Posted on 03/01/2005 11:31:24 AM PST by DoctorZIn
Top News Story
Bush considers Iran policy shift
John Shovelan
ELEANOR HALL: Now to another key player in the Middle East – Iran, and United States President George W. Bush looks like taking the advice of European leaders and shifting his policy toward the Islamic theocracy.
Last week after the President returned from Europe senior White House officials began considering a policy of offering incentives for Iran to give up its alleged nuclear weapons program.
From Washington, John Shovelan reports.
JOHN SHOVELAN: President Bush went to Europe hoping to convince his allies that their approach to Iran was too much carrot and not enough stick.
But it was the Europeans who proved persuasive. And the Bush administration now seems set to change it's Iran policy and join with the Europeans in offering Iran incentives to give up their pursuit of nuclear weapons.
A final decision hasn't been made yet, but since the President's return to Washington the direction of US policy has changed.
The White House spokesman Scott McClellan says the President was forced to consider a policy shift after the Europeans showed they were committed to ensuring Iran doesn't become a nuclear power.
SCOTT MCCLELLAN: We all have a shared goal of making sure Iran does not acquire a nuclear weapon. That's something we all share, we're all speaking with the same voice. Iran needs to abide by its international obligations. They need to come clean, and they need to end their pursuit of nuclear weapons.
JOHN SHOVELAN: The administration now believes it's more appropriate to offer carrots first, and if Iran fails to meet its obligations the stick would be more effective later.
The shift is significant, for the administration all along has opposed any incentives, refusing to reward Iran for failing to meet its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
SCOTT MCCLELLAN: What we are doing is continuing to talk with our European friends about the best way forward for addressing this issue and accomplishing our shared goal.
JOHN SHOVELAN: French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder in particular pressed President Bush last week on the need for the US to get behind the European-led effort.
A formal decision on the policy shift isn't expected until a meeting this Friday of the National Security Cabinet in which Vice President Dick Cheney will participate by videophone.
White House officials are already working on exactly what incentives could be offered to Iran.
SCOTT MCCLELLAN: The President is considering ideas that were discussed last week in Europe for moving forward on our efforts to get Iran to end its pursuit of nuclear weapons and abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions.
JOHN SHOVELAN: Bush administration officials also say the policy shift reflects the serious US effort at healing the transatlantic rift, and shows that it extends to substance.
John Shovelan, Washington.
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Looks like a flip flop.
U.N. Says Iran Rejected Inspection of Military Base
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...nuclear_iran_dc
VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran rejected a request by U.N. nuclear inspectors to return to its Parchin military base, where Washington suspects Iran might have conducted tests linked to nuclear bomb-making, the U.N. atomic watchdog said Tuesday.
Several months after their initial requests, Iran permitted U.N. inspectors to visit Parchin in January. During this visit, inspectors told Iranian officials they would like to visit an area not covered in that inspection, the agency said.
Deputy chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Pierre Goldschmidt, quoted Iran's response in a speech to the agency's board as saying: "The expectation of the (IAEA) in visiting specified ... points in Parchin Complex are fulfilled and thus there is no justification for an additional visit."
Iran is not required to allow the IAEA into sites like Parchin, where this is no clear sign of nuclear activities. But, Western diplomats on the IAEA board said permitting agency inspections at such sites was crucial to building confidence that Tehran's nuclear plans are peaceful.
Iran says its nuclear intentions are limited to the generation of electricity, but Washington accuses it of using its nuclear program as a cover to build an atomic bomb.
Goldschmidt also said a December visit to a uranium conversion plant at Isfahan had "revealed extensive underground excavation activities which Iran had failed to report in a timely manner to the agency as required."
This excavation was the digging of a tunnel under the Isfahan plant, which Iran has said could be used to store equipment to protect it in case of U.S. or Israeli attack.
Negotiations with mullahs are doomed to failure. We need strike Iran's nuclear facilities now.
Bump!
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