Posted on 03/30/2006 12:04:06 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
BERLIN, March 30 — A day after the United Nations Security Council approved a heavily compromised statement criticizing the Iranian nuclear program, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice today raised the idea of imposing sanctions on Iran for the first time with the permament members of the council but received a decidedly cool reaction from China and Russia.
During a news conference after a three and one-half hour meeting here today, Dai Bingguo, China's vice minister of foreign affairs, rejected the idea of sanctions and offered a thinly veiled criticism of the war in Iraq when he said, "The Chinese side feels there has already been enough turmoil in the Middle East. We don't need any more turmoil."
The Security Council approved the statement on Wednesday after three weeks of debate, and Ms. Rice praised it, even though it was far weaker than the one the United States had originally proposed. It calls on the International Atomic Energy Agency to report within 30 days on Iran's progress toward curtailing its nuclear development work.
Ms. Rice noted that Russia had wanted to strip out the language calling for a referral to the Security Council but had relented under American pressure.
As it is, both Russia and China bluntly declared that they had no interest in imposing sanctions or taking any further action against Iran, though both countries did express concern about the nuclear program. Both countries said they wanted to refer the issue back to the atomic energy agency.
"Russia believes that the sole solution for this problem will be based on the work of the I.A.E.A.," said the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Well...I would say that's probably like the Victoria Secrets thong design division refusing Pamela Anderson's shopping sprees.
...or something like that
Wait until the Chechens or the Urghurs get ahold of the nuclear bomb and then we'll see what they think about waepons proliferation.
Russia and China need to fall off one side of the fence or the other.
They're already on the opposite side of the fence as us; just not admitting it yet for strategic reasons.
It used to be that the international appeasement crowd used sanctions as a way to avoid war. Now, the international appeasement crowd (in this case, with substantial pressure from the two sponsoring states of the Iranian regime) find sanctions to be too hard core. What's left, sending nasty emails to Tehran? Twiddling thumbs? Drinking heavily and simply hoping things get better?
They need to fall off a cliff.
Come on, the Chicomms and Soviet Russians are our friends!
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