Iran on fresh enrichment drive, says new IAEA
report
Saturday, June 10, 2006
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/6120.html
VIENNA,
June 9
Iran launched a fresh round of uranium
enrichment this week just as world powers
offered it incentives to halt nuclear fuel work,
a new report by the International Atomic Energy
Agency said today.
Iran
has said it will seriously consider Tuesday’s
overture by the six world powers but the report
indicates Tehran is pushing ahead with efforts
to expand a fledgling enrichment programme and
increase its bargaining clout in any future
negotiations.
The IAEA report
said Iran had resumed feeding UF6 gas, feedstock
for nuclear fuel, into a pilot cascade of 164
centrifuge enrichment machines at Natanz on
Tuesday after a five-week pause of test runs
without UF6. That was the day European Union
foreign policy chief Javier Solana visited
Tehran to hand over the package of incentives to
mothball nuclear fuel production.
US Ambassador to
the United Nations John Bolton said in London
that if the report was accurate it made for
‘‘very disturbing’’ reading as it showed Iran
was continuing to make progress in uranium
enrichment.
The IAEA report,
emailed to the 35 states on the IAEA’s governing
board before a meeting next week, also said Iran
had continued with installation of two more
164-centrifuge networks begun in April despite a
UN Security Council resolution prohibiting it
form doing so.
Meanwhile in
Tehran, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the head of the
Guardian Council, Iran’s highest constitutional
watchdog, said today that a package of
incentives offered by six major powers would
never stop Iran from making nuclear fuel.
‘‘Now they want to
deprive us of many advantages. The package they
have brought is a package that is good for
themselves and is not appropriate for the
Iranian people,’’ Jannati told worshippers at
Friday prayers in Tehran.
‘‘In short, we
must have enrichment to the level of 3.5 to 5
perc ent and they have no choice but to accept
it.’’
New US threat of UNSC action against Iran
By Our
Correspondent
June 10, 2006
http://www.dawn.com/2006/06/10/top2.htm
WASHINGTON,
June 9: President George W. Bush said on Friday
that if Iran does not respond soon to a package
of incentives offered earlier this week, the
United States will take the matter to the UN
Security Council.
“We’ve given the Iranians a limited period of
time — weeks, not months — to digest a proposal
to move forward. And if they choose not to
verifiably suspend their program, then there
will be action taken in the UN Security
Council,” he told reporters.
Oil prices rise as ongoing disorder in Iraq,
Iran tough talk unnerves markets
Jun 9, 2006
BRAD FOSS
http://www.cbc.ca/cp/business/060609/b060978.html
WASHINGTON (AP) - Oil prices rose by more than
$1 US a barrel Friday, reversing a three-day
decline. Brokers attributed the rise to tough
talk from an Iranian cleric and the kidnapping
of a senior Iraqi petroleum industry official -
proof that the killing of al-Qaida's leader in
Iraq did not mark the end of instability in that
country.
Also, a Nigerian government official said more
than 800,000 barrels a day of the country's oil
production was shut - about 60 per cent more
than previously reported - because of violence
in the Niger Delta, Dow Jones Newswires
reported.
Meantime, Valero Energy Corp. experienced a
"total power failure" at its
240,000-barrel-per-day Aruba refinery Wednesday
night, a spokeswoman said Friday, adding that it
would be at least two weeks before the plant
would be operating at "reduced rates."
Fimat USA oil broker Mike Fitzpatrick said the
oil market is staring at a "wall of worry" that
includes strong global demand, geopolitical
unrest and the Atlantic hurricane season.
Light sweet crude for July delivery was up $1.10
to $71.45 a barrel on the New York Mercantile
Exchange. In London, Brent crude was trading at
$69.90, up 85 cents on the ICE Futures exchange.
Nymex gasoline futures were up more than five
cents to $2.1575 a gallon, while heating oil
prices rose almost three cents to $2.0130 a
gallon. Natural gas prices increased by 10 cents
to $6.294 per 1,000 cubic feet.
The cost of crude is roughly 30 per cent more
than a year ago, and U.S. pump prices average
$2.90 a gallon. Gasoline demand keeps rising,
albeit at a slower pace than normal, according
to government statistics.
Oil prices jumped Friday amid news that gunmen
kidnapped Muthanna al-Badri, a senior Iraqi oil
official in Baghdad, as he was returning home
from work.
Analysts had cautioned Thursday against reading
too much into the U.S. air strike that killed
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian-born militant
who led a campaign of suicide bombings and other
violence across Iraq. Attacks on the country's
oil infrastructure, including pipelines, were
not directly linked to his movement.
"We're not out of the woods in regard to the
insurgency in Iraq, and the market needs a
couple of weeks, maybe a month, to gauge the
situation before prices will ease," said Mark
Pervan, commodities analyst at Daiwa Securities
in Melbourne, Australia.
Vienna's
PVM Oil Associates said that - despite
al-Zarqawi's death, "the general level of
political instability and violence as well as
the absence of a new legal framework" will
continue to keep oil-related investments - and
crude exports - down in Iraq.
Additionally, the outlook regarding Iran's
nuclear program, which the West wants shut down,
remains cloudy. A top hardline Iranian cleric on
Friday came out against a western incentive
package aimed at persuading Iran to suspend
uranium enrichment, reflecting conservative
pressure on the government to reject the offer.
Earlier in the week, Iran's president suggested
an openness to negotiate.
With the summer's Atlantic hurricane season just
underway, traders are also worried about the
potential for powerful storms to damage
important oil production and refining facilities
across the Gulf of Mexico.
Iran
strike `easier`, says ret. General
By Joshua Brilliant
Jun 9, 2006, 19:00 GMT
http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/article_1171509.php/Iran_strike_%60easier%60_says_ret._general
TEL
AVIV, Israel (UPI) -- A retired Israeli general
who planned the demolition of Iraq`s nuclear
reactor in 1981 said this week that it would now
be technically \'easier\' to destroy Iran`s
nuclear facilities in a pre-emptive air strike.
\'A
modern air force, first and foremost the U.S.
Air Force but also Israel`s... (would find it)
easier to do something similar in Iran... today.
Technology has changed, the intelligence
technology has changed. Today we know much more
than what we used to know and especially the
technology for attack has changed,\' Maj. Gen.
in the reserves Isaac Ben Israel said. Ben
Israel now heads Tel Aviv University`s security
studies program.
One
U.S. stealth plane, an F-117 or a B-2, can
\'drop its bombs (and) accurately destroy the
targets the planners decided it should
destroy... (It could) enter Iran, leave Iran,
and the Iranians won`t know it is there,\' he
told a conference marking the 25 anniversary of
Israel`s attack in Iraq.
Satellites, photography equipment and
intelligence gathering means are so advanced
today that \'what existed in 1981 seems... like
the Middle Ages,\' said retired intelligence
Brig. Gen. Amos Gilboa, who was involved in the
preparations for that attack.
In
1981 Israeli intelligence had detailed plans of
the Osirak reactor rising southeast of Baghdad.
They knew the inner walls` locations and
thickness.
Ben
Israel`s team reckoned that in order to destroy
the reactor beyond repair they would have to hit
its 8 cubic meter core located between two meter
thick walls of reinforced concrete more than 20
meters underground.
The
team calculated the path and speed that a
one-ton bomb would take once it hits the spot
they chose. Then they calculated how many bombs
must be dropped to be 100 percent sure that the
core will be hit.
