PARIS-In a sign that Iran has hardened its position on its nuclear program, its new nuclear negotiator said in talks in London on Friday that all proposals made in past negotiations were irrelevant and that further discussion of a curb on Iran’s uranium enrichment was unnecessary, senior officials briefed on the meeting said.The Iranian official, Saeed Jalili, also told
Javier Solana, who represented the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany in the five-hour talks, that
United Nations Security Council resolutions punishing Iran for not suspending its enriched uranium activities were illegal, the officials said. Representatives of the six countries met in Paris on Saturday afternoon to discuss further punitive Security Council measures against Iran after the final talks in London failed to produce a breakthrough.The countries have been divided on new sanctions, and the Paris talks were only preliminary, in part because of the absence of Sergei Kisliak, Russia’s top nuclear negotiator, who was blocked in Montreal by snow.
A French official briefing reporters after the Paris meeting said that the six countries had begun work on a new sanctions resolution based on a rough text drafted by Britain, and that he hoped it could be passed soon, perhaps in the next few weeks.
But he stressed that there was no agreement now, and that any resolution would have to be a compromise. “It won’t be a dramatic breakthrough,” he said.R. Nicholas Burns, an under secretary of state who represented the United States at the Paris meeting, has been pressing for tougher sanctions as soon as possible, arguing that the goal is to isolate Iran until it stops enriching uranium.The failure in London could make it easier to pass a new Security Council resolution — even if it is not as strong as the United States, Britain and France would like it to be.The London meeting was the first time that Mr. Jalili, a close ally of Iran’s president,
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, had led negotiations on the Iranian side. His performance made clear that he brings a very different style and approach from that of his predecessor, Ali Larijani, who had taken a tough line but had shown a willingness to engage substantively on the nuclear issue.
The first hour and a half of the meeting on Friday was described as a monologue, with Mr. Jalili speaking about the will of the Iranian people to support uranium enrichment, theology, God, even his doctoral thesis, according to several officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity under normal diplomatic rules.“Jalili said, ‘Everything in the past is past, and with me, you start over,’” an official said. “He said, ‘None of your proposals has any standing.’”When Mr. Solana, the
European Union’s foreign policy chief, said that he was under the assumption that there would be continuity in the talks, Mr. Jalili told him that was wrong.After the meeting, Mr. Solana abandoned his habitual optimistic stance, telling reporters that he was “disappointed.”
The French official described the meeting as “a disaster,” adding “Jalili essentially said, ‘Everything that Larijani has proposed is a dead letter and we have to start from zero.’”The official also said that Mr. Jalili had declared, “There is no longer an Iranian nuclear problem,” and had added that the only interlocutor recognized by Iran from now on would be the
International Atomic Energy Agency.The hard-line position from the Iranian side was clear confirmation that Iran would not compromise on this issue, the French official said, adding, “We have in front of us the real Iran.”An official involved in the talks put it even more bluntly, saying, “We can’t do business with these guys at this point.”Nine months ago, the Security Council unanimously imposed new sanctions on Iran to press it to stop enrichment and threatened more if it refused. But the six nations that united behind the sanctions have been divided over what to do next.Russia and China have paid lip service to Iran’s need to comply with Council resolutions, but also have held firm to the view that further pressure will only intensify the standoff.The foreign ministers from the six nations agreed in September to pass a new Security Council resolution if both Mr. Solana and the International Atomic Energy Agency, a part of the
United Nations, did not certify that there was progress with Tehran by November.
Last week in Vienna,
Mohamed ElBaradei, the agency’s director, reported that while Iran was cooperating on answering questions about past nuclear activities, it also had crossed the threshold of putting into operation 3,000 centrifuges, the fast-spinning machines that enrich uranium. He added that Iranian restrictions on his inspectors precluded his agency from determining whether Iran’s nuclear program was intended to generate power or make weapons. In the meeting in London, Mr. Jalili contended that the atomic energy agency had sent a letter to Iran saying that the case involving suspicious activities in Iran’s program of centrifuges was “closed.”“We have solved all our problems with the agency,” an official involved in the negotiations paraphrased Mr. Jalili as saying.Senior agency officials have told the countries involved in the negotiations that while Iran has provided important information about the centrifuge programs, the case is not closed and that any written communication would have been pro forma.Back in Tehran on Saturday, Mr. Jalili defended Iran’s position and said it was not to blame for the perceived failure of the talks.“The fact is that we defended the Iranian nation’s rights and stressed fulfilling our duties and that the Iranian nation will not accept anything that goes beyond the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty,” he told reporters. “If some people have become disappointed because they cannot deprive Iran of its natural rights, then this is another matter.”
As in the days of Noah...
.bmp)
.bmp)
WASHINGTON - [[[The United States will impose travel and financial sanctions against 38 more people and two companies with ties to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, a senior State Department official said.]]]Jendayi Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, warned in a speech Monday that the U.S. will expand the sanctions further [[[if violence does not cease.]]]She did not identify the individuals or the companies affected, but said they included [[[nine state security officials and five adult children of Zimbabwean government officials studying in the United States.]]][[[[[[The United States already has imposed travel and financial sanctions against 130 people with ties to Mugabe.Zimbabwe is embroiled in its worst economic crisis since independence from Britain in 1980. Unemployment is around 80 percent, and political unrest is high. Foreign investment, loans and development aid have dried up. Official inflation is 4,500 percent-the highest in the world-although independent estimates put it substantially higher. Mugabe, 83, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence, blames the crisis on Western sanctions and rejects criticism that mismanagement caused the meltdown.]]]]]]Given Mugabe's escalated use of violence, "the United States will be imposing additional sanctions against the worst perpetrators of the regime's brutality...and human rights abuses," Frazer said, speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.[[[[She said it was "intolerable" that those closest to Mugabe should be sending their children to study in the United States "when they have destroyed the once outstanding educational system in their own country." She said the U.S. was especially watching those using their position "to enrich themselves at the expense of suffering Zimbabweans.]]]]"Frazer described Zimbabwe as an imploding country that remains "a powerful blight on sub-Saharan Africa," a region where she said democracy is on the rise and poverty on the decline.Store shelves there are bare of corn meal, meat, bread, eggs, milk and other basics that sell for at least five times the government price on a thriving black market. There are also shortages of fuel and foreign currency as well as soaring poverty.
