Nuclear Crisis

[Rasputin]

Iran says atom deal possible only without threats

Iran urged world powers on Thursday to take up its call for talks without preconditions on its nuclear activity and condemned U.N. Security Council intervention as based on "ridiculous ... political motivations".

Aliasghar Soltanieh, Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency, spoke to the IAEA's 35-nation governing board after Washington accused Tehran of "aggressively" seeking atomic bombs under the guise of a civilian nuclear fuel project.

Diplomats said Iran tentatively offered to consider halting enrichment of uranium in talks with the European Union last weekend aimed at finding a basis for negotiations on an offer of trade incentives to Tehran to drop its program.


But the United States, convinced Iran is playing for time, called during IAEA board debate on Wednesday for swift drafting of punitive sanctions against Iran in the Security Council this month.

Soltanieh told the board Iran was genuinely interested in a negotiated solution but Washington was trying to undermine the atmosphere for good-faith talks.

"If there is a political will on the other side, (our) response would be the basis on which one could pave the way for an immediate solution through dialogue and negotiation ... free from any threat, pressure or any precondition," he said.

He called on the Security Council to return Iran's nuclear dossier to the IAEA and urged six world powers to "commence negotiations without any preconditions or further delay".

A legally binding Security Council resolution sponsored by the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China demands Iran halt enrichment work before negotiations to rebuild trust in its nuclear intentions.

[Rasputin]

Soltanieh accused the United States of trying to poison the "positive environment" for exploratory talks between Iran negotiator Ali Larijani and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana with "baseless allegations" of an Iranian bomb bid.

"The decision to refer Iran's nuclear dossier to the Security Council was based on ridiculous, non-technical political motivations and not as a result of diversion of nuclear materials to prohibited purposes," he said.

IAEA inspectors probing the nature and scope of Iran's nuclear program since 2003 have found many indications of military involvement and past cover-ups of sensitive nuclear research, but no hard proof of an underground weapons project.

Soltanieh reiterated Iran's position that its nuclear activity is entirely peaceful.

[Rasputin]

گفته می شود که آژانس بين المللی انرژی اتمی نسبت به محتوای يک گزارش کنگره آمريکا در باره توانايی اتمی ايران اعتراض کرده است.
به گزارش برخی خبرگزاری ها، آژانس بين المللی در نامه ای که برای کميته اطلاعات مجلس نمايندگان ايالات متحده ارسال داشته اعلام کرده است که در گزارش مورخ 23 اوت اين کميته در مورد ايران، "برخی اطلاعات اشتباه، گمراه کننده و بی پايه" ديده می شود.

اين گزارش با عنوان "شناسايی ايران به عنوان يک تهديد استراتژيک: چالشی اطلاعاتی برای آمريکا" توسط کميته اطلاعات مجلس نمايندگان تهيه شده و محور اصلی آن لزوم تکميل اطلاعات در مورد برنامه های هسته ای ايران است.

براساس نامه آژانس بين المللی، گزارش کنگره آمريکا اظهار داشته که ايران در حال غنی سازی اورانيوم تا درجه خلوص لازم برای کاربرد در توليد بمب اتمی است.

آژانس در پاسخ گفته است که ايران اورانيوم را تنها تا حد 6/3 درصد غنی کرده است که به مراتب از اورانيوم غنی شده تا 90 درصد خلوص، يعنی خلوص مورد نياز برای توليد بمب اتمی، کمتر است.

در نامه اعتراض آميز آژانس بين المللی انرژی اتمی، اظهارات گزارش کميته اطلاعات مجلس نمايندگان آمريکا در مورد تصميم مديرکل آژانس در برکناری يکی از بازرسان ارشد آژانس (به نام آقای شارليه) رد و نسبت به آن اعتراض شده است.

تهيه کنندگان گزارش کميته اطلاعات مجلس نمايندگان اظهار داشته بودند که مدير کل آژانس به اين دليل آقای شارليه را برکنار کرد که وی ايران را در ارتباط با "فريبکاری در مورد برنامه هسته ای" آن کشور به چالش خوانده بود.