They
concluded that four planes with one-ton bombs
each would be enough. The air force`s commander
decided to be on the safe side. He sent eight
F-16s, recalled Ben-Israel.
He
ridiculed claims that the Iranians have learned
a lesson from the Osirak strike and placed
everything underground.
\'These things are always built underground.
It`s not an Iranian invention,\' he said, adding
that one of the bombs hit the ground in front of
the designated spot and plowed through into the
structure.
The
question is whether it is worthwhile launching a
strike, he said.
Ben
Israel, in his presentation, and a recent study
by Prof. Efraim Inbar, who heads Bar Ilan
University`s Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic
Studies, concluded that the risks of letting
Iran develop a bomb are too great.
Tehran`s nuclear program began during the days
of the shah, before the Islamic revolution. Some
of its elements, \'Have little or no suitability
for any other purpose\' but military
applications, wrote Inbar.
The
Shehab 3 missile it developed \'can probably be
nuclear tipped.\' It can reach Israel, Turkey,
Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States and several
important U.S. bases, he noted.
\'Further improvements in Iranian missiles would
initially put most European capitals, and
eventually the North American continent, within
range,\' he added.
For
Israel an Iranian nuclear bomb would be \'an
existential threat,\' Maj. Gen. in the reserves
Giora Eiland said in a briefing shortly before
stepping down as head of the National Security
Council.
Many
political disputes can be resolved but it is
difficult to strike compromises when religion is
involved, Eiland maintained.
Inbar and Ben Israel concurred. \'The tripartite
combination of a radical Islamic regime,
long-range missile capability and nuclear
weapons is extremely perilous. Due to its small
and dense population Israel is exceedingly
vulnerable to a nuclear attack,\' wrote Inbar.
Middle Eastern states can hardly establish a
nuclear \'balance of terror\' with Iran and
there is no full proof defense against nuclear
tipped missiles, he added.
The
analysts seemed to support the government`s
policy of letting the U.S.-lead a diplomatic
effort to stop Tehran`s nuclear program.
If
that fails, the world might try economic
sanctions. Iran depends on imported refined oil
products; its revenues from exporting crude oil
are a source of enormous revenues and U.S. naval
forces could block much of those in the Straits
of Hormuz, noted Inbar.
He
nevertheless cautioned that, \'Societies and
regimes have demonstrated great resilience in
the face of economic sanctions and a capacity to
withstand pain.\'
\'External pressure has been used more than once
as a focal point for rallying domestic support
for the embattled regime,\' he noted.
\'If
the world won`t stop this, it is a matter of
time\' until Iran has a bomb, warned Ben Israel.
If
everything else fails, \'We`ve got to do it
ourselves because this risk cannot be taken,\'
he said.
Not Just Straight Supply: Iran and the Strait of
Hormuz
By
Karl Heilman
09 Jun 2006
http://www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?relid=20576
ST.
LOUIS (ResourceInvestor.com)
-- Oil prices over the last few months have been
drastically affected by a select number of
particular world events, notably, the Iranian
enrichment dispute.
A
figurative I.E.D., and a diplomatic
tug-of-war, the international drama seems to
continuously take one step forward and two steps
back. The dispute over Iran’s sovereignty in
enriching their own uranium has created quite
the stir politically; however, the economic
concerns appear to be just as tedious.
Currently, the Persian Gulf exports 27% of the
world’s oil, while Iran’s export amount
constitutes 15% of Persian Gulf oil exports,
according to the
U.S. Energy Information Agency.
Mathematically speaking, this equates to Iran’s
oil exports making up roughly 4% of world supply
at 2.6 (Iran’s OPEC quota is 4.11M) million
barrels per day.
According to the EIA, the Iranian Revolution,
which began in 1978, led crude prices to more
than double
from $14 to over $34 dollars/barrel between
1979 and 1981. Adjusted for inflation, barrel
prices were well over $80 a barrel to today’s
standards.
Other factors leading to the price rise included
the start of the Iran-Iraq war, and decreasing
production by OPEC, a reduction of nearly 7
million barrels daily, to 22.8 million barrels
per day.
According to Ariel Cohen, of the Heritage
foundation, uncertainty about Iran being capable
of sustaining oil production at current levels
could lead to barrel prices reaching over $80 in
the near future, yet
Iran’s export numbers are not the
only concern.
Strait of Hormuz
A
narrow body of water, known as the Strait of
Hormuz, is arguably one of the most significant
waterways in the world. The Strait of
Hormuz links the Gulf of Oman and the Persian
Gulf. In 2003, roughly 90% of all Persian Gulf
oil passed through the Strait of Hormuz,
accounting for 40% of the world’s oil, its
geo-strategic significance being matched by few
other areas when it comes to energy shipments.
It
is important to contemplate the fear
premium stemming from Iranian threats in
relation to geo-strategic control of the Strait;
a factor more pressing than Iran's oil
production numbers.
From a Washington Institute article by Sam
Henderson, Vice Adm. Lowell E. Jacoby of the
Defense Intelligence Agency said during a 2005
Senate Testimony:
“We judge Iran can briefly close the Strait of
Hormuz, relying on a layered strategy using
predominantly naval, air, and some ground
forces. In 2004 it purchased North Korean
torpedo and missile-armed fast attack craft and
midget submarines, making marginal improvements
to this capacity.”
Iran
is not able to keep up with OPEC crude
production quotas, and Iranian oil hasn’t
reached U.S. soil in decades. Yet, with each day
of the enrichment drama unfolding and then
squeamishly folding back up, prices across the
world are affected by the outcome of the latest
diplomatic progress or lack there of.
Last Sunday, Iran’s Supreme leader, Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei, warned of possible supply
disruptions if the U.S. or other countries
invaded Iran.
“If you make any mistake (and invade Iran),
definitely shipment of energy from this region
will be seriously jeopardized. You have to know
this,” Khameni said.
The Khameni threat led to Monday’s oil prices
jumping 77 cents, closing oil at over $73 for US
crude. It is indeed amazing how one threat can
raise prices so quickly.
One thing seems to be clear, Iran relies heavily
on oil revenues as they make up 80% of export
revenues. Countries including Germany, France,
Italy and Japan help consume a great deal of the
exports, it is unlikely that Iran will forego
such a large part of their income, and even less
likely that import partners will allow the
debacle to reach such a level.
Is
then such a threat and constant crude price
fluctuations due to Iran having such a large
sphere of influence over the Strait?
Logistically speaking, much of the world depends
on oil which comes through it, and perhaps
Iran’s largest weapon is being so close to it.
Oil can come from many places, however, the
majority of it comes through one small Strait,
34 miles across at its widest point.
Conclusion
The obvious yet often neglected fact can’t be
avoided, if Persian Gulf oil is not able to pass
through the Strait, let production numbers be
damned; oil exports must have a safe and
reliable passage into its markets.
Today oil closed above $71 a barrel as Western
and Iranian tensions continued.
Iranian Deception
Allan Topol | June
07, 2006
http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,100200,00.html
Last week
President Bush and Condoleezza Rice made a bold
move in agreeing to participate with Iran in
negotiations, provided that the Iranians met
certain basic conditions, including the
suspension of nuclear fuel production. This
shift in the Administration's position on Iran
surprised many people in Washington and dismayed
others. It should not be viewed as appeasement
or surrender to Iran, but rather as a wise move
to counter Iran's deceptive effort to split the
United States from its allies.
