all, is a country with known oil reserves in excess of 90 billion barrels, more than enough to meet its energy needs well into the next century.

Mr ElBaradei was even prepared to accept at face value the Iranians' shame-faced admission that their failure to disclose the existence of their massive nuclear enrichment plant at Natanz was no more than a bureaucratic oversight.

When the inspectors were finally granted admission, they were dumb-founded to find themselves in a 250,000-acre complex containing two vast underground bomb-proof bunkers designed for enriching uranium to weapons grade.

Mr ElBaradei is now prepared to concede that the Iranians have run out of excuses, and Teheran has been given until April 29 to implement a total freeze on its nuclear enrichment activities at Natanz and its other key plants, or face the wrath of the Security Council.

At the same time the IAEA's nuclear specialists are working on a report that will be submitted to the UN on the same day, in which they will state explicitly their concerns about Iran's nuclear programme.

But to judge by the Iranians' response so far, the threat of international condemnation and isolation does not appear to be causing sleepless nights.

This is because, while Western diplomats agonise over how to deal with the threat posed by Iran's nuclear programme, Iranian scientists are working hard to achieve nuclear enrichment, processing uranium to a level where it can be used to make atomic weapons.

Far from taking the UN's ultimatum seriously, nuclear experts at the IAEA now report that Iranian scientists at Natanz are taking advantage of the diplomatic stand-off to intensify their efforts to develop the technical capability to enrich uranium to weapons-grade.

This process began in January, when they began assembling new centrifuges, the sophisticated equipment needed to enrich high-grade uranium. Their ambition is to link 164 centrifuges, thereby forming a "cascade". Once that is accomplished, Iran will be able to produce its own weapons-grade uranium.

Estimates vary as to how long it will take the Iranians to accomplish such a technically demanding task, and how long it will then take them to make an atom bomb. The hawks argue that Iran could have enough material for a nuclear bomb within three years, while the more sanguine members of the international intelligence community say it could take 10 years.

What is not in doubt is that the work now being undertaken at Natanz, and at the processing plant at Isfahan, means the Iranians will soon be self-sufficient in producing weapons-grade uranium. And once they have passed that important milestone, it is then merely a question of when, not if, they develop a nuclear arsenal.

"Iran's strategy all along has been to talk and at the same time proceed with its nuclear programme," said an official closely involved in the IAEA's negotiations with Iran. "The longer we draw out the diplomatic process, the closer they get to fulfilling their nuclear ambitions."

The mounting frustration, particularly within the Bush Administration, over the UN's impotence to prevent Iran fulfilling its nuclear destiny explains the recent hysterical reports suggesting that George W. Bush is seriously contemplating nuclear air strikes against Iran's bomb-making infrastructure.

It is no coincidence that these reports are circulating at a time when the Iranians themselves are indulging in their own sabre-rattling, with their armed forces undertaking a series of military exercises in which they are showing off all their latest technological advances, from radar-evading missiles to stealth flying boats.

While none of these weapons would seriously threaten the overwhelming superiority enjoyed by America, the clear signal that the Iranians are trying to send out is that, if attacked, they have the ability to retaliate and cause mayhem throughout the Middle East.

Apart from starving the West of vital oil supplies by closing the Straits of Hormuz, the Iranians have an advanced ballistic missile capability that can hit targets throughout the Middle East - including Israel.

Certainly the fear of provoking a wider Middle East war is one of the reasons that divisions are already starting to appear in the Security Council over how best to deal with Iran.

While Britain and America would like to see a "smart sanctions" regime implemented if Teheran refuses to call a halt to its nuclear enrichment activities by the end of this month, other powerful voices, particularly Russia and China, believe such a move would be counter-productive.

Irrespective of the outcome, however, the Bush Administration is correct in its assessment that, without the threat of serious military action, the Iranians are unlikely to take seriously the West's determination to prevent them acquiring a nuclear arsenal.

The suggestion, contained in Seymour Hersh's article in this week's New Yorker, that Washington is prepared to use tactical nuclear weapons, might appear far-fetched: the ground-penetrating bombs used to destroy Saddam's state-of-the art German-built bunkers at the start of the Iraq war three years ago adequately accomplished the task using conventional munitions.