دفاع از صداقت آژانس

به گفته مقامات آژانس، ايران به عنوان يک کشور عضو حق دارد از قبول افرادی خاصی که به عنوان بازرس آژانس به آن کشور اعزام می شود خودداری ورزد و آژانس موظف است طبق اين خواست عمل کند.

به گفته آژانس بين المللی اورانيوم غنی شده در ايران برای توليد بمب اتمی مناسب نيست

در نامه آژانس آمده است که ايران انتصاب بيش از دويست تن ديگر از بازرسان هسته ای را مورد قبول قرار داده است.

اين نامه می افزايد که اين رقم مشابه ارقام مربوط به اکثر کشورهای امضا کننده پيمان منع گسترش تسليحات هسته ای - ان پی تی - است که دارای تسليحات اتمی نيستند.

به گفته مليسا فلمينگ، سخنگوی آژانس بين المللی انرژی اتمی، اين نامه از آن جهت برای مجلس نمايندگان آمريکا ارسال شده که آژانس که لازم می بيند اشتباهات اطلاعاتی را تصيحيح کند و همچنين، از آنجا که در اين مورد به خصوص، صداقت آژانس نيز زير سئوال رفته بود.

برخی ديپلمات ها گفته اند که گزارش کميته اطلاعات مجلس نمايندگان آمريکا را می توان تلاشی برای القای اين انديشه تلقی کرد که محمد البرادعی، مديرکل آژانس، در برابر ايران نرمش بيش از اندازه به خرج می دهد.

همچنين، می توان اين گزارش را يادآور شرايط قبل از حمله نظامی به عراق دانست که ايالات متحده اطلاعات ارايه شده از سوی آژانس را دقيق ندانست و تلاش شد صداقت بازرسان اعزامی آژانس به عراق در معرض ترديد قرار گيرد.

در آن زمان، آژانس بين المللی اصرار داشت که بازرسان اين نهاد شواهدی از فعاليت عراق در زمينه توليد تسليحات اتمی بهدست نياورده اند.

[Rasputin]

Iran calls for negotiations; France warns of split over nuclear issue

VIENNA (AFP) - Iran has called on the United States to be patient in the standoff over its nuclear activities and said negotiations should begin without preconditions and delay.

But French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy warned that Iran was trying to divide the international community in order to pursue its uranium enrichment activities, referring to the process which makes nuclear reactor fuel but also atom bomb material.

"If the international community were to become divided, Iran would continue" its enrichment work, Douste-Blazy charged in an interview to appear in the French weekly Valeurs Actuelles.

Douste-Blazy called for a sustained effort to engage Tehran in dialogue and warned that otherwise there would be "a growing drive -- on either side -- towards confrontation, (and) the international community would split."

Six world powers have proposed Iran talks on a package of benefits if it first suspends enrichment.

In Tehran, foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said: "The United States only needs to be a little patient to prove its honesty on welcoming talks under the current circumstances."

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Wednesday in Dakar that he doubted the United Nations Security Council would impose sanctions over his country's nuclear program, which Western countries fear aims to build atomic weapons.

"We are supporters of dialogue and negotiation and there is no reason for sanctions," Ahmadinejad told journalists.

In Vienna, Iran's ambassador to the watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Asghar Soltanieh urged the IAEA's 35-nation board of governors to use its influence to help "commence the negotiation, without any precondition and without further delay."

Soltanieh challenged the US ambassador to an "open-ended" debate on Washington's call for UN sanctions over Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment.

"I am fully prepared ... (for) a debate with the US ambassador in order to prove ... that allegations are baseless and the Islamic Republic of Iran is (the) victim of neglect, discrimination and double standards," Soltanieh said.

Soltanieh's challenge echoed Ahmadinejad's call in August on US President George W. Bush to debate. US officials refused this, calling the offer a public relations gimmick.

Soltanieh said that Washington's presenting sanctions as diplomacy was equivalent to describing "unilateral military invasion in Iraq as 'multilateral diplomacy.'"

US ambassador Gregory Schulte had Wednesday told the IAEA board, which Thursday wrapped up a meeting that had begun Monday, that "Iran's refusal to suspend and its refusal to cooperate is a choice of confrontation over one of negotiation."