Until about a
month ago, President Bush and Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice believed that they had
reasonably secure support from Russia, Germany
and France for a hard line position against
Iran's continued development of nuclear weapons.
As the Iranians dug in, Bush's support in Moscow
and Berlin began to disintegrate. This is not
particularly surprising. Both Russia and Germany
trade extensively with Iran, and the Russians
particularly in all areas including nuclear
development. Once again, Russia and the
Europeans are placing their own economic
self-interests ahead of principle and long-term
national security.
This split between
the United States on the one hand and the
Europeans and Russians on the other deepened
with the eighteen-page letter that Iranian
President Ahmadinejad sent two weeks ago. There
was nothing conciliatory about this letter that
declared that liberal democracy was a failure
and attacked the West. Yet those who wanted to
grasp for straws determined -- with wishful
thinking -- that this was an effort to reach out
and start a dialogue with the United States.
This was a
brilliant move by the masters of deception in
Tehran. As they no doubt anticipated, it threw
the United States on the defensive. The Iranian
leaders would have liked nothing better than for
Bush to resist the call for a dialogue and
continue to assert a hard line from which
Russia, Germany and France would distance
themselves. The United States would then be
isolated, having a choice between unilateral
military action and acquiescence in Iran's
nuclear program.
Bush and Rice saw
through this Iranian ploy. In an attempt to
avoid diplomatic isolation, which may or may not
be possible, Condoleezza Rice developed the idea
of the letter to Iran offering to negotiate with
certain preconditions. As this letter was sent,
there was no optimism in Washington that there
would ever be meaningful negotiations. On the
other hand, the Administration does have a hope
that if it plays its cards right in connection
with this Iranian gambit it may be able to
obtain support from Germany, France and Russia
for some sanctions against Iran if the Iranians
do not break off their nuclear work. Personally,
I think this hope is tempered with far too much
optimism. When it gets right down to the moment
of decision, I don't think Bush will be able to
count on support from Germany, Russia and France
for any kind of sanctions in the U.N. I may be
unduly pessimistic, but whether or not I am it
is still necessary for the Administration to
continue to play the diplomatic game that it is
not doing.
Already President
Bush is receiving some positive value from the
letter that Rice prepared. Two days ago Iran's
religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei lashed
out with a series of vitriolic broadsides
against the United States contending that
suggestions of a consensus against Iran were “a
lie.” Khamenei further warned the United States
that Iran would respond to any wrong move by
disrupting energy flow in the region. This
threat was intended to include blockage of the
Strait of Hormuz that is a major sea transit
point for oil tankers. Threats to disrupt energy
supply would have massive economic impact on
Iran as well as the United States and its
allies. It is questionable whether the Iranians
would ever take such an action. However, one
can't underestimate the religious zealots who
are in control of the Iranian government.
The crucial point
is the administration's letter offering to talk,
which was certainly a carrot, was met with this
bitter attack from Tehran. The Iranians were
angered by Washington's show of flexibility in
an effort to retain control of the coalition.
What Tehran was hoping for was a hard line
response from Washington that would have split
the alliance. Thus, in this round of diplomatic
chess the Administration has won some points.
It is still
unclear as to how this matter will play out in
the next couple of weeks. The most likely
scenario is that the Iranians will formally
reject the United States' preconditions in the
hope that Merkel and Putin will persuade Bush to
drop the preconditions for negotiations. The
pressure on Bush to drop these preconditions can
be expected to be severe. Whether Bush will
abandon them or not remains to be seen.
Sound Off...What do you think?
Join the discussion.
Talks without cake or Bible
By
JOHN HALL
Media General News Service
07-JUN-06
http://www.shns.com/shns/g_index2.cfm?action=detail&pk=HALL-06-07-06
WASHINGTON
-- Where is Iran, the "evil empire" which was to
have suffered unspecified but drastic
consequences if it pursued its current reckless
course toward developing nuclear weapons?
Gone
with the wind. The Bush administration, in
collaboration with its European allies, is now
on a new path promising not pain but rewards,
from jetliners to new military aircraft, if Iran
will listen to its better angels and behave
itself.
This
is starting to sound like the Iran-Contra deal
of Ronald Reagan's second term _ except it is
all out in the open. The peace offensive is
being run by Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice, not some back-channel colonel in the
basement of the White House.
In
the late 1980s, cash from the secret sale of
aircraft and parts to Iran for its war with Iraq
were used to arm the Nicaraguan "Contras"
without congressional authority.
In
the 21st century sequel rolled out by the United
States and world powers this week, money isn't
the object. The point of this elaborate
diplomatic waltz is to make it as attractive as
possible for Iran not to raise the nuclear sword
of Damocles over Israel and the region.
Sound naove? Could be they are chortling about
this under their turbans and behind their beards
in Tehran's mosques the same way they reportedly
howled at the wacky American delegation that
offered a cake and a Bible to the Ayatollah
Khomeini as a token of goodwill.
Nonetheless, the package has backing from the
five veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security
Council _ Britain, France, China, Russia and the
United States _ as well as Germany and the
European Union.
The
deal is that Tehran must relinquish its current
uranium enrichment program that can be used to
produce nuclear warheads.
In
return, it would receive a list of concessions
fit to set before a king, an offer, according to
the Associated Press, to supply European Airbus
aircraft for Tehran's civilian fleet,
long-banned American Boeing airliners if they
would prefer; "dual use" technology, with both
civilian and military applications, now also on
the banned list; help in building nuclear
reactors and a guaranteed supply of fuel to a
nation with the biggest reported oil reserve in
the world.
According to diplomats in Vienna, the United
States will even supply Tehran with some nuclear
technology if it stops enriching uranium. This
would go to a country that kidnapped American
embassy officials less than three decades ago,
and whose current president openly questioned
whether the Holocaust occurred and denied
Israel's right to exist _ an implicit threat to
blow the Jewish state off the earth if Tehran
ever gets nuclear warheads.
The
main bauble dangled by the West in front of the
eyes of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was an
offer for direct talks with the United States _
provided, of course, that Iran stops fooling
around with uranium enrichment.
That
precondition is a show-stopper, Ahmadinejad
declared right off the bat. Nonetheless, he
initiated the contact and welcomed Bush's
response. That is something.
Just
talking to each other may not achieve much, of
course. If a breakthrough is, indeed, imminent
or even possible, the question is how far either
Iran or the United States is willing to go.
Would either side be open to a mutual
non-aggression and no-first-use pledge with
Israel brought in as a co-signatory?
Some
skeptics have suggested this is all a ruse to
allow President Bush to say later on, just as he
did before the Iraq invasion, that no stone was
left unturned to seek a diplomatic solution to
the Iran problem.
The
offer for direct talks with Iran, however, has a
ring of credibility that Bush's late-inning
Iraqi peacemaking efforts at the United Nations
did not. He and Rice were said to have decided
on the direct talks option without participation
from Vice President Cheney or Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld.
There reportedly have been some military
operations directed at Iran, including the use
of CIA surveillance drones. But these have been
miniscule compared to the forward momentum of
gigantic ocean supply convoys and troop
movements that preceded the Iraq invasion and
made it almost a fait accompli.
Iran
would be foolish not to take this overture
seriously.