But if the current round of diplomacy is to stand any chance of success, then the Iranians must be made to understand that their prevarication tactics at the UN can no longer be tolerated over an issue of such importance for international security.

For while Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, regards the concept of military action against Iran as "nuts", it would be even nuttier to allow Teheran to have an atom bomb.

Stay Away From World Cup, German Commentators Tell "Madman of Tehran"

April 10, 2006
Spiegel
David Crossland

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Should Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has doubted the scale of the Holocaust and wants to eradicate Israel, be allowed to visit Germany to watch his national team play in the World Cup? A German cabinet minister has come under fire for saying he could come. That remark has stoked up a barrage of newspaper editorials telling the Iranian leader to stay away.

German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble has whipped up controversy by saying Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has threatened to "wipe Israel off the map," could come to Germany to watch Iran play during the World Cup. Speaking at a conference on Saturday hosted by the German soccer federation (DFB), Schäuble said: "Naturally he can come to the matches. It won't be a simple matter because of the things that he has said in the past that are simply unacceptable. But my advice is we should be good hosts. We want to be better."

Ahmadinejad, who is defying the international community with a nuclear program the West suspects is aimed at producing nuclear bombs, has also questioned whether 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis in the Holocaust. If he repeated that assertion in Germany he would be breaking a law that makes denial of the Holocaust a crime punishable with up to five years in prison.

If Ahmadinejad did come, Schäuble of the conservative Christian Democratic Union said he would take him to task for his comments. That wasn't enough to placate the central Council of Jews in Germany, which called Schäuble's statement a "scandal" and said he was "risking ruining the government's credibility in the fight against anti-Semitism." Politicians have also weighed in. "Herr Ahmadinejad should kindly stay at home," Hans-Ulrich Klose, foreign policy expert for the Social Democrat party, which shares power in the government , told the mass-circulation Bild. The German Foreign Ministry has pointed out that heads of government enjoy immunity and don't need a visa to enter Germany. Unless, that is, the European Union were to slap a visa ban on Ahmadinejad as it did for Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko on Monday.

German newspapers have been too busy expressing their outrage at the prospect of his visit to bother checking whether Ahmadinejad actually plans to come. He doesn't, according to an Iranian government official quoted by Reuters on Sunday. "It is not on his agenda," Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters. Iran's opening match against Mexico on June 11 is in Nuremberg.

But who's to say Ahmadinejad won't change his mind if Iran kicks its way into a semi-final or even the final? Basking in his team's soccer glory with the world watching may prove too tempting to resist. Iran's team is ranked 19th in the world, three places ahead of hapless host team Germany.

Top-selling tabloid Bild newspaper says the "Madman of Tehran" should stay at home. "The motto of the World Cup is: 'A Time to Make Friends.' Everyone is looking forward to the peaceful festival of nations here with us," writes Bild in a commentary. "Everyone is welcome here -- except for one person: Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad! As long as the madman of Tehran denies the Holocaust, tinkers with an atomic bomb and supports terrorism, he should stay at home. The World Cup mustn't be poisoned by a political fanatic and abused for his purposes."

Center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung notes that there are no travel limits on Iranian government officials, so Schäuble's position is in line with international diplomacy. Similarly, all relevant authorities including the German government have rejected calls for Iran to be excluded from the World Cup. "It's he (Ahmadinejad) himself who has built up obstacles to a sporting visit. His predecessor, reformist President Mohammad Khatami, was able to enjoy full honors in a state visit to Germany. But the respect he generated for his country has been swiftly and thoroughly gambled away by Ahmadinejad." A visit would also pose security problems because exiled Iranians would be bound to seize the opportunity to stage protests, the newspaper adds.

The left-wing Die Tageszeitung devotes its entire front page to the story headlined "Fair Play For an Anti-Semite?" and shows a smiling Ahmadinejad jogging in a soccer tracksuit. It points out that women aren't allowed to watch football matches in Iranian stadiums and quotes various politicians, film directors, sportsmen and religious leaders on the subject. They disagree on whether he should be allowed in but one message is clear in most of the commentaries: He wouldn't be welcome.