Schulte and European speakers urged Iran to choose negotiations over UN sanctions, but said the key to this was Tehran first suspending enrichment.

EU-Iran talks stalled Thursday, when a meeting planned between EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and Iran's top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani was postponed. Their aides met in Geneva Thursday.

Soltanieh said there was "no problem. The only thing is both sides (need) to find the best appropriate time and venue.

"Therefore everything is on the right track."

Solana and Larijani had held talks described as "constructive" last weekend in Vienna, raising hopes this would lead to negotiations with the six world powers, Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States.

The United States, which charges that Iran is engaged in secret work to make nuclear weapons, is pushing for Security Council sanctions against Iran for failing to honor a Council resolution that set an August 31 deadline for Tehran to halt enrichment.

Larijani had offered to consider a temporary halt in uranium enrichment in talks with Solana in Vienna last Saturday, diplomats said.

But they noted that this was only an offer to consider a halt, not to implement it, and that there were conditions attached such as the UN ceasing action against Iran which made it unacceptable to the West.

[Rasputin]

IAEA protests "erroneous" U.S. report on Iran

VIENNA (Reuters) - U.N. inspectors have protested to the U.S. government and a Congressional committee about a report on Iran's nuclear work, calling parts of it "outrageous and dishonest," according to a letter obtained by Reuters.

The letter recalled clashes between the IAEA and the Bush administration before the 2003 Iraq war over findings cited by Washington about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction that proved false, and underlined continued tensions over Iran's dossier.

Sent to the head of the House of Representatives' Select Committee on Intelligence by a senior aide to International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei, the letter said an August 23 committee report contained serious distortions of IAEA findings on Iran's activity.

The letter said the errors suggested Iran's nuclear fuel program was much more advanced than a series of IAEA reports and Washington's own intelligence assessments have determined.

It said the report falsely described Iran to have enriched uranium at its pilot centrifuge plant to weapons-grade level in April, whereas IAEA inspectors had made clear Iran had enriched only to a low level usable for nuclear power reactor fuel.

"Furthermore, the IAEA Secretariat takes strong exception to the incorrect and misleading assertion" that the IAEA opted to remove a senior safeguards inspector for supposedly concluding the purpose of Iran's program was to build weapons, it said.

The letter said the congressional report contained "an outrageous and dishonest suggestion" that the inspector was dumped for having not adhered to an alleged IAEA policy barring its "officials from telling the whole truth" about Iran.

Diplomats say the inspector remains IAEA Iran section head.

The IAEA has been inspecting Iran's nuclear program since 2003. Although it has found no hard evidence that Iran is working on atomic weapons, it has uncovered many previously concealed activities linked to uranium enrichment, a process of purifying fuel for nuclear power plants or weapons.

IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said: "We felt obliged to put the record straight with regard to the facts on what we have reported on Iran. It's a matter of the integrity of the IAEA."

Diplomats say Washington, spearheading efforts to isolate Iran with sanctions over its nuclear work, has long perceived ElBaradei to be "soft" on Tehran.

"This (committee report) is deja vu of the pre-Iraq war period where the facts are being maligned and attempts are being made to ruin the integrity of IAEA inspectors," said a Western diplomat familiar with the agency and IAEA-U.S. relations.

[Rasputin]

U.N. Inspectors Dispute Iran Report By House Panel

U.N. inspectors investigating Iran's nuclear program angrily complained to the Bush administration and to a Republican congressman yesterday about a recent House committee report on Iran's capabilities, calling parts of the document "outrageous and dishonest" and offering evidence to refute its central claims.

Officials of the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency said in a letter that the report contained some "erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated statements." The letter, signed by a senior director at the agency, was addressed to Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), chairman of the House intelligence committee, which issued the report. A copy was hand-delivered to Gregory L. Schulte, the U.S. ambassador to the IAEA in Vienna.

The IAEA openly clashed with the Bush administration on pre-war assessments of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Relations all but collapsed when the agency revealed that the White House had based some allegations about an Iraqi nuclear program on forged documents.