(John Hall is the senior Washington
correspondent of Media General News Service.
E-mail jhall(at)mediageneral.com.)
|
Iran must respond within weeks – Bush
http://jta.org/page_view_breaking_story.asp?intid=3044
|
|
 |
|
Iran
has weeks to respond to an incentives
package to get it to stop enriching
uranium, President Bush said.
“We´ve given the Iranians a limited
period of time -- you know, weeks not
months -- to digest a proposal to move
forward,” Bush said Friday in press
conference. “And if they choose not to
verifiably suspend their program, then
there will be action taken in the U.N.
Security Council."
Iran
could face sanctions if it turns down
the offer, which has been endorsed by
all veto-wielding members of the
Security Council. The incentives include
economic help, trade, cultural and
educational exchanges and assistance in
developing a civilian nuclear capacity. |
Iran
Cleric Says Nuclear Proposals Unacceptable
June
09, 2006
Reuters
today.reuters.com
link to original article
A powerful Iranian cleric said on Friday a
package of incentives offered by six major
powers would never stop Iran making nuclear
fuel.
The United States, Britain, France, Germany,
Russia and China have presented Tehran with
proposals they hope will persuade it to halt
uranium enrichment, a process the West fears
Iran will use to build atomic weapons.
"Now they want to deprive us of many advantages.
The package they have brought is a package that
is good for themselves and is not appropriate
for the Iranian people," Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati
told worshippers at Friday prayers in Tehran.
Jannati heads the Guardian Council, Iran's
highest constitutional watchdog.
The council does not directly make nuclear
policy. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
has entrusted the handling of nuclear affairs to
the Supreme National Security Council.
"In short, we must have enrichment to the level
of 3.5 to five percent and they have no choice
but to accept it," Jannati added.
Iran says it needs uranium enriched to this low
level to fuel power stations and has no
intention of enriching uranium to the higher
level needed for weapons.
It has failed to convince the international
community and has been referred to the U.N.
Security Council for possible sanctions.
Analysts see the package of proposals as an
attempt to give Tehran a last chance before
pulling together a united front for action
against Iran at the world body.
The package offered to Iran has not been made
public, but Western diplomats say it includes a
U.S. pledge to join European-led talks and
offers of a light-water reactor and a facility
to stockpile nuclear fuel.
Iranian officials have said they are willing to
consider the proposals but have reiterated that
they can never back down on making nuclear fuel
themselves. Without this concession, the
proposals cannot succeed.
French President: World "Cannot Accept" Iranian
Nuclear Arms
June
09, 2006
Dow Jones Newswires
AP
link to original article
PARIS
-- French President Jacques Chirac said Friday
that the international community "cannot accept"
an Iranian effort to build a nuclear weapon.
"We cannot accept that it has launched and
pursued a process that could, notably through
enrichment, ....lead to the creation of a
nuclear weapon," Chirac told reporters after a
meeting with U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, at
which the two discussed international efforts to
stem Iran's nuclear efforts.
Iran
'Steps Up Uranium Enrichment'
June
09, 2006
The Financial Times
Daniel Dombey and Quentin Peel in London
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/80048d62-f753-11da-a566-0000779e2340.html
Iran resumed sensitive nuclear work this week,
just as the world's big powers presented it with
an offer aimed at halting such activities,
according to the United Nations' nuclear
watchdog. A report by Mohamed ElBaradei,
director-general of the International Atomic
Energy Agency, says that Tehran has just
increased the scale of uranium enrichment, the
most sensitive part of its nuclear programme,
after scaling it back two months ago.
The report, sent to the 35 states on the IAEA's
governing board ahead of a meeting starting on
Monday, also says Iran is installing more
cascades of centrifuge enrichment machines.
Mr ElBaradei's report adds that Tehran, which
insists its programme is purely peaceful, has
also failed to provide his agency with the
answers it seeks in a number of areas.
The report says that on June 6 Iran started
enriching uranium in a 164-centrifuge cascade, a
process that can produce either nuclear fuel or
weapons grade material. It has not carried out
work at such a scale since April.
Some experts say that if Iran had 3,000
centrifuges in perfect working order - an
extremely difficult feat that could take some
time - it could produce enough material for a
bomb in about a year.
"Iran is continuing its installation work on
other 164-machine cascades," the report says. It
adds that the IAEA had asked in April for
clarification of public statements "that Iran
was conducting research on new types of
centrifuges".
The revelations, after several days in which
western officials have struck an upbeat note
about the prospects of negotiations, highlight
how difficult it will be for the world's big
powers to persuade Tehran to suspend enrichment.
Iran made its move the same day Javier Solana,
the European Union's foreign policy chief,
visited Tehran to propose an offer on behalf of
the EU, the US, Russia and China for Iran to
halt all enrichment.
Tehran is still considering the offer, which its
chief negotiator, Ali Larijani, has
characterised as containing both positive points
and "ambiguities" that need to be removed.
Yesterday Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad, Iran's
president, called for negotiations to "take
place in a fair atmosphere".
He added: "If they [the international community]
think they can threaten and hang a stick over
the head of the Iranian nation and negotiate at
the same time, they should know the Iranian
nation will reject such an atmosphere."
Western diplomats indicate that Tehran has until
about the end of the month to suspend uranium
enrichment and begin talks. "I don't think Iran
wishes to complicate thing," said Mr Solana last
night after briefing French President Jacques
Chirac on his meeting in Tehran. "I think they
are seriously in a position to try to find a
formula for advancing together."
Western diplomats add that the international
proposal would not forceIran to put a
definitiveend to uranium enrichment, but insist
that this could only be resumed after years of
IAEA inspections and once "international
confidence" in Iran had risen.
Last night John Bolton, US envoy to the UN, said
the dispute was a test of the UN's resolve - a
possible barb at Russia and China, which have
deep reservations about threatening Tehran with
sanctions. "It really is a challenge to the
Security Council to see whether it can perform,"
he said. "We can't really predict the outcome."
He
also hailed President George W. Bush for his
"dramatic decision" to give Iran the prospect of
direct talks with Washington if it suspended
enrichment.
Iran
Cleric Says Nuclear Proposals Unacceptable
June
09, 2006
Reuters
today.reuters.com
link to original article
A
powerful Iranian cleric said on Friday a package
of incentives offered by six major powers would
never stop Iran making nuclear fuel.
The United States, Britain, France, Germany,
Russia and China have presented Tehran with
proposals they hope will persuade it to halt
uranium enrichment, a process the West fears
Iran will use to build atomic weapons.
"Now they want to deprive us of many advantages.
The package they have brought is a package that
is good for themselves and is not appropriate
for the Iranian people," Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati
told worshippers at Friday prayers in Tehran.
Jannati heads the Guardian Council, Iran's
highest constitutional watchdog.
The council does not directly make nuclear
policy. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
has entrusted the handling of nuclear affairs to
the Supreme National Security Council.
"In short, we must have enrichment to the level
of 3.5 to five percent and they have no choice
but to accept it," Jannati added.
Iran says it needs uranium enriched to this low
level to fuel power stations and has no
intention of enriching uranium to the higher
level needed for weapons.
It has failed to convince the international
community and has been referred to the U.N.
Security Council for possible sanctions.
Analysts see the package of proposals as an
attempt to give Tehran a last chance before
pulling together a united front for action
against Iran at the world body.