Business daily Financial Times Deutschland comments on an article released over the weekend by investigative journalist Seymour Hersh that the US administration is stepping up plans for a possible air strike on Iran. Hersh's story in the April 17 issue of the New Yorker magazine, mostly citing unidentified current and former officials, says President George W. Bush views Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as a "potential Adolf Hitler," and wants "regime change" in Tehran. The Hersh report also says the administration is seriously considering using "bunker buster" tactical nuclear weapons to ensure the destruction of Iran's main centrifuge plant at Natanz. The Financial Times Deutschland says Bush may be deliberately encouraging speculation about his war planning so that he can increase the pressure on Iran to back down in the diplomatic stand-off over its nuclear program. "The pressure is necessary because Iran has shown itself to be unimpressed by the threats of sanctions from the United Nations Security Council," writes the paper. "The regime can evidently only be impressed by a large military threat." That isn't to say it's an empty threat, it adds. "Bush is in his second term, cannot be re-elected, doesn't have to be popular at all cost. Whether there will be a military strike depends on how Iran responds to the atmosphere of threat that Washington is gradually building. And whether Ahmadinejad in the coming months reinforces the impression that he is a far more dangerous man than Saddam Hussein ever was."

China's Nuclear Diplomacy

April 11, 2006
The Wall Street Journal
Gordon G. Chang

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As Mao Zedong once said, "without the bomb people just won't listen to you." Since then, China's attitudes toward nuclear proliferation have matured. But the transformation isn't yet complete. With China's backing, Iran's nuclear program has advanced, and it's still unclear what the mainland will do as pressure on Tehran intensifies. Given the threat, it's time for America and the West to step up the pressure on China -- both privately and publicly -- to prove that its "peaceful rise" really will be peaceful. It's time for China to drop its support of Iran.

Such a change in national policy won't be easy for the Chinese, but it's been accomplished before without significant international pressure. In the 1950s, Beijing applied its own brand of Marxist analysis to the issue of nuclear proliferation. Nukes in the hands of socialists, the Party argued, advanced world peace -- so all communist states should have them. Other "peace-loving countries" -- the non-aligned states -- could possess them too. Beijing's logic was straightforward: Nuclear weapons gave weaker nations the means to deter the two superpowers, the U.S. and the former Soviet Union, and granted them a voice in world affairs.

Once the Chinese detonated their first atomic device in 1964, however, their outlook changed. By 1983, their pro-proliferation rhetoric was a thing of the past. China joined the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, in 1984 and signed nuclear-proliferation agreements at a fast clip from 1992 to 1998. Since then, Beijing has enacted comprehensive nuclear export-control legislation and established stringent licensing for nuclear material, dual-use items and related technology.

China, the one nation that given its history might have dispersed nuclear weapons technology indiscriminately, has not done so. Yet the issue is not whether Beijing's policies are moving in the right direction -- it is whether they are progressing fast enough. The existing American-led international system could completely fail if hostile and unstable regimes obtain atomic weapons. Unfortunately, that kind of rapid nuclearization may soon occur. In 2004, the IAEA estimated that at least 40 nations could build a bomb within a few years' time. Not all of these countries would be a threat to global order -- but many of them would.

China's role in the current Iranian crisis is particularly unsettling. Alongside Russia, Beijing has insisted on "dialogue" rather than economic sanctions. This attitude is driven by China's extensive oil exploration and gas interests in Iran.

The West should've seen this coming. The IAEA identified China as one of the sources for enrichment equipment used in Tehran's suspected nuclear weapons program. As noted in these pages, Chinese weapons scientists were working in Iran as late as the end of 2003. According to the National Council of Resistance of Iran, a dissident group, in 2004 China sent Iran beryllium, which can be used to trigger a nuclear weapon. And as late as last year, various sources, including the NCRI and some inside the American intelligence community, reported that China sold either centrifuges or centrifuge parts to Iran.