After no such weapons were found in Iraq, the IAEA came under additional criticism for taking a cautious approach on Iran, which the White House says is trying to build nuclear weapons in secret. At one point, the administration orchestrated a campaign to remove the IAEA's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei. It failed, and he won the Nobel Peace Prize last year.

Yesterday's letter, a copy of which was provided to The Washington Post, was the first time the IAEA has publicly disputed U.S. allegations about its Iran investigation. The agency noted five major errors in the committee's 29-page report, which said Iran's nuclear capabilities are more advanced than either the IAEA or U.S. intelligence has shown.

Among the committee's assertions is that Iran is producing weapons-grade uranium at its facility in the town of Natanz. The IAEA called that "incorrect," noting that weapons-grade uranium is enriched to a level of 90 percent or more. Iran has enriched uranium to 3.5 percent under IAEA monitoring.

When the congressional report was released last month, Hoekstra said his intent was "to help increase the American public's understanding of Iran as a threat." Spokesman Jamal Ware said yesterday that Hoekstra will respond to the IAEA letter.

Rep. Rush D. Holt (D-N.J.), a committee member, said the report was "clearly not prepared in a manner that we can rely on." He agreed to send it to the full committee for review, but the Republicans decided to make it public before then, he said in an interview.

The report was never voted on or discussed by the full committee. Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), the vice chairman, told Democratic colleagues in a private e-mail that the report "took a number of analytical shortcuts that present the Iran threat as more dire -- and the Intelligence Community's assessments as more certain -- than they are."

Privately, several intelligence officials said the committee report included at least a dozen claims that were either demonstrably wrong or impossible to substantiate. Hoekstra's office said the report was reviewed by the office of John D. Negroponte, the director of national intelligence.

Negroponte's spokesman, John Callahan, said in a statement that his office "reviewed the report and provided its response to the committee on July 24, '06." He did not say whether it had approved or challenged any of the claims about Iran's capabilities.

"This is like prewar Iraq all over again," said David Albright, a former nuclear inspector who is president of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security. "You have an Iranian nuclear threat that is spun up, using bad information that's cherry-picked and a report that trashes the inspectors."

The committee report, written by a single Republican staffer with a hard-line position on Iran, chastised the CIA and other agencies for not providing evidence to back assertions that Iran is building nuclear weapons.

It concluded that the lack of intelligence made it impossible to support talks with Tehran. Democrats on the committee saw it as an attempt from within conservative Republican circles to undermine Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who has agreed to talk with the Iranians under certain conditions.

The report's author, Fredrick Fleitz, is a onetime CIA officer and special assistant to John R. Bolton, the administration's former point man on Iran at the State Department. Bolton, who is now ambassador to the United Nations, had been highly influential during President Bush's first term in drawing up a tough policy that rejected talks with Tehran.

Among the allegations in Fleitz's Iran report is that ElBaradei removed a senior inspector from the Iran investigation because he raised "concerns about Iranian deception regarding its nuclear program." The agency said the inspector has not been removed.

A suggestion that ElBaradei had an "unstated" policy that prevented inspectors from telling the truth about Iran's program was particularly "outrageous and dishonest," according to the IAEA letter, which was signed by Vilmos Cserveny, the IAEA's director for external affairs and a former Hungarian ambassador.

Hoekstra's committee is working on a separate report about North Korea that is also being written principally by Fleitz. A draft of the report, provided to The Post, includes several assertions about North Korea's weapons program that the intelligence officials said they cannot substantiate, including one that Pyongyang is already enriching uranium.

The intelligence community believes North Korea is trying to acquire an enrichment capability but has no proof that an enrichment facility has been built, the officials said.

[donsaeid]

[Rasputin]

Giora Eiland: Iran will get nuclear bomb

Iran will not be deterred from its nuclear program and will ultimately reach a nuclear capability, Giora Eiland, the recently retired head of Israel's National Security Council, has told The Jerusalem Post, in an assessment immediately refuted by the Prime Minister's Office.

"The political process vis-a-vis Iran has more or less exhausted itself," Eiland said in an interview this week. "The efforts being made now to try and reach some kind of agreement with the Iranians are really the final efforts. In my opinion, they will fail."