The package offered to Iran has not been made
public, but Western diplomats say it includes a
U.S. pledge to join European-led talks and
offers of a light-water reactor and a facility
to stockpile nuclear fuel.
Iranian officials have said they are willing to
consider the proposals but have reiterated that
they can never back down on making nuclear fuel
themselves. Without this concession, the
proposals cannot succeed.
Bolton rejects ‘grand bargain’ with Iran
By
Daniel Dombey in London
June 9 2006
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/3016bd02-f7e9-11da-9481-0000779e2340.html
Time
is running out for the diplomatic effort to
resolve the dispute over Iran’s nuclear
programme and Washington has no intention of
striking a comprehensive “grand bargain” with
Tehran, the US’s ambassador to the United
Nations has warned.
Speaking to the Financial Times, John Bolton
made clear many of his reservations about the
current outreach to Iran, which Condoleezza
Rice, US secretary of state, has persuaded
President George W. Bush
to endorse.
Referring to a report by the United Nations
nuclear watchdog that Iran has stepped up
uranium enrichment – a process that can create
both nuclear fuel and weapons grade material –
Mr Bolton said: “They’ve got both feet on the
accelerator, which is why we have a sense of
urgency that these diplomatic efforts can’t
continue indefinitely . . . Each
day that goes by gives Iran more time to
continue to perfect its efforts for mass
production.”
While Iran insists that its nuclear programme is
a purely peaceful attempt to bolster the
country’s energy security, the US and the
European Union suspect Tehran of seeking to
develop nuclear weapons.
But
Russia and China have repeatedly made clear
their doubts about sanctions against Tehran,
pushing Washington instead to back a new package
of incentives to Iran, which would give the
Islamic republic help in a number of areas,
including in constructing nuclear reactors.
The
US has also agreed to join the negotiations with
Iran, if Tehran suspends enrichment.
Mr
Bolton, who describes himself as “not much a
carrots man”, was quick to play down
expectations of a dramatic breakthrough and
highlighted many of the problems facing the
diplomatic process.
“It
would be a mistake to think these negotiations
are a first step towards some kind of grand
bargain [involving US recognition],” he said.
“We are only addressing the nuclear issue and
stopping their pursuit of nuclear weapons.”
He
said US security guarantees for Iran were “not
on the table”, and argued instead that regime
change could remove a nuclear threat: “Our
experience has been that when there is a
dramatic change in the life of a country, that’s
the most likely point at which they give up
nuclear weapons.”
He
added: “I think there will certainly be
discussion of the question at the G8 summit” on
July 15-17, by which time he said Iran had to
make its response to the offer known.
“Some people thought for three years they [Iran]
wanted to do a deal and there’s no deal out
there, at least no deal that they’ve adhered
to,” he said. “Maybe the deal that they want is
the best of both worlds.”
Mr
Bolton also voiced doubts that International
Atomic Energy Agency inspections would be able
to prove that Iran’s programme was purely
peaceful, and said that sanctions against Iran
if it declined the offer were “a step in the
process”. But he also conceded that he could not
predict whether the Security Council would back
such a measure.
He
said the EU, which conducted negotiations with
Iran from 2003, had been embarrassed by a
declaration by a former Iranian official that
during that time the Islamic republic had worked
on nuclear techniques.
“It
shows why even as they sit contemplating this
recent offer they’re still spinning centrifuges
and now they’re putting gas in them,” he said.
Dissident Urges Accountability at Home,
Restraint Abroad
June
06, 2006
Radio Free Europe
Golnaz Esfandiari
link to original article
PRAGUE
-- Iranian journalist and rights activist Akbar
Ganji continued his current international tour
with an appeal for greater openness and
accountability from officials in Tehran. But
while he vowed to maintain his battle against
abuses at home, he warned international critics
that they should not seek to impose their will
on Iran.
Akbar Ganji told journalists in Moscow today
that he is determined to keep up his struggle
for "democracy and human rights," and that "I
will return to Iran, [and] I will continue to
express my critical views regarding all issues."
Akbar Ganji told journalists in Moscow today
that he is determined to keep up his struggle
for "democracy and human rights," and that "I
will return to Iran, [and] I will continue to
express my critical views regarding all issues."
Ganji spent the past six years in prison for
articles implicating senior Iranian officials in
the deaths of intellectuals and dissidents. He
was released in March, and was in Russia to
accept the
World
Association of Newspapers' Golden Pen of Freedom
award.
Ganji has challenged the legitimacy of Iran's
Islamic establishment. He has also said that
democracy cannot be achieved under the country's
current political system.
Necessary
Sacrifice
Today he conceded that he might well face
imprisonment again, but he called it the price
one must pay "for democracy, freedom, and human
rights." He also suggested that other critics of
the Iranian establishment have been under even
greater pressure than he has.
"I don't have much to say about my prison term,
because in Iran there are people who faced a
worse situation than me," Ganji said. "Some of
our intellectuals were murdered in an organized
manner; some were murdered in prisons. My dear
friend, [journalist Said] Hajarian is now
paralyzed as a result of an assassination
attempt. Several million Iranians have been
forced into exile -- they live in Europe and
America. I think they have paid a heavier price
than me."
Combating
'Militarization'
He is clearly unafraid of wading into the
political thick of things -- or of adopting
controversial stances. Asked about the
international
dispute over Iran's nuclear program,
Ganji called it the duty of all intellectuals to
oppose the "militarization" of the world,
although it might seem a "far-fetched" goal.
He said intellectuals should also condemn
governments that move in that direction.
"I'm not an official with secret information or
knowledge of who is telling the truth [about the
nuclear issue]," Ganji said. "As a journalist,
not only do I not support Iran having nuclear
weapons, but I also want other countries that
have atomic weapons to be disarmed. By no means
do we want a confrontation between Iran, the
West, and the U.S. We journalists and
intellectuals bring the voice of peace from Iran
to the world. And we also believe that the
Iranian government should be transparent."
...And
Demanding Information
Ganji argued that Iranian officials -- first and
foremost -- should be forthcoming toward their
fellow citizens. Iranians have a right to know
what is going on with the nuclear issue, he
insisted.
"Intellectuals and journalists and Iranians
should have the right to express their critical
views regarding the government's nuclear
project," Ganji said. "Unfortunately, today in
Iran, [authorities] do not allow any [criticism]
of the nuclear issue to be published. It is as
if there were only one voice in Iran regarding
this issue, and that is the voice of the
government. But this is not the case; in fact,
many of our intellectuals and academics disagree
with the government's nuclear policies."
Ganji said the situation has worsened in recent
months. He cited increased censorship of
journalists, book bans, and increased state
pressure targeting dissidents, academics, and
students.
Seeking Moral
Support
But he also stressed that his criticism of the
Iranian leadership does not translate into
automatic support for actions against it.
"In any case, we should support our country,"
Ganji said. "I am against the Iranian government
and its policies. This is one thing. But it is a
different thing to call for the destruction of
my own country. If a confrontation like that in
Iraq happens in Iran, it could ruin my country.
No Iranian desires such a thing. We oppose the
Iranian government, and we fight against it. But
we will do it by ourselves. What we need is the
moral support of civil-society institutions
around the world."
He went on to warn that democracy cannot be
imposed on his country by force. "We have to
establish democracy in Iran," Ganji said.
"Democracy cannot be brought from outside. We
have to do our best -- [to] struggle to make our
country democratic."