China's assistance to Iran is a violation of its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. It also violates Beijing's Oct. 1997 pledge to America that it would not engage in any new nuclear cooperation with Iran and would expedite the completion of two small projects there. "Chinese entities remain involved with the nuclear and missile efforts in Iran," confirmed Peter Rodman, U.S. assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, in written testimony to a congressional commission last year.

These reports suggest that China, despite passionate and repeated denials, is still playing "the proliferation card" to secure access to Iranian energy. China's activities also raise broader questions about Beijing's adherence to international norms to prevent the dispersal of nuclear technologies. What can Washington do to encourage the Chinese to make the right choice about their future?

For the past decade, U.S. administrations have typically used a light touch that accomplished little. They have, for instance, slapped a series of minor sanctions on China's state-owned enterprises for particularly egregious transfers of missile and WMD technology to Iran. If anything, these mild rebukes, even though administered publicly, have shown Beijing that America is not serious about stopping Chinese proliferation. Some critics argue that, whatever Washington does, it holds little sway over Beijing. The Chinese, they contend, will never support sanctions or other coercive measures against Iran that run counter to their own national interests.

When the U.S. is resolute, however, Washington gets results. Consider U.S. measures in the early 1990s, as regards North Korean nuclear proliferation. In 1994, Washington privately told Beijing that its support of Pyongyang would isolate China internationally. Furthermore, Washington threatened to put the Chinese in the unenviable position of having to take a clear stand in support of Pyongyang in public. President Clinton also offered substantial trade concessions -- an unprincipled bribe, but an effective one. The Chinese complied, employing both backroom diplomacy and public pressure on Pyongyang, suggesting China might adhere to any embargo imposed on North Korea and stop food and oil supplies. Pyongyang immediately softened its position on starting talks over its plutonium production. This type of effective diplomacy was employed again by the current U.S. administration in 2003, when, after intense bargaining with China, Beijing cut off the flow of oil to North Korea for three days. Again, Pyongyang yielded, agreeing to sit down for multilateral talks shortly thereafter.

The North Korean example shows that China can become a constructive force if America acts to make it one. Washington may have to step up its public rhetoric with Beijing or employ a strong mix of sticks and carrots, but in any event America needs to act. The Chinese have yet to make the right choice in the showdown with Iran.

Mr. Chang is the author of "Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes On the World" (Random House, 2006).

European Ministers Consider Possible Actions Against Iran

April 10, 2006
Reuters
The New York Times

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LUXEMBOURG -- European foreign ministers reviewed options for steps against Iran for the first time on Monday, including possible visa bans and financial sanctions if Iran pressed on with its nuclear activity.

The European Union's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, who drafted a confidential options paper for the 25 ministers, and the British foreign secretary, Jack Straw, said that the discussion here on Monday was just a contingency-planning exercise and that sanctions were not imminent.

The ministers appealed to Iran in a statement to comply with the United Nations request to suspend all nuclear enrichment-related activities, and they reaffirmed their support for a diplomatic solution.

The statement made no mention of possible sanctions. But European Union officials said that among the possible steps cited in Mr. Solana's paper were a travel ban on individuals involved in Iran's nuclear program, tighter export controls on dual-use technologies — goods ostensibly acquired for civilian purposes that can possibly be diverted to military use — a ban on Iranian students studying sensitive sciences in European universities and, ultimately, a ban on export credit guarantees to companies trading with Iran.

In Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised "good news" in the next week on the nuclear program — perhaps, a newspaper said, that Iran had enriched uranium to a level used in power plants. Iran "will not step back one iota from the right of the Iranian nation," he said at a rally.

Mr. Solana told reporters that his plan, details of which were first reported by The Financial Times, was not for immediate sanctions. "What we are doing today is a reflection on what may happen if at the end of the day" what is happening in the "Security Council does fail," Mr. Solana said.

Mr. Solana dismissed a report in The New Yorker that Washington was stepping up plans for a possible airstrike. "It has nothing to do with reality," he said. "Any military action is absolutely off the table for us."

Asked if a visa ban on Iranian officials was among the possibilities, he replied, "There are many things," and added that a "visa ban is a classical type of measure."