Speaking with the Post in his office at the council, where he is still working as he completes a transition period after stepping down as its head, Eiland added: "In the end, Iran will attain a nuclear capability. The international opportunities of a few years ago were not exploited, and today it's too late. I don't regard the [international diplomatic] processes unfolding now as being strong enough to stop them, or even to temporarily suspend them."

But Miri Eisin, a spokeswoman for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said that Olmert "doesn't accept this assessment."

"The prime minister doesn't see this [a nuclear Iran] as a given," she said. "He doesn't accept this assessment as fact, but feels that Iran can still be deterred." Eisin stressed that Olmert believes that the issue is a world problem, and that Israel "sees that the US is not about to back down."

In recent months there have been different assessments at the highest levels of Israel's policy making pyramid regarding whether US President George W. Bush would take military action against Iran to stop its nuclear march, with some saying he is too weak politically and over-extended in Iraq and Afghanistan to take such a dramatic step, and others arguing that he would not want to leave office with a nuclear Iran as one of his legacies to the world.

Traces of Eiland's comments about the inevitability of a nuclear Iran were evident in a statement Vice Premier Shimon Peres made at a 9/11 memorial service earlier in the week.

"Even if Iran gets the nuclear bomb, and I hope that it doesn't, we shall develop and can develop better technology to face them," Peres said.

This was the first time a senior Israeli official had publicly acknowledged that Israel might have to adapt to a reality where Iran has nuclear capabilities.

Eiland said that Israel, facing a nuclear Iran, would have "two terrible options." One is to do nothing [militarily], which is dangerous. And the other is to do something, which is dangerous. It is a very grave dilemma."

If Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became the next supreme leader of his country, and it attained a nuclear capability, "that's a problematic combination," Eiland said dryly. For now, he stressed, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, reports to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei." (In a briefer conversation with the Post three weeks ago, Eiland had warned that Ahmadinejad, if he ever became the supreme decision maker, would "sacrifice half of Iran for the sake of eliminating Israel.")

Eiland said Israel should not blame itself "too much" for the anticipated failure of the effort to thwart Iran. Israel had not been at the center of the diplomatic struggle, although "maybe we could have tugged at the sleeves of those who were making decisions" with suggestions for wiser policies, he said.

Specifically, he faulted the United States with a "double mistake" that had prevented a possible political solution.

[Rasputin]

On the one hand, he said, Washington "is not giving any credibility to the notion that it would weigh military action. Nobody takes such a notion seriously. It is not carrying out activities that would suggest any such readiness. So the stick is not big enough.

"On the other hand it is not prepared to offer a bigger carrot - in the form of a dramatic change in policy on Iran, to say that 'We'll speak directly to you.'" Direct US engagement "might make an impression on the Iranians. But the US is ideologically opposed to doing this.

"So the carrot is small and the stick is small, and there's no reason for the Iranians to be persuaded [to change course]. The more time passes, the clearer this becomes, to my sorrow."

He said Israel had always been unwilling to so much as suggest to the US that it might change tack in situations where Washington's policy was tougher than Israel's, on matters relating to "Iran, the Palestinians, the Syrians, whoever. We don't dare to suggest to them that perhaps something else would be better...

"Israel is very faithful to the American ideological position," he said. "If the US is right, who are we to say anything different?

"But politics isn't about being right or wrong. It's about being smart or not smart. Sometimes the thing to do is not necessarily the "right" thing but the thing that will ultimately bring the best result. And if we think the US is making a mistake, we should say so. We don't. We do go to the Americans with complaints when we think they're not being tough enough, but never in the other direction."

On the Iranian issue, he went on, "there have been grave missed opportunities over the years, because the US did not merely say that it wasn't prepared to speak to Iran. Until February 2005, the US said that it would not support anybody else speaking to Iran either. 'They're bad. Don't talk to them.' But that doesn't work. Neither Iran, nor Hizbullah, nor anybody else, surrendered. We're through with the era of the ultimatum."

[Rasputin]

France confirms Iran said it may suspend enrichment

PARIS (Reuters) - Iran has told the European Union it is prepared to discuss suspending its uranium enrichment program to enable talks aimed at resolving its nuclear dispute with the West to go ahead, France confirmed on Friday.


EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana met Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani in Vienna last weekend.

"Iran ... has accepted to talk about the question of suspension. That for us is a positive development," spokesman Jean-Baptiste Mattei told a regular news briefing.

"Like you, I see that there are a number of rumblings which are interesting, notably the fact that Iran has apparently accepted to discuss the question of suspension," Mattei added.

Neither side had previously confirmed the Iranian offer although an EU diplomat told Reuters after the meeting that Larijani offered to consider a roughly 2-month suspension.

Iran has so far ignored an August 31 U.N. Security Council deadline to suspend its enrichment program, which Tehran says will only be used for civilian purposes, not to make atomic weapons as many Western countries suspect.

Suspension of enrichment-related activities is a precondition set by France, Britain, Germany, Russia, the United States and China for talks on a package of economic and other incentives in exchange for Iran scrapping efforts to produce nuclear fuel.

Larijani offered to consider a suspension for the duration of the talks on the offer, which should be around two months, said the EU diplomat.

Larijani added, however, that the suspension would start after talks began, contrary to what the six big powers have demanded, the diplomat said.

European diplomats said Russia and China would accept suspension after talks start and that France and Germany would probably not oppose it.

Some Western diplomats fear Iran is simply stalling to try to stave off U.N. Security Council sanctions.

On Tuesday U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey dismissed reports of "some alleged Iranian offer."

"There's been no change in the Iranian position, meaning they have not agreed to suspend uranium enrichment activities for any length of time that I'm aware of," he said.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday seemed to suggest Washington might join talks with Iran if it temporarily suspends the nuclear program, and did not flatly reject talk of a shorter-term enrichment freeze by Tehran.

Larijani and Solana were due to meet on Thursday but their meeting was postponed, Solana's spokeswoman Cristina Gallach said on Wednesday.

[Rasputin]

خاوير سولانا، مسئول سياست خارجی اتحاديه اروپا، در توضيح علت تعويق مذاکرات برنامه ريزی شده وی با علی لاريجانی، دبير شورای عالی امنيت ملی ايران، که قرار بود پنجشنبه گذشته برگزار شود، گفته است "ايران به زمان بيشتری برای رسيدن به اجماع در مورد شرايط آغاز گفتگوهای هسته ای با گروه شش نياز دارد."
تاکيد آقای سولانا بر موضوع "اجماع" در واقع اشاره ای ظريف به مساله بغرنج و پيچيده تصميم گيری در باره مسائل استراتژيک در نظام سياسی ايران است.

هر چند که سران جمهوری اسلامی اصرار بر دستيابی به چرخه سوخت هسته ای را موضوعی مورد اجماع همه جناح های سياسی در ايران می دانند، اما نشانهها حاکی از آن است که روند تصميم گيری در باره مسائل استراتژيک در جمهوری اسلامی چنان درهم پيچيده است که به سختی می توان اجماع در باره يک موضوع خاص را احراز کرد.

البته آنچه در ظاهر جريان دارد اين است که همه جناح ها و مقام های سياسی موثر در نظام جمهوری اسلامی بر حق ايران برای دستيابی به دانش و تکنولوژی هسته ای تاکيد می کنند، اما در مورد اينکه اين حق را با کدام شيوه و بر طبق چه جدول زمانی بايد به دست آورد، همه به يکسان سخن نمی گويند.


به نظر می رسد آقای رفسنجانی و برخی روحانيون سنتی و محافظه کار نزديک به او، خواستار نوعی نرمش در مذاکرات ايران با گروه شش هستند به گونه ای که جمهوری اسلامی با خطر تحريم اقتصادی و يا حمله نظامی روبرو نشود



هواداران نرمش در مذاکرات

از زمانی که دولت محمود احمدی نژاد فعاليت تاسيسات هسته ای ايران را از حال تعليق خارج کرده است، انتقادهای تلويحی بسياری از دولت وی و تيم جديد مذاکره کننده ايرانی، از سوی مقام های بلندپايه دولت های قبلی بويژه کسانی که هنوز هم از نفوذ سياسی در حکومت برخوردارند، صورت گرفته است.