(RFE/RL Tajik Service Moscow correspondent Rasul
Shodiev contributed to this report.)
Diplomacy is Not Enough
June
08, 2006
Prospect
Michael Rubin
link to original article
On
31st May, Condoleezza Rice offered Iran a deal:
suspend nuclear enrichment in exchange for a
package of incentives, including de facto US
recognition. But engagement alone will not solve
the crisis. Between 2000 and 2005, EU trade with
Iran almost tripled. But the Iranian authorities
invested their additional income not into
schools and hospitals, but rather into Iran's
nuclear programme. Tehran has become conditioned
to associating concessions with non-compliance.
Indeed, further incentives may make a crisis
more rather than less likely. President Bush is
serious when he says: "the development of a
nuclear weapon in Iran is intolerable."
Iranian reformers do not offer a way out. While
the rhetoric of hardline president Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad has shocked Western officials,
Iran's nuclear programme is no recent
phenomenon, but rather the product of the
administrations of Ahmadinejad's predecessors,
the reformist Muhammad Khatami and pragmatist
Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Nor should
diplomats assume that Tehran is motivated by
security concerns. Iran's covert programme
pre-dates US presence in both Afghanistan and
Iraq. While Israel occupies a paramount position
in regime rhetoric, no Iranian has ever died in
a war with the Jewish state.
The idea that there exists a magic diplomatic
formula to bring Iranian behaviour back in line
is the product of the faulty assumption that
motivation for the regime's programme is
external. Seventy per cent of Iranians were born
or came of age after the 1979 revolution.
Polling and anecdotal evidence suggest that only
20 per cent of Iranians still believe in the
wisdom of theocracy. Yet there is no question
that the unelected supreme leader and those
surrounding him believe their sovereignty rests
with God, not the people. To them, public
opinion and demography is irrelevant. While
pundits may hope for gradual reform or a
"saffron revolution," true believers will not
compromise their ideology. A nuclear deterrent
enables them to crush dissent at home without
fear of outside interference. China model? Think
ten Tiananmen Squares.
European officials point out the difficulty of
military action. While air strikes would set
back Iran's programme, they would not eliminate
it. Iranians would certainly rally around their
flag. The regime might lash out. It could
destabilise Iraq or engage in terrorism. It
could disrupt oil supplies. But, if it felt
itself secure behind a nuclear deterrent, it
could do the same. No matter how costly military
strikes may be, however, they remain possible,
as the White House calculates that the cost of
allowing the Islamic Republic to possess nuclear
weapons would be higher given the possibility
that the regime might use them.
But debate need not be limited to advocating
diplomacy or defending a military strike.
Between the extremes is an arsenal of tools
which could be applied if Iran continues to defy
the international community. While comprehensive
sanctions are unlikely given high oil prices,
more targeted sanctions are possible: just as
the international community once curtailed air
service into Libya, it could do so into Iran.
Freezing the bank accounts of Iran's corrupt
leadership would be popular among ordinary
Iranians and inflict pain only upon those who
deserve it.
While the chattering classes dismissed Bush's
"axis of evil" rhetoric as unsophisticated,
Iran's inclusion was not cowboy rhetoric, but
rather a non-violent effort to apply economic
pressure. It worked. Foreign investment in Iran
dropped.
The EU should not let ongoing diplomacy stop
investment in independent civil society. The
West should not hesitate to support independent,
unlicensed civil society groups and trade
unions, even if Iranian authorities declare such
groups illegal. The dangers from the Islamic
republic come from its government's lack of
accountability to its people, who are far more
moderate. The west should invest in independent
Iranian media, which could better explain
western concerns over the Iranian regime's
behavior. Western governments might be surprised
by how receptive ordinary Iranians would be:
while Iranian government-sponsored polls
indicate 77 per cent of Iranians support
Tehran's nuclear stance, support drops
precipitously when independent pollsters ask
whether Iranians would feel comfortable if their
leaders possessed nuclear weapons.
The west should also support Iranian dissidents.
Besieged Iranian journalists have become engines
for change. It is incumbent upon European
diplomats to recognise their courage. When
imprisoned journalists receive medical furlough,
Iranians line up to visit them. European
diplomats ignore them. The silence of the
British, French, and German embassies makes a
mockery of European human rights rhetoric and
gives carte blanche to the regime to continue
its abuses. Dissidents have little to lose; they
have already proved their mettle and put their
lives on the line. If British officials demanded
to see Ahmad Batebi, the young student
imprisoned after the 1999 student protests for
the crime of having his photograph put on the
cover of the Economist, the effect would be
enormous.
The Gdansk model should be emulated, especially
as labor unrest grows in Iran. Independent
unions would force the regime to be accountable
to its people. Textile workers in Gilan, bus
drivers in Tehran, and refinery workers in
Abadan all deserve respect. Rather than invest
its money in nuclear centrifuges, the Iranian
leadership might pay the back wages of workers
in government-owned factories.
The Iranian supreme leader is unelected and
wields absolute power for life. The council of
guardians disqualified more than 1,000
presidential candidates before the last
elections for insufficient revolutionary fervor.
If there is to be a lasting solution to the
Iranian crisis, the west must address the
question of how to make the Iranian regime
accountable to its constituents.
To receive articles regularly by email, join the
MEF News mailing list.
Iran
cleric rejects nuclear incentives
ISN
SECURITY WATCH (Friday, 9 June 2006: 15.14 CET)
– A top Iranian cleric has rejected an
international incentives package designed to
coax Iran to return to negotiations over its
nuclear program on Friday, saying the offer
would never stop Iran from reprocessing uranium
for nuclear fuel.
Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati told worshippers at
Friday prayers in Tehran: "Now they want to
deprive us of many advantages. The package they
have brought is a package that is good for
themselves and is not appropriate for the
Iranian people."
"In
short, we must have enrichment to the level of
3.5 to five percent and they have no choice but
to accept it," he added, in comments carried by
Reuters.
Jannati heads the powerful Guardian Council,
Iran's pre-eminent constitutional watchdog.
Iran's
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has given
authority over nuclear negotiations to the
Supreme National Security Council, headed by Ali
Larijani who is regarded as a more moderate
figure.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced
earlier this year that his country had mastered
the full nuclear fuel cycle. It is believed that
Iran now has the ability to reprocess uranium to
low levels of enrichment unsuitable for the
production of nuclear weapons.
However the Islamic republic has announced plans
for bringing 54,000 centrifuges online in coming
years allowing for large-scale production of
high-grade uranium. Work on 3,000 centrifuges is
set to begin by the end of the year, Iranian
officials have said.
It
was revealed on Friday that Iran had begun
enriching a second batch of uranium on the same
day that the incentives package was delivered,
underlining the Islamic republic's resolve to
protect its right to reprocessing activities.
The
EU and US fear that Iran has a hidden nuclear
weapons program, a charge the Iranian government
strenuously denies.
The
five permanent members of the UN Security
Council offered the incentives to Iran through
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana on
Tuesday. The offer was made to secure the export
of uranium reprocessing activities and a return
to Iranian compliance with the country's nuclear
commitments.
The
incentives package is thought to include the
offer of light water reactors; a nuclear fuel
storage facility; access to Boeing and Airbus
aircraft parts; and an allowance that Iran be
allowed to resume nuclear enrichment in the
future after assuring the UN and International
Atomic Energy Agency that its nuclear program is
for peaceful purposes.