The next step would depend on what the International Atomic Energy Agency reports to the United Nations Security Council this month. The French foreign minister, Philippe Douste-Blazy, said it was "essential" for Iran to suspend sensitive nuclear activity. "It is necessary to listen perfectly to what the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency says," he said at a news conference on Monday during an official visit to Algiers.

The German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, said the European Union would adopt its own restrictions against Iran only if there was deadlock in the United Nations.

The Solana paper charged that Iran had moved backward in all areas of concern to the European Union, including the nuclear program, human rights and support that it might be providing for terrorism.

Nuclear Bluster

April 10, 2006
The Times
Leading Articles

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The flurry of rebuttals and reactions to the reports that America has drawn up secret plans to launch a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities if necessary may please the proponents of psychological warfare; it can only dismay America’s allies and those attempting to negotiate a halt to Iran’s nuclear programme.

Hawks on the fringes of the Republican Party say that an attack could be “over before anyone knew what happened”. The White House, in keeping with its policy of not ruling out any option, has not denied the report, published today in The New Yorker magazine. But Jack Straw dismissed all such talk as “completely nuts”. And he reiterated the Government’s view that such an attack was “inconceivable”.

The Bush Administration has long believed that Iran has been negotiating in bad faith over its nuclear intentions — a position shared by the disillusioned European foreign ministers who have spent two fruitless years attempting to persuade Tehran to abide by its treaty obligations and undertakings to the International Atomic Energy Agency. But although Washington has long been pushing the IAEA to refer Iran to the United Nations Security Council, it has been careful in recent months to tone down the rhetoric.

It is the sceptics now outside the Administration who have little faith in the UN route and who believe that sanctions, even if enforce- able, will have no effect. The only way, they maintain, to guarantee regional security is a pre-emptive strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. This is not the mainstream position in Washington. It would almost certainly be opposed by both the State Department, worried about the global reaction, and the Pentagon, stretched by Iraq and unable to deliver assurances that it could protect all US assets around the world from retaliatory terrorist strikes.

It would be neither surprising nor wrong if contingency plans for a military strike had been examined: any policy option must always be considered. That they have been presented as though they were soon to be implemented, however, is irresponsible.

There are three immediate dangers. The first is that all such talk reinforces the perception in Muslim countries of an Administration that is institution-ally “anti-Muslim”. The second is that Washington’s allies find it ever harder to maintain a united front on Iran if voters believe that this implies condoning military action. And thirdly, such talk takes on a life of its own, and gives hardliners in Tehran the excuse to quash opposition on the pretext of the need for national unity.

The effects of such talk may be seen not in Iran, but next door. Iran’s interference in Iraq is massive, unscrupulous and potentially extremely de- stabilising. There is ample evidence that Iranian weapons and funding have been finding their way to the insurgency, even if most of the victims are fellow Shias. The brutal logic is that Tehran wants to make quite clear not only its ability to manipulate the political balance, but also to demonstrate to Washington that Iran is a power that cannot be ignored.

That message has got home. The US has put out feelers to Iran to discuss how to speed up the formation of a viable Iraqi government. Tehran, which has no long-term interest in civil war, might respond. But there is, understandably, linkage with the nuclear stand-off. For this reason, Washington has every reason to act with caution.

Iran Says to Give "Good News" on Atomic Progress

April 10, 2006
Reuters
Parinoosh Arami

http://go.reuters.co.uk/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=1174190&section=news&src=rss/uk/worldNews

TEHRAN -- Iran's president on Monday promised "good news" within days about the country's nuclear programme and a newspaper said he might declare the Islamic Republic had enriched uranium to a level used in power plants. "I will give you, the Iranian nation, good nuclear news during the time I am in Mashhad," President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in the northeastern city, where newspapers said he was expected to spend around five days.

His comments echoed remarks by other officials suggesting the imminent announcement of progress in Iran's nuclear programme, which the West fears is a cover to develop atomic weapons but which Iran insists is for civilian uses.

The daily Jomhuri-ye Eslami wrote: "It was said the good news is related to Iran's achievement of uranium enrichment at 3.5 percent and creating a laboratory platform that will register Iran in the club of nuclear fuel countries."

It gave no source or further details.