اکبر هاشمی رفسنجانی، رئيس مجمع تشخيص مصلحت نظام، که البته در باره ميزان نفوذ وی در نظام سياسی ايران اختلاف نظرهايی وجود دارد، از جمله کسانی است که در اظهارات علنی خود از نوع سياست هسته ای دولت آقای احمدینژاد به صورت غير مستقيم انتقاد می کند و گفته می شود که در محافل درون حکومتی لحن وی در اين باره صريح و بی پرده است.

به نظر می رسد آقای رفسنجانی و برخی روحانيون سنتی و محافظه کار نزديک به او، خواستار نوعی نرمش در مذاکرات ايران با گروه شش هستند به گونه ای که جمهوری اسلامی با خطر تحريم اقتصادی و يا حمله نظامی روبرو نشود. با اين همه، مشخص نيست که اين دسته از روحانيون چه سهمی در نهايی شدن تصميمهای کلان سياسی ايران دارند.


نهادهای روحانی، نظامی، تجاری، امنيتی، تقنينی، قضايی، دولتی و افراد ذينفوذ هر کدام بنا بر وزن سياسی خود در تصميم گيریها [ی جمهوری اسلامی] شريکند، اما مکانيسم اين شراکت و سهم هريک در روند تصميم گيری روشن نيست



راه پر پيچ و خم تصميم گيری

هر چند که گفته می شود تصميم نهايی در جمهوری اسلامی توسط رهبر نظام گرفته میشود، اما در عين حال چنين به نظر می رسد که نهادهای رسمی و غير رسمی بسياری وجود دارد که در روندی در هم تنيده و غير شفاف، بر هر گونه تصميم نهايی در باره موضوعات سرنوشت ساز اثر می گذارد.

در واقع نهادهای روحانی، نظامی، تجاری، امنيتی، تقنينی، قضايی، دولتی و افراد ذينفوذ هر کدام بنا بر وزن سياسی خود در تصميم گيریها شريکند، اما مکانيسم اين شراکت و سهم هريک از آنها در روند تصميم گيری روشن نيست.

از اين رو، تمايل تيم مذاکره کننده هسته ای ايران به تعليق کوتاه مدت عمليات غنیسازی اورانيوم پس از شروع مذاکرات رسمی با اعضای گروه شش، هنوز نمی تواند به عنوان نظر نهايی و رسمی نظام جمهوری اسلامی تلقی شود، زيرا همانطور که خاوير سولانا اشاره کرده است، علی لاريجانی برای دستيابی به اجماع در تهران نياز به زمان بيشتری دارد.

مساله اما اکنون اين است که آيا نهادها و افراد تصميمگير در ايران، در مورد تعليق غنی سازی برای خروج از بن بست فعلی به اجماع خواهند رسيد؟ هر گونه اظهار نظر قاطع در اين باره، ريسک تلقی می شود، اما اعلام تصميم نهايی تهران، ميزان نفوذ و قدرت نيروهای ميانه رو و تندرو درون نظام را مشخص خواهد کرد.

[Sepideh_UK]

So does that mean they are finnally gone give up? or are they still playing about ??

[Rasputin]

China asserts Iran's right to civilian nuclear use

BEIJING (Reuters) - Iran has the right to harness nuclear energy for civilian use but should abide by its international commitments on the issue, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said in comments published on Sunday.

Yang's remarks come a day after state media carried comments by Premier Wen Jiabao urging Iran to show more flexibility on its nuclear program.

"Iran has the right to use nuclear energy peacefully," the official Xinhua news agency cited Yang as saying on Saturday at a summit of Non-Aligned Movement nations in Havana, which China attended as an observer.

Echoing Wen's comments, Yang said that the Iranian nuclear issue was at a critical stage, but that there was still hope for a negotiated settlement to the standoff.

"All parties concerned should take constructive steps and show flexibility to resume dialogue and negotiation at an early date," Xinhua quoted Yang as saying.