Iranian officials said they would study the
incentives offer before making an official
response.
Diplomatic officials have said that an Iranian
answer is expected before the upcoming G8 summit
convenes in St. Petersburg on 15 July.
(By
ISN Security Watch staff, news agencies)
Iran
has until the G8 summit in July to think it
over" - Austria
06/09/2006
http://www.eitb24.com/portal/eitb24/noticia/en/international-news/uranium-enrichment-iran-has-until-the-g8-summit-in-july-to-think-?itemId=D36144&cl=%2Feitb24%2Finternacional&idioma=en
These comments from Schuessel represent the
first clear deadline for Iran to respond to the
offer, which was prepared by Germany, France and
Britain and is backed by the EU, United States,
Russia and China.
Iran has until the Group of Eight (G8) summit in
mid-July to consider an offer of incentives to
suspend its nuclear enrichment programme,
Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel was
quoted as saying on Friday.
Asked what would happen if Iran did not accept
the offer, Schuessel, whose country currently
holds the rotating presidency of the European
Union, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine
Zeitung:"This will be discussed within the
framework of the G8. Iran has until the world
economic summit in July to think it over."
These comments from Schuessel represent the
first clear deadline for Iran to respond to the
offer, which was prepared by Germany, France and
Britain and is backed by the EU, United States,
Russia and China.
Iran's
Nuclear Scorpion
June
08, 2006
RealClearPolitics
Victor Davis Hanson
link to original article
Why did the United States suddenly reverse
course and agree to negotiate directly with the
Iranians over their development of a nuclear
arsenal?
There are a few reasons. It's an election year,
and the Bush administration knows the American
public is in no mood for even a hint of more
hostilities in the Middle East. After failing to
talk sense to the Iranians, the embarrassed
multilateral Europeans want us to buck up their
dialogue. The Russians and Chinese - for both
commercial and mischievous reasons - have warned
America they'll stonewall at the United Nations
unless we begin horse-trading with Iran's
president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And, finally,
it's always smart to allow a loudmouth like
Ahmadinejad enough public rope to hang himself.
So, if negotiations occur - a big if - what can
we expect?
For that answer, it's worth remembering the
scorpion scene in "The Appaloosa," an otherwise
forgettable Western from 1966. For excruciating
minutes, the hero, played by Marlon Brando,
arm-wrestled the talkative, confident villain
who had tied a scorpion to the top of the table.
In the same manner, we will go back and forth
with the Iranians, each sounding off until one
side's arm weakens, hits the table and gets
stung.
The Iranians know from recent history that their
acquisition of a bomb would have little
downside. They figure that had the Israelis not
destroyed Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor at
Osirak in 1981, Kuwait would still be the 19th
province of Saddam's untouchable Iraq.
North Korea is the model of a rogue nuclear
state. It thumbs its nose at the international
community, but over the years has still earned
billions in aid money (essentially bribes) from
the U.S., South Korea and China. Only the bomb
allows an otherwise failed, murderous regime in
Pyongyang to achieve status with nearby
democracies in Taiwan, Japan and South Korea.
Then there's Pakistan, a so-called American ally
that, thanks in large part to its nuclear-weapon
capability, can shrug off our pleas to ferret
out Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri.
With a few nuclear missiles, Iran knows it could
dictate the strategic landscape of the Persian
Gulf - bullying Gulf sheikdoms over border
disputes and petroleum output and claiming the
forefront in the Islamist struggle against
Israel. A "Persian bomb" wins national prestige
and quells dissidents at home, while ensuring
enough unpredictability to keep oil prices
sky-high.
For those reasons, a nuclear Iran would be a
Western nightmare. Periodically, we would have
to reassure states within missile range of
Tehran, from Germany to Saudi Arabia, that the
United States is willing to go to war to keep
them safe - and thus they need not go nuclear
themselves.
Given these circumstances, why would the U.S.
and Iran ever face off at the negotiating table?
Because each thinks the breathing space works in
its own favor. Iran views talking with the U.S.
as a reprieve from the threat of a military
strike - or at least American-inspired embargoes
and sanctions at the U.N. If the mullahs can
sweet-talk the Americans while secretly pressing
ahead to get the bomb, they might get home free
yet. Indeed, in 2008, with the "cowboy" George
Bush out of office, the next U.S. president
might deal with Iran's nuclear aspirations as
America did with Pakistan's in the 1990s - stern
lectures but little action.
The U.S. wants more time before a showdown as
well so that we can make a better case to the
international community that the oil-exporting
theocracy really wants more than peaceful
nuclear power.
Time also provides a window to learn exactly
where Iran is on the road to full uranium
enrichment, and perhaps even to allow Iranian
dissidents to strengthen, or nearby democratic
Iraq to stabilize, or our own military to refine
its 11th-hour plans.
Such a breather would be reminiscent of the
Paris Peace Talks with the North Vietnamese,
from 1968 to 1973, in which each side thought
protracted negotiations would favor its cause.
The U.S. always insisted on a free autonomous
South; the North never gave up its dream of a
unified communist Vietnam.
In that impasse, we thought talking and periodic
ceasefires would buy time for the South
Vietnamese to strengthen enough to resist the
inevitable aggression to come. The North
Vietnamese were equally convinced the American
public in the interval would grow ever more
tired of the Vietnam "quagmire" - and then they
could pounce.
After endless negotiations, the Watergate
scandal and the Senate's curtailment of aid to
the South, North Vietnam patiently waited for
its moment and then renewed the war. By 1975,
the communists had won what they could not in
1968.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad surely remembers that
precedent. No wonder he wants us to arm-wrestle
over his nuclear scorpion.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and
historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford
University, and author, most recently, of "A War
Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans
Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him
by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.
Iran's
"Oil Weapon" is a Double-edged Sword
June
07, 2006
National Review Online
Ilan Berman
link to original article
Who’s afraid of Iranian oil power? If the
Islamic Republic of Iran has its way, the West
will be.
In recent weeks, as the international crisis
over Iran’s runaway nuclear ambitions has
deepened, officials in Tehran have repeatedly
rattled their sabers about energy, raising the
prospect of a disruption of energy trade in the
Persian Gulf. Most recently, Iran’s supreme
leader himself has warned publicly that the West
could face disruptions in fuel shipments from
the Persian Gulf if it makes a “wrong move”
against Iran.
Iranian officials have every reason to feel
confident in making such threats. After all, the
Islamic Republic is now a bona fide energy
superpower. Home to 10 percent or more of world
oil, it is the second largest exporter in the
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
(OPEC), and produces an average of 3.9 million
barrels of oil per day. To boot, with 940
trillion cubic feet of reserves, Iran is second
only to Russia in natural gas wealth. And,
intelligence analysts say, a combination of
advantageous geography and a sustained national
rearmament has given Iran the ability to
dominate, at least temporarily, the Strait of
Hormuz, the principal passageway for roughly two
fifths of world oil trade. What’s more, thanks
to a series of blockbuster energy deals over the
past couple of years, the Islamic Republic quite
literally now has some of the world’s largest
economies over a barrel.
But is energy really Iran’s trump card, as some
have suggested? In fact, a closer look indicates
that the “oil weapon”—whether in the form of
reductions in Iranian output or military moves
in the Hormuz Strait—is likely to be a
double-edged sword for the Islamic Republic.