Uranium enriched to a low level can be used as fuel to generate electricity. Fuel for use in Iran's only nuclear plant now under construction would need to be enriched to 3.5 percent. Uranium must be enriched to far higher levels for bomb-making.

An announcement this week may coincide with a planned visit to Iran by Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, for talks that diplomats at the IAEA in Vienna said were likely to be held on Thursday.

Iran has resumed efforts to enrich uranium this year, defying demands by the United Nations that it halt such work.

"On this (nuclear) issue, it (Iran) will not step back one iota from the right of the Iranian nation," Ahmadinejad told a rally in Mashhad, on one of his regular provincial tours.

"Our enemies know that they are not able to inflict the slightest harm on our nation," he said in the address which was broadcast live on television.

"ABSOLUTE RIGHT"

The United States says it wants a diplomatic resolution to the dispute, but there has been rising speculation that it could resort to military force, an option Washington has kept open.

"Our enemies know that by creating a fuss or with these meetings or by frowning, they cannot impede our nation," the Iranian president told the crowd, which chanted back to him: "Nuclear energy is our absolute right."

European foreign ministers were meeting on Monday to review options for possible measures against Iran, including financial sanctions, if it fails to halt sensitive nuclear activity.

Gholamreza Aghazadeh, head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation, said in February Iran had started work on uranium fuel but on a very small scale involving injecting uranium gas into only a few centrifuges. He said Iran was still months away from starting a full pilot cascade of centrifuges.

Such chains, each containing 164 centrifuges, refine the uranium gas. Around 1,500 centrifuges running optimally for a year could yield enough material for a bomb, experts say.

An IAEA report in March said Iran had begun vacuum-testing a cascade of 20 centrifuges and was renovating its system for handling uranium hexafluoride (UF6) gas at its Natanz plant.

Experts have said Iran could have serious difficulties in enriching uranium on an industrial scale because of quality problems with uranium hexafluoride gas. Some also doubt whether Iranian technicians can get the centrifuges to spin in cascades.

Solana: EU Should Consider Iran Sanctions

April 10, 2006
The Associated Press
The Washington Post

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LUXEMBOURG -- A top European Union official said Monday that the 25-nation bloc should consider sanctions against Iran, including a visa ban on nuclear officials, because Tehran refuses to cooperate with the United Nations on its nuclear program.

"We have to begin thinking about that possibility," EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana told reporters outside an EU foreign ministers meeting.

The ministers debated if the EU should get tougher with Iran over its nuclear plan, which the West fears is geared toward building nuclear weapons.

Solana ruled out, however, that EU would back any military action.

"Any military action is definitely out of the question for us," he said.

Solana said that the EU would await Iran's response to a U.N. Security Council call for a halt to uranium enrichment before considering any actions. Iran has so far rejected international demands for clarity over its nuclear intentions.

"Iran has to respond to the Security Council. We have to be prepared in case they fail," Solana said.

Misunderstanding Iran

April 08, 2006
Arab News
Amir Taheri

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"But what does Iran want?" This was the question frequently hurled at me during a series of lectures and meetings in the United States recently. It indicated the desire of those who posed it to find "a reasonable way" to avoid a conflict that many now regard as inevitable.

To critics of President George W. Bush the Tehran's policy of deliberate provocation is a result of Washington's failure "to understand what Iran really wants." One questioner even claimed that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad owed his election as president of the Islamic republic to "Bush's intransigence" which supposedly weakened the "moderates" in Iran.

Many answers to that question are already in circulation.

One answer, echoing the views of the Council on Foreign Relations, is that the Islamic republic is, in fact, crying out for attention. The Tehran leadership resents being shut out of the regional geopolitics at a time of upheavals prompted by regime changes in Kabul and Baghdad.

But how credible is such an analysis?

Not much. Tehran was given a place at the table when the future of Afghanistan was shaped in Bonn in 2002. But that did not prevent it from doing its bit of mischief on the side. Tehran's influence has also been present in post-Saddam Iraq from day one, in the shape of Shiite groups and personalities close to the Iranians by blood, marriage, and political affinity. And, yet, that has not prevented Tehran from financing and arming maverick groups, including the one led by Moqtada Sadr, against Iran's long-time friends in the new Iraqi leadership.