Tehran ignored an August 31 U.N. Security Council deadline to halt uranium enrichment, which Iran says is for civilian energy use but which Western powers fear will be used for making weapons.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana has been negotiating with Iran on behalf of the world's major powers, but Washington is pushing for a move toward sanctions if there is no breakthrough soon.

U.S. and EU diplomats told Reuters on Saturday that major powers were considering a joint meeting with Iran next week that would exclude the United States, as a way of bridging the divide over its nuclear program.

China, which wields veto power on the Security Council, is wary of sanctions and has long urged a diplomatic solution.

Yang also called for an early resumption of six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue, urging the nations involved to show greater flexibility and avoid taking any action that would "increase tension and exacerbate the situation," Xinhua said.

The talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program broke down in late 2005 with Pyongyang demanding an end to U.S. financial restrictions driven by accusations that the isolated state counterfeited dollars and traded in illegal drugs.

China hosts the talks, which are also attended by North and South Korea, the United States, Japan and Russia.

[Rasputin]

Germany calls for an international uranium enrichment centre

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has proposed setting up uranium enrichment centres under UN control to end nuclear disputes like the one over Iran.

Steinmeier said such centres could be used by several nations and placed under control of the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the daily Handelsblatt said in an advance extract of its Monday edition.

"Interested countries like Iran could in this way obtain nuclear fuel for civilian use under strict control," Steinmeier told the newspaper.

"It could be financed by countries that claim the right to buy nuclear fuel," he added.

"We need to have an international supply of nuclear fuel to stop countries feeling the need to build their own installations."

Steinmeier said the Vienna-based IAEA had the right to build and run nuclear installations.

According to the Handelsblatt, IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei has been informed of the proposal and Germany is planning to promote it when the country takes over the rotating presidency of the European Union in January 2007.

In a bid to resolve the standoff over Iran's suspect nuclear actitivities, Russia has offered to provide the Islamic Republic with enriched uranium.

Tehran, which denies Western allegations that it is seeking to produce nuclear weapons, has turned down the offer and violated a UN deadline to stop enriching uranium by the end of August.

The IAEA starts a general conference on Monday that will be dominated by the Iranian crisis and will consider a proposal, backed by Russia and the United States, for an international fuel bank.

"I want to make sure that every country that is a bona fide user of nuclear energy and that is fulfilling its non-proliferation obligations is getting fuel," ElBaradei said at the weekend.

[donsaeid]

BEIJING (Reuters) - Iran has the right to harness nuclear energy for civilian use but should abide by its international commitments on the issue, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said in comments published on Sunday.

Yang's remarks come a day after state media carried comments by Premier Wen Jiabao urging Iran to show more flexibility on its nuclear program.

"Iran has the right to use nuclear energy peacefully," the official Xinhua news agency cited Yang as saying on Saturday at a summit of Non-Aligned Movement nations in Havana, which China attended as an observer.

Echoing Wen's comments, Yang said that the Iranian nuclear issue was at a critical stage, but that there was still hope for a negotiated settlement to the standoff.

"All parties concerned should take constructive steps and show flexibility to resume dialogue and negotiation at an early date," Xinhua quoted Yang as saying.

Tehran ignored an August 31 U.N. Security Council deadline to halt uranium enrichment, which Iran says is for civilian energy use but which Western powers fear will be used for making weapons.

European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana has been negotiating with Iran on behalf of the world's major powers, but Washington is pushing for a move toward sanctions if there is no breakthrough soon.

U.S. and EU diplomats told Reuters on Saturday that major powers were considering a joint meeting with Iran next week that would exclude the United States, as a way of bridging the divide over its nuclear program.

China, which wields veto power on the Security Council, is wary of sanctions and has long urged a diplomatic solution.

Yang also called for an early resumption of six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue, urging the nations involved to show greater flexibility and avoid taking any action that would "increase tension and exacerbate the situation," Xinhua said.

The talks aimed at ending North Korea's nuclear weapons program broke down in late 2005 with Pyongyang demanding an end to U.S. financial restrictions driven by accusations that the isolated state counterfeited dollars and traded in illegal drugs.

China hosts the talks, which are also attended by North and South Korea, the United States, Japan and Russia.

dame china garm