For all of its energy clout, the Islamic
Republic is not impervious to economic
countermeasures. The vast majority (80 to 85
percent) of Iran’s export earnings, as well as
one half of its budget and a quarter of its
gross domestic product, currently derives from
energy sales. As a result, over the past two
years Iran has reaped a staggering fiscal
windfall, amounting to dozens of billions of
dollars, from the rising price of world oil. But
Iran’s single-sector economy is deeply dependent
on foreign direct investment to maintain this
output. If they were to be applied consistently
and multilaterally, therefore, measures that
reduce the foreign capital flowing into Iran’s
energy sector have the ability to cause Tehran
some serious economic pain.
In particular, Iran is severely susceptible to
domestic pressure. Despite massive oil exports
(some 2.5 million barrels a day), Iran currently
imports a third or more of its refined petroleum
products from abroad, at a cost of over $3
billion annually. These imports are not simply
surplus; according to some estimates, Iran
maintains just 45 days worth of gasoline
domestically. Since all politics is ultimately
local, this suggests that the inevitable
economic squeeze that would accompany an Iranian
energy play is likely to reverberate within
Iranian society in the form of gasoline
shortages and steep price hikes at the pump. And
that, in turn, could create major domestic
problems for Iran’s ayatollahs.
Perhaps most important, however, is the fact
that Iranian interference with the global energy
market has the ability to do what the nuclear
issue so far has not: crystallize a forceful
international consensus against the Islamic
Republic. The Bush administration may have
thrown its weight behind
the creation of a “package” of inducements and
penalties designed to bring Iran back to the
nuclear negotiating table, but Iran’s ayatollahs
know full well that a major energy play on their
part is likely to give American calls for more
robust measures a much-needed shot in the arm.
Simply put, there is no quicker way to turn
energy-hungry nations such as China and India
into proponents of regime change in Tehran than
by turning off the oil tap.
Given these realities, the rhetoric emanating
from the Islamic Republic looks more than a
little bit like bluster. So far, though, this
strategy appears to be succeeding; investor
jitters over a looming confrontation with Tehran
are directly responsible for the recent spike in
crude oil prices—and the attendant chorus of
voices warning about the dire consequences of
seriously bringing Iran to account.
In their planning, the Bush administration and
its international partners would do well to take
doomsday predictions about Iranian energy
leverage with a grain of salt. But they should
also be thinking carefully about the economic
and political costs of inaction. Simply put,
Washington must ask itself whether the world
would be better off with a temporary spike in
energy prices created by a serious Iran
strategy, or with a permanent hike in the cost
of doing business in a region dominated by an
atomic Islamic Republic.
- Ilan Berman is vice president for policy at
the American Foreign Policy Council in
Washington, D.C., and author of Tehran Rising:
Iran’s Challenge to the United States.
Right to see live soccer is their goal
Women share Iran's obsession with game, but
clerics say stadium stands out of bounds
By Christine Spolar
Tribune foreign correspondent
Published
June 9, 2006
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0606090143jun09,1,2834108.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed
TEHRAN
-- Zahra Sheiklu danced in the aisle, waved an
Iranian flag and, as the only female spectator
in the capital's soccer stadium, probably struck
fear in the hearts of the ruling mullahs who
vowed no female should ever get a close look at
Iran's national sport or, more pointedly, the
players' legs.
Zahra is 7.
"I love it, but I don't know why," she gushed as
the crowd roared with approval as the Iran team
skittered across the field and bested a Bosnian
crew in a couple of hours at Azadi Stadium. "I
love it."
Soccer has become the latest battlefield for
girls and women who want to test conservative
strictures in the Islamic republic. President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a hard-line religious
conservative who rose to power last year,
surprised Iranians in April when he lifted a ban
on woman spectators and ventured that women
could even have a good effect on the often rowdy
spectator sport.
Women should attend the games by sitting in a
separate section of the stands, he said. Such
camaraderie would even "improve the
soccer-watching manners and promote a healthy
atmosphere," he added.
The president, an ardent fan, soon had such
optimism kicked out of him.
Iranian religious leaders let loose. More than
120 members of parliament sent Ahmadinejad a
letter demanding that he reconsider his
decision.
"Women's presence at such places is un-Islamic,"
Grand Ayatollah Lotfollah Safi Golpaygani said
in a letter published in the Tosea newspaper.
One lawmaker warned of the dangers of women
seeing soccer players' bare legs and hearing
spectators shout obscenities.
President backpedals
Within weeks the president, who was supported by
the hard-line clerics in his election bid,
backed off. Ahmadinejad agreed "to revise his
decision based on the supreme leader's opinion,"
a government spokesman said, referring to Iran's
most powerful cleric, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
So women were mostly left behind the gates at
the last matchup in Tehran before the World Cup
in Germany, where Iran plays Mexico on Sunday. A
few female Iranian reporters were allowed in the
press box. A woman photographer, relegated to
sitting hundreds of yards from the field, hauled
out a telescopic lens to try to capture the
play.
A small group of women protesters, wearing white
head scarves as a sign of peace, was shunted
behind one entrance gate and then quickly
encircled by another small group of Iranian
women, all police, all in black chadors, all
unsmiling.
As the protesters attempted to share their ire
with a lone Western woman reporter--the Iranian
women reporters were forbidden to go near
them--security officers pushed in to hear their
remarks. There were no big surprises: "We all
just want to watch the game," said Paristou
Dokuhuki, one of about a dozen young women
slumped in frustration.
Overprotective measure?
The ban on women at Iran's national sport
perplexes many. Iranian women drive, socialize
in cafes, work with men in offices, even hold
jobs in fire and police departments. Volleyball
matches are open to women; the ban on soccer
seems overprotective to some enthusiasts.
Almost every man interviewed last week in
Tehran's stadium, festooned with banners of
ayatollahs that fluttered in the night breeze,
was supportive of allowing women to watch
soccer--or football, as they and most other fans
in the world know it--in the flesh.
"My wife loves football," said Jalal
Danishmandi, a retired army general who brought
his 13-year-old son and his friend to the match.
"She's at home watching this on TV. . . . I love
my wife and I'd love if she could be sitting
with me."
"Football is in our blood," said Sina Sarbush, a
14-year-old fan. "My mother, my sister, every
woman in my family, everybody would like to
come. With God's help, it will happen."
Ali Haghiat, vice president of security at the
stadium, offered a faint hope that things may
change soon.
"I don't have anything against it, but it's not
my decision," he said. "We have to do some
things to the stadium--for security, for
toilets--before they can come."
But Zahra Sheiklu and her father couldn't see
much reason to miss what they shared on a cool
spring eve. Mohammed Sheikly works in the
judiciary and has to attend the games as part of
his job. For a year he has bundled Zahra in with
his sons to catch a bit of the action.
She has become a fan, he said proudly, and she's
always the only girl.
"I think it's good for her to see sports. . . .
This is our country and I understand you have to
follow the rules," he said. "But this year she's
learned everything about the game. She has her
own ball at home and she kicks and runs. She can
kick it up to 60 meters. . . . It's very good
for her in many ways."
Zahra giggled at the praise and let it be known
that among her girlfriends, she was quite
special. She was the only girl in her class who
has ever seen a live soccer match.
And why did Zahra think her father brought her
to the games?
"Because he loves me," she said.
