March 21, 2008
IRAN: BUSH BEGINS THE JUSTIFICATION!
….trigger for the Burden of Damascus?
INTRODUCTION by Doug Krieger
Iran, according to President Bush, wants the BOMB to destroy people. The Bush Treasury Department, along with Vice-President Cheney, have just leveled a one-two bunch against Iran (March 20, 2008). Now that Admiral Fallon is fallen (resigned) – and the door wide open for the “big blow” against Iran – what is there but a round of “justifications” and, presto, eliminate Iran’s nuclear capability! Now, is there something that the old fox himself, Kofi Annan, former UN Secretary, knows that we don’t, in efforts to broker dialogue to forestall the inevitable? So it appears that Israel’s intelligence is being taken seriously by Cheney and Bush – at least that’s what it looks like on the surface. Folks, we’re not playing games here—so much for the Bush Administration’s assertions that Iran, since 2003, hasn’t been messing with the BOMB! Read on – the graphics are revealing.
Bush erroneously says Iran announced desire for nuclear weapons
By Jonathan S. Landay, McClatchy Newspapers Thu Mar 20, 7:13 PM ET
WASHINGTON —
President
Bush contended that Iran has "declared they want a nuclear weapon to
destroy people" and that the Islamic Republic could be hiding a secret
program.
Iran , however, has never publicly proclaimed a desire for nuclear weapons and has repeatedly insisted that the uranium enrichment program it's operating in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions is for civilian power plants, not warheads.
Bush made his assertion Wednesday in an interview marking the Iranian New Year with Radio Farda, a U.S. government-run radio service that broadcasts into Iran in the Farsi language. The White House released the transcript on Thursday.
The president reiterated his view that Iran has a right to civilian nuclear power. But, he said, the low-enriched uranium fuel for its reactors should be supplied by Russia , a proposal that Tehran has repeatedly rejected.
"The problem is the (Iranian) government cannot be trusted to enrich uranium because one, they've hidden programs in the past and they may be hiding one now. Who knows?" said Bush.
"Secondly, they've declared they want to have a nuclear weapon to destroy people, some in the Middle East . And that is unacceptable to the United States and it's unacceptable to the world."
Iran has repeatedly denied seeking nuclear warheads, and its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a religious edict in 2005 forbidding the production, stockpiling and use of such weapons.
Asked about the president's comment, Gordon Johndroe , a White House spokesman, said Bush had "shorthanded" Iran's desire "to wipe Israel off the map," its refusal to heed U.N. Security Council demands to suspend its enrichment work and Iran's continued development of ballistic missiles.
Asked if Iran could exploit Bush's inaccurate comment for political purposes, Johndroe replied: "I'm not concerned about that. If they want to spin it a certain way, they can do it any way they want. They have still called for Israel to be wiped off the map and are in violation of three U.N. Security Council resolutions."
Speaking in October 2005 at a "World Without Zionism" conference, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was quoted by state-run Iranian media as saying that " Israel must be wiped off the map."
Some experts, however, disputed the translation, saying that Ahmadinejad's comment couldn't be interpreted as a threat to use force against Israel .
Meanwhile, the State Department announced targeted new restrictions on a bank in Bahrain , which is controlled by the Iran -based Bank Melli, and additional scrutiny of any vessel calling at a U.S. port that has recently visited Iran . It said Iran hadn't maintained "effective anti-terrorism measures" at its ports.
"The international community will not allow the Iranian government to misuse the international financial system or global transportation network to further its aspirations to obtain nuclear weapons capability, improve its missile systems or support international terrorism," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
The Treasury Department also warned U.S. banks that Iran is using "an array of deceptive practices" to circumvent international financial sanctions.
The department said that it is "particularly concerned that the central bank of Iran may be facilitating transactions for sanctioned Iranian banks."
In the Radio Farda interview, Bush said, "There's a chance that the U.S. and Iran could reconcile their differences," but only if Iran verifiably suspends its uranium enrichment program.
"The Iranian people have got to understand that the United States is going to be firm in our desire to prevent the nation from developing a nuclear weapon, but reasonable in our desire to see to it that you have a civilian nuclear program . . . without enabling the government to enrich."
Enrichment produces both low-enriched uranium, which is used to fuel nuclear power plants, and highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons, depending on the duration of the process.
Iran kept its program hidden for 18 years until its disclosure by an Iranian opposition group in 2002.
A December 2007 U.S. intelligence report said Iran halted work on nuclear weapons four years earlier, but could restart it.
Tehran has refused to comply with three U.N. Security Council resolutions demanding that it suspend the program while the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency completes an investigation and institutes strict safeguards to ensure the project isn't being used for weapons.
Treasury warns banks about Iran efforts to skirt sanctions
By Jeannine Aversa | Associated Press
5:49 PM CDT, March 20, 2008
BUSH:
WASHINGTON
(AP) — The
Bush administration issued a fresh warning Thursday to U.S. banks that
Iran is using "an array of deceptive practices" to hide its alleged
involvement in nuclear proliferation and terrorist activities.
The Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network alleged
that Iran is resorting to such alleged practices to evade detection
and skirt financial sanctions.
"The government of Iran disguises its involvement in proliferation and terrorism activities through an array of deceptive practices specifically designed to evade detection," FinCen said in its warning to banks.
For
instance, the agency said that the Iran's central bank,
also known as Bank Markazi, and Iranian commercial banks
have requested that their names be removed from global financial
transactions to make it difficult to "determine the true parties in
the transaction."
It marked the (US)
government's latest effort to ramp up pressure on Iran, which the
United States accuses of bankrolling terrorism and seeking a nuclear
bomb.
The United States' warning to U.S. banks comes after an international
financial watchdog — the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force —
pressed its 34 member countries to urge banks to monitor their
dealings in Iran. The watchdog group said Iran hasn't done enough to
fight money laundering and to combat terror financing.
In Thursday's warning, the U.S. government told U.S. banks that the
Treasury Department is "particularly concerned that the central bank
of Iran may be facilitating transactions for sanctioned Iranian
banks."
Under U.S. financial sanctions, virtually all trade and investment
activities with the government of Iran — including government-owned
banks — are prohibited. Moreover, other sanctions have been imposed on
Iranian entities that the United States believes are linked to
terrorist activities and the spreading of weapons of mass destruction.
The State Department, meanwhile, said vessels that arrived at U.S.
ports after recent visits to Iran "will be scrutinized" because Iran
has not maintained effective anti-terrorism measures in its ports.
The U.N. Security Council recently passed a third round of sanctions
on Iran ordering financial assets to be frozen of additional Iranian
officials and companies with links to the country's nuclear and
missile program. For the first time, it also banned trade with Iran in
some goods that have both civilian and military use.
Iran insists its enrichment program is intended to produce fuel for
nuclear reactors that would generate electricity and has vowed to push
ahead with it.
Cheney Issues Iran Nuclear Warning
By
DEB RIECHMANN
March 19, 2008 posted 1:05 pm EDT
CHENEY:
MUSCAT,
Oman —
Vice President Cheney
retained his tough stance against
Iran today and said
America is uncertain if
Tehran has restarted the
nuclear weaponization program that a U.S. intelligence report says it
halted in 2003.
Speaking in Oman, an America-allied Arab monarchy and neighbor of Iran's, Mr. Cheney told ABC News, "The important thing to keep in mind is the objective that we share with many of our friends in the region, and that is that a nuclear-armed Iran would be very destabilizing for the entire area."
In December an intelligence report known as the National Intelligence Estimate concluded that Iran's nuclear weapons development program was stopped in the fall of 2003 because of international pressure. The report, however, cautioned that Tehran continues to enrich uranium and still could develop a bomb between 2010 and 2015 if it decided to do so.
Critics of the Bush administration said the report should dampen any campaign for an American confrontation with Iran.
But Mr. Cheney said that while the NIE said Iran had a program to develop a nuclear warhead, it remains unclear if it has resumed that activity.
"What it (the NIE) says is that they have definitely had in the past a program to develop a nuclear warhead; that it would appear that they stopped that weaponization process in 2003. We don't know whether or not they've restarted," he said.
Annan Warns Against Conflict With Iran
By EDITH M. LEDERER – (March 20, 2008)
ANNAN:
Former
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned Thursday that military action
against Iran would be "a real disaster" and said the Middle East could
explode if the international community doesn't handle the many
conflicts in the region very carefully.
He also said there was "quite a bit of hypocrisy on all sides" in trying to resolve the five-year conflict in Sudan's Darfur region — especially in encouraging the African Union to take on peacekeeping when it didn't have the resources.
At a wide-ranging round-table with journalists, Annan said he didn't have enough information to comment on the justification for the U.N. Security Council's demand that Iran suspend uranium enrichment until it allays suspicions its nuclear program is trying to produce weapons. Tehran insists the program is peaceful, aimed only at using nuclear power to generate electricity.
Annan said he had told Iranian leaders that "if indeed you have nothing to hide and you are not making a bomb and your intentions are pacific, open your doors, let the inspectors come, let them go anywhere — find a way of reassuring the world, not just the U.S."
Asked how the international community should deal with Iran, he said dialogue was the only way.
"We cannot, I'm sure, take on another military action in Iran, and I hope no one is contemplating it. It would be a real disaster," he said.
Calling the broader Middle East "a very dangerous region," Annan said that "many conflicts have converged and are feeding off each other, and the international community has to handle that situation very carefully because any miscalculation can lead to very serious explosions."
He said Lebanon's political crisis and inability to elect a president was "very worrying," adding that it was a bit like the infighting among the Palestinians, which pits the Fatah movement of President Mahmoud Abbas against the Islamic militants of Hamas.