Another answer in circulation is that the Islamic republic, scared of being attacked, is acting as a bully to scare off would-be aggressors. But that does not hold much water either.

The Islamic republic and the US signed an accord in Algiers in 1980 that committed Washington not to endanger the Khomeinist regime. That undertaking was similar to the one given by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 not to destabilize the Castro regime in Cuba.

Although the Islamic republic did not ratify the Algiers accord through its legislature, successive US administrations have taken care not to infringe it. (The accord is often cited to prevent US citizens from suing the Islamic republic for acts of terrorism, hostage taking, and confiscation of property, in American courts.)

Thus the claim that Iranian leaders are aggressive because they fear attacks by the US is false. So far, no American administration has initiated a low— intensity campaign against the Islamic republic, let alone target it with a "regime change" program.

The Islamic republic, however, has not respected the accord by pursuing its low-intensity war against the US and its allies in the region.

Yet another answer to the question is provided by those who subscribe to the myth of "Iran's legitimate grievances". According to that myth, the US changed Iran's "democratic regime" in 1953, angering the Iranians who now want an apology in lieu of actual revenge. That myth is too stupid to merit a detailed debunking here. But even supposing that the US had done what it is supposed to have done, can anyone believe that the present rulers are angry because Iran lost the "democratic regime" it never had?

Can anyone in his right mind present the present rulers of Iran as champions of democracy?

In any case, at least two prominent US politicians bought into that myth and did offer "apologies" to the present rulers where none was warranted. President Bill Clinton's Secretary of State Madeleine Albright did so in 2001 at a banquet organized by a lobby group for the Islamic republic in New York. A few months later it was the turn of Clinton himself who, as always, did one better by apologizing not only for the mythical intervention of 1953 but also " for all the wrongs that my culture has done to you", thus assuming responsibility for the many wars that Russia and Great Britain had fought against Iran in the 19th and 20th centuries — wars in which the United States had played no part.

The Albright-Clinton apologies prompted Muhammad Khatami, who was the president of the Islamic republic at the time, to propose a form of detente and peaceful coexistence between Iran and the United States. In 1984 the same Khatami had written that the Islamic republic and the US were at war and could not think of peace because a truly Muslim state could never consider itself at peace with an "infidel" power.

Nevertheless, Khatami did work hard to foster his version of detente. That prompted the Clinton administration to come up wit the idea of a "Grand Bargain".

The "Grand Bargain" as Khatami saw it would create a mini-Yalta under which the Islamic republic and the US would divide the Middle East into their respective zones of influence. Tehran would be recognized as "the regional superpower" with a dominant position in Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Armenia, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. It would also preserve its special relationship with Oman, the only country to have signed a security pact with Iran. The US would further acknowledge Iran's presence in the United Arab Emirates, chiefly Dubai.

In exchange, the Islamic republic would not interfere with the flow of oil from the Gulf, would tone down its opposition to the Israel-Palestine peace efforts, and would not use terrorism against the US and its allies. Under the "Grand Bargain" the US would end up as the dominant power in Egypt, Jordan, Israel, the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Azerbaijan, and Turkey.

The problem is that the "Grand Bargain" is no longer on the table.

The Islamic Majlis (Parliament) in Tehran has passed a law making any substantial dialogue with the US illegal. And Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Khatami's successor as president, is not interested in making any deals with the US that he regards as a "sunset" power. Ahmadinejad is in inspirational contact with the "Hidden Imam" whose return he believes is drawing nigh.

Ahmadinejad believes that the world is heading for a clash of civilizations in which Islam, led by Iran, will triumph over the "infidel" led by the United States. Ahmadinejad publicly states his policy as "a Jihad to reshape the world and ensure Islam's universal dominance."

Smug foreign policy wonks in the US might dismiss all that as "delusional fantasies." They may be right. But don't forget that Ahmadinejad also sees Bush's claim that the US is mandated by God to bring democracy to the Middle East as "a delusional fantasy."

