RSS
U.S. President Barack Obama's administration has asked lawmakers to make changes to an Iran sanctions bill that would permit the exclusion of some countries from federal penalties targeting non-U.S. firms doing business with Iran's energy sector, the Washington Times reported today (see GSN, April 28).
(Apr. 29) -
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, shown earlier this month unveiling an advanced uranium enrichment centrifuge built by his country. The United States has granted Ahmadinejad a visa to attend next month's Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty review conference at U.N. headquarters in New York (Behrouz Mehri/Getty Images).
The administration request for the language, confirmed yesterday by a White House official, was intended to help secure Russian and Chinese support for a fourth U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution against Iran, Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) said (see GSN, March 5). Washington and its allies have sought tough international penalties against Tehran for pursuing activities that could support development of a nuclear bomb. Iran has insisted its nuclear activities are strictly peaceful, and Moscow and Beijing have put up varying levels of resistance to Western calls for tough penalties against the Gulf state.
"It's incredible the administration is asking for exemptions, under the table and winking and nodding, before the legislation is signed into law," Ros-Lehtinen said. "The administration wants to give a pass to countries for merely supporting a watered-down, almost do-nothing U.N. resolution," she added (Eli Lake, Washington Times, April 29).
The U.S. House of Representatives and Senate were set to convene a joint panel yesterday to resolve differences in the respective versions of the legislation, according to a congressional press release (U.S. Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee release, April 28). Neither house of Congress incorporated an exclusion in its original legislation for countries judged by the administration to be cooperating with international efforts against Iran, according to the Times.
Once a nation receives such a designation, the administration would not be obligated to single out firms in that country dealing with Iran's energy industry, said three Capitol Hill sources with knowledge of the administration's request. As the United States identifies such firms under existing law, the proposed measure would remove the administration's current "name-and-shame" measure for persuasion, the sources said.
The "'cooperating-country' status would send a signal to the energy sector that the Obama administration is not serious about penalizing those companies that continue to do business with the Iranian energy sector, the lifeblood of the men who rule Iran," said Foundation for the Defense of Democracies head Mark Dubowitz.
Washington Institute for Near East Policy deputy head Patrick Clawson contended the proposed measure would strengthen efforts against Iran.
"If the administration can use this 'cooperating-countries' waiver to get cooperation from a country like China on enforcing the U.N. sanctions and on suspending investment in Iran's oil and gas industry, then this bill will be a great success for U.S. objectives about Iran's nuclear program and support for terrorism," Clawson said.
Keith Weissman, an Iran expert formerly with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, offered a different assessment of the sanctions legislation.
"Of all the sanctions I have been around, this is one of the dumber ones," he said. "We have been talking about this for so long, the Iranians are ready for this. Not only are they building the capacity for refining the fuel, they will have more capacity to purchase it from regional countries" (Lake, Washington Times).
Meanwhile, French President Nicolas Sarkozy encouraged his Chinese counterpart in a meeting yesterday to help counter the nuclear threat posed by Tehran, the Associated Press reported. China wields veto authority on the Security Council like the body's other permanent members: France, Russia the United Kingdom and the United States.
"China hopes to use dialogue to solve this problem. France completely understands China, and we are willing to discuss this problem together at an appropriate time, but if dialogue does not work then we can only use sanctions," Sarkozy said (Gillian Wong, Associated Press I/Taiwan News, April 28).
Beijing reaffirmed its commitment to a negotiated solution to the dispute, the Xinhua News Agency reported (Xinhua News Agency I, April 29).
Elsewhere, the United States yesterday indicated it would grant Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a visa to attend the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treat review conference, which is scheduled to begin Monday at U.N. headquarters in New York.
"We have certain responsibilities as the host of the United Nations. Any foreign officials who's coming to the U.N. for official business is normally granted a visa," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. "If they choose to have the president lead that delegation, that's their decision" (Xinhua News Agency II, April 19).
"We want to see nations reaffirm their commitment to the treaty and we would certainly hope that President Ahmadinejad or whoever leads the Iranian delegation will come to New York prepared to make that commitment," AP quoted Crowley as saying. "This is a case where President Ahmadinejad, if he comes to New York on Monday, will have the opportunity to clearly make that kind of commitment" (John Heilprin, Associated Press II/Boston Herald, April 28).
Some have feared the nuclear dispute could overshadow efforts at the meeting to strengthen the nuclear nonproliferation regime, Agence France-Presse reported. Iran was considered a major challenger of the treaty framework, due to its defiance of the Security Council as well as the possibility for an Iranian nuclear weapon to set off a regional scramble for nuclear armaments (Agence France-Presse I/Khaleej Times, April 29).
"Iran is obviously in any case in the backdrop when consideration of the nonproliferation treaty is occurring because it remains in violation of its obligations," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice said. "But we think this is much bigger than any one country, and our aims are universal and we approach it in that vein" (Lachlan Carmichael, Agence France-Presse II/Yahoo!News, April 28).