Annan also cited the dangers of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Sunni-Shiite divide in Iraq and other Mideast countries, and unrest in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
On Darfur, he criticized wealthy nations with well-equipped militaries for refusing to provide essential helicopters for the joint U.N.-African Union force that took over peacekeeping there early this year.
He urged U.N. member states to heed the warning of peacekeeping chief Jean-Marie Guehenno that the world body's peacekeeping operations are overstretched with more than 100,000 troops in the field.
"I don't think the U.N. is in a position today to go and take over in Afghanistan," he said. "I don't think the U.N. will get the resources to go and play a major and active role in Somalia. We are already struggling to get the resources for Darfur, where some have declared it a genocide."
Annan was in New York to receive the first MacArthur Award for International Justice from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. As U.N. secretary-general, he promoted the concept of an international "responsibility to protect" that was adopted by world leaders at a 2005 summit.
He said his recent successful mediation after Kenya's post-election violence "was a hopeful example" of putting this responsibility into practice.
Israeli officials reject U.S. findings on Iran
By Dion Nissenbaum | McClatchy Newspapers
Posted on Tuesday, December 4, 2007
JERUSALEM
— Israeli officials, who've been warning that Iran would soon pose a
nuclear threat to the world, reacted angrily Tuesday to a new U.S.
intelligence finding that Iran stopped its nuclear weapons development
program in 2003 and to date hasn't resumed trying to produce nuclear
weapons.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak directly challenged the new assessment in an interview with Israel's Army Radio, and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the new finding wouldn't deter Israel or the United States from pressing its campaign to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapons capability.
"It seems Iran in 2003 halted for a certain period of time its military nuclear program, but as far as we know, it has probably since revived it," Barak said.
"Even after this report, the American stance will still focus on preventing Iran from attaining nuclear capability," Olmert said. "We will expend every effort along with our friends in the U.S. to prevent the Iranians from developing nuclear weapons."
Probably no country felt more blindsided than Israel by the announcement Monday that 16 U.S. intelligence agencies, in a stunning reassessment, had concluded with "high confidence" that Iran had halted its nuclear program in 2003 and with "moderate confidence" that it hadn't restarted that program as of mid-2007.
For years, Israel has been at the forefront of international efforts to isolate Iran, with Israeli intelligence estimates warning that Iran was on the brink of a nuclear "point of no return," an ominous assessment that often fueled calls for a military strike.
Israeli officials also have sought to isolate Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, citing his calls for Israel's destruction and his skepticism that the Holocaust took place.
The U.S. intelligence finding said that evidence "suggests" that Iran isn't as determined as U.S. officials thought to develop a nuclear weapon and that a diplomatic approach that included economic pressure and some nod to Iranian goals for regional influence might persuade Iran to continue to suspend weapons development.
On Tuesday morning, Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper called the U.S. findings "a blow below the belt." An analysis in the competing Haaretz newspaper suggested that Israel might come to be viewed as a "panic-stricken rabbit" and said that the U.S. intelligence estimate established "a new, dramatic reality: The military option, American or Israeli, is off the table, indefinitely."
"This is definitely a blow to attempts to stop Iran from becoming nuclear because now everybody will be relaxed and those that were reluctant to go ahead with harsher sanctions will now have a good excuse," said Efraim Inbar, the director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Israel's Bar-Ilan University.
The estimate created an awkward situation for Israeli leaders, who mostly tried to sidestep direct criticism of the Bush administration.
Olmert sought to focus on the report's finding that Iran had been deterred in 2003 from pursuing its nuclear weapons program by international pressure. That, said Olmert, made continued sanctions essential.
Barak was tougher and promised that the report wouldn't influence Israeli policy.
"We cannot allow ourselves to rest just because of an intelligence report from the other side of the earth, even if it is from our greatest friend," he said.
Israeli officials also highlighted where the U.S. and Israeli assessments agree.
They noted that while the latest U.S. assessment said that the earliest Iran was likely to develop enough weapons-grade material for a nuclear bomb was 2010, Israeli assessments weren't dramatically different, finding that Iran could develop the workings for a nuclear bomb by 2009.
Gerald Steinberg, the chairman of the political science department at Bar-Ilan University, suggested that the findings might increase the chances that Israel will attack Iran because they reduce the chances that the United States will act.
"I think it may introduce a lot of stress in the Israeli-American relationship," he said.
But Emily Landau, the director of the Arms Control and Regional Security Program at Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies, said it would be very difficult for Israel to launch an attack without explicit support from the United States.
"If Israel were to carry out a military action, it would have to be in coordination with the United States, so if the United States is moving away from that option, it would have implications for Israel as well," she said.
(McClatchy special correspondent Cliff Churgin contributed to this report from Jerusalem.)
IRAN’S NUCLEAR FACILITY AT BUSHEHR, IRAN