The Obama administration has not yet reached a final judgment of Iran's response to a U.N. plan aimed at eliminating immediate concerns that the Middle Eastern state could produce enough material for a nuclear weapon using its current cache of low-enriched uranium, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told CNN today (see GSN, Oct. 29).
(Oct. 30) -
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, shown today, said Washington is still assessing Iran's answer to a U.N. proposal for enrichment of Iranian uranium (Getty Images).
Iran reportedly sought key changes to the plan, asking that it be allowed to gradually turn over limited amounts of its low-enriched uranium for refinement by other nations rather than rapidly transferring a large portion of its stockpile. France, Russia and the United States indicated their support for the original proposal, put forward last week by International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei at the end of three days of talks between the four nations in Vienna, Austria.
ElBaradei received Iran's "initial response" to the proposal yesterday, according to an IAEA statement that provided no further details.
Addressing whether Iran's response would prompt moves toward additional economic penalties on the country, Clinton said she would "let this process play out."
"We are working to determine exactly what they are willing to do, whether this was an initial response that is an end response or whether it's the beginning of getting to where we expect them to end up," Agence France-Presse quoted her as saying.
It is "very significant that Russia and France and the U.K., Germany, China are all united" against a nuclear-armed Iran, Clinton added. "This is all of us saying: we came to this idea, you agreed in principle and we expect to have you follow through" (Agence France-Presse I/Google News, Oct. 30).
The State Department yesterday indicated it had not yet received an official Iranian answer to ElBaradei's proposal.
"We need to hear a formal response from Iran. We'll see what kind of clarifications we get from the Iranians," said spokesman Ian Kelly.
Iran's statement yesterday to the U.N. nuclear watchdog was an "oral response," one high-level U.S. official noted (Agence France-Presse II/Google News, Oct. 29).
France called on Iran to "give its formal response" to the U.N. proposal "without delay" (AFP I).
Privately, U.S. and other Western officials expressed doubts about the intentions behind Iran's counteroffer.
"We assumed they'd try and drag this out. It's their modus operandi," one U.S. official told the Wall Street Journal (Wall Street Journal, Oct. 30).
"They are trying to turn this into a negotiation. But it makes no sense to do it in this way. Their response is unacceptable," added a European diplomat familiar with Iran's communication to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, according to the Financial Times (Financial Times, Oct. 30).
"It's like playing chess with a monkey. You get them to checkmate, and then they swallow the king," a diplomat connected to this month's negotiations told the London Telegraph, (Richard Spencer, London Telegraph, Oct. 29).
"This was a proposal to buy time, build trust, and test Iranian intentions. Iran seems to have failed in all three areas," David Albright, head of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, told the Christian Science Monitor. "The U.S., allies and Russia were willing to pay for Iran to reprocess its fuel. It was a deal to take something of zero value and turn it into something of value. Iran would get something for nothing, and if reports are true, they've said no."
"The U.S. should continue to negotiate until December -- that's what the U.S. said it would do -- then look at multilateral efforts at sanctions," Albright said (Robert Marquand, Christian Science Monitor, Oct. 29).
Meanwhile, Iranian political opposition figure Mir Hossein Mousavi expressed reservations about the U.N. plan put forward last week, Reuters reported.
"The discussions in Geneva were really surprising and if the promises given (to the West) are realized then the hard work of thousands of scientists would be ruined," the reformist Kaleme Web site quoted Mousavi as saying.
"If we cannot keep our promises then it would prepare the ground for harder sanctions against the country," he said (Reza Derakhshi, Reuters I, Oct. 29).
Elsewhere, Russia indicated it would not take a harder stance on Iran's nuclear work in exchange for the Obama administration's decision to scrap a European missile defense initiative that Moscow had opposed, according to Interfax.
"Such deals are impossible. This is not even science fiction. We have always said this. These are different things [of] different magnitudes," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said (Interfax, Oct. 29).
In Washington, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee yesterday endorsed legislation that would restrict U.S. business with international firms selling gasoline to Iran, Reuters reported.
"We must send a very clear signal to Iran's leaders that if they continue to defy the will of the international community, our nation is prepared to confront them," Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) said.
Senator Robert Corker (R-Tenn.), though, said the bill's passage represented a "tacit vote of no-confidence" in the Obama administration's diplomacy with Iran.
"The State Department did not want to see this happening," he said (Susan Cornwell, Reuters II, Oct. 29).