The Council on Foreign Relations cannot liberate itself from the typical deal maker's mentality. It cannot conceive of a regime and a movement that put their messianic mission above conjectural maneuvers and compromises. They do not understand movements and regimes that, given something, would demand more because they believe that they should have it all.

Let us return to the question: What do the Iranian leaders really want?

The answer is simple: They want nothing in particular; they want everything!

Iran Doesn't Spring Forward, Time to Get Mad

April 09, 2006
The New York Times
Nazila Fathi

link to original article

TEHRAN -- A decision by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government not to move the clocks ahead at the beginning of spring this year has caused immense problems and irritations for Iranians.

For the first time in 15 years, the government unexpectedly announced that it was not changing to daylight saving time. The reason, said the government spokesman, Gholamhossein Elham, was that the cabinet had concluded that making the change had not led to energy savings in past years.

But to hedge its bets, the government decided that schools and government offices would start their day at 7 a.m. instead of the usual 8 a.m.

Energy experts dispute the cabinet's conclusion, predicting that the decision is going to cost the government $3.3 billion in additional energy costs anyway, the ISNA state news agency reported. The decision has also caused widespread inconvenience and anger. Many people traveling abroad have missed their flights, confused about what time the planes were actually leaving. Government employees have showed up late at work. Businessmen who work with foreign companies must try to recalculate the time difference. Many parents are having a hard time adjusting their working hours to their children's new school time.

"I used to drop my son at school, go to work and pick him up at 1:30 when I left my office," said Nassim Aradalan, a dentist and the mother of a 9-year-old. "Our schedule is a mess now. I go to the office one hour early but I cannot leave an hour early to pick him up at 12:30."

Saeed Leylaz, an economist and political analyst, said the energy cost of not making the change, which the government has brushed off as insignificant, was equal to three days of Iran's oil revenues. "Mr. Ahmadinejad just wants to do something different and does not care about its costs and consequences," he said.

The public welfare minister, Parviz Kazemi, said the government had the country's 20 million farmers in mind when it decided not to move to daylight saving time. "They usually start their work with the daylight, and changing the time does not affect their lives," the daily newspaper Shargh quoted him as saying.

But opponents of the decision have contended that the government has ignored the benefits of the change for 18 million students and others.

Before the Islamic revolution in 1979, the government enforced daylight saving for a few years, but then it ended after Shiite clerics contended it was anti-Islamic because it changed the hours of prayer. But the government began making the change again in 1991, as a measure to curb energy consumption.

Mohammad Ali Abtahi, a former vice president who is a midranking cleric himself, brushed off the argument that changing time is against Islam on his Web site (webneveshteha.com). He argued that clocks in the modern sense did not exist in the time of Prophet Muhammad.

Critics of Mr. Ahmadinejad have said the decision was made without an examination of its consequences. They have compared it to some of his other actions and statements that seemed not to have been weighed against the possible political consequences, like his comments that the Holocaust was a myth and that Israel should be wiped off the map.

"This particular measure has had immediate impact on people's daily lives and people can feel how such decisions can change their lives," said Ahmad Shirzad, a former member of Parliament. "It is clear that the government did not study its consequences, like what Mr. Ahmadinejad said about the Holocaust. It made many wonder if he said it and then thought about it, or thought about it before saying it."

Members of Parliament have called the decision hasty, but have said they will not confront Mr. Ahmadinejad because they want to avoid another conflict with the government. "The government is responsible for bringing order into society, not creating chaos," Hossein Afarideh, a member of Parliament, told ISNA . "Its excuse for not changing the time is wrong and will soon lead to shortage of power."

Arrest Warrant Issued in Slaying of Iranian Exile

April 10, 2006
Los Angeles Times
Times Wire Reports

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A Swiss investigator has issued an international arrest warrant for Iran's former intelligence chief in connection with the killing of an exiled Iranian opposition leader. The warrant demands the arrest of Ali Fallahian, who was intelligence minister from 1989 to 1997, on the grounds that he "decided and ordered the execution of Kazem Rajavi."

Rajavi, a member of the Mujahedin Khalq armed resistance movement, was shot to death near his home in suburban Geneva in 1990. He had obtained political asylum in Switzerland. Iranian officials had no immediate comment.