NORMALISATION OF TIES WITH THE US UNDER SERIOUS CONSIDERATION
TEHRAN, 5 Jan. (IPS) The Islamic Republic is seriously discussing the possibility of opening dialogue with the United States, as the "topics" are debated at the Supreme Council for National Security (SCNS), the regime’s highest decision-taking body.
"The topic is under study by the respective organs and they may announce their views if they deem necessary", the government’s official spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh told reporters, asking him about the need to study Iran-US relations in the SNSC, according to the official Iranian news agency IRNA.
Tehran’s quick acceptance of American relief missions for the quake-stricken people of Bam, the city and region in south eastern Iran that was hit by a strong earthquake on 26 December, killing more than 40.000 people and destroying eighty per cent of the houses and the infrastructures prompted speculations that the sinister might help warming up relations between the Islamic Republic and the United States, cut since the victory of the Islamic revolution of 1979.
Iran has also welcomed President George W. Bush’s decision to lift some of American sanctions against the Islamic Republic allowing Americans NGO’s and Iranians living in the United States to send money and other equipments to the needy people of Bam.
"The Government could not give to green light to American relief missions without prior authorisation from the leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i, a staunch adversary of normalisation with the Great Satan", an Iranian analyst had observed to Iran Press Service.
But as rapidly the Iranians had agreed to the relief and rescue missions, they rejected a new American proposal to send a "diplomatic mission", led by Senator Elizabeth Doyle to evaluate future American assistance for the region.
Asked why Tehran had rejected the venue of a diplomatic mission, Mr. Ramezanzadeh said laconically that Iran turned down the proposal "owing to involvement in Bam relief operations and it should not be related to other matters", dismissing any link between the US offer and the domestic politics.
He was referring to mounting voices, mostly among the ruling conservatives and the Revolutionary Guards criticising the authorities accepting American relief assistance that got disproportionate media report worldwide.
"Of course Tehran-Washington relations are complicate and full of problems which require appropriate time and atmosphere", he added.
In response to a question about the US humanitarian help to the quake-stricken people of Bam,
Mr. Ramezanzadeh said the earthquake followed by the humanitarian help from all over the world and the United States did its part in this respect with the positive step of lifting sanctions.
On Tehran-Cairo relations, the spokesman said that bilateral relations have gained momentum since President Mohammad Khatami and his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak held a meeting in Geneva last December and that the two countries are willing to remove their differences in line with mutual interest and regional stability.
As he was talking to reporters, the Tehran city council that is under the control of pro-conservatives was debating an official request from the Foreign Affairs Ministry to remove the name of Khaled Eslambouli, the terrorist who killed the late Egyptian president Anwar Sadat from a street in the Capital.
Cairo has made a "sine quoi none" condition the removal of the name of Eslambouli from the street for normalising its relations with the Islamic Republic, ties that were severed on order from the Grand Ayatollah Roohollah Khomeini, the leader of the Islamic revolution to "punish" the Egyptian for recognising officially the State of Israel.
In Cairo, Mr. Ahmad Maher, the Egyptian Foreign Affairs Minister said Iran-Egypt relations "have had many ups and downs, but now the differences of the past, including the Camps Davis issue must be buried to prepare the future for a better relations between the two nations".
Answering a question on Egyptian mediation between Tehran and Washington, Ramezanzadeh said he is unaware of that.
On transfer of the administrative capital from Tehran, he said it has been under study since 1989 and the experts believe that since Tehran is located on the seismic fault-line, it requires national resolve to transfer the capital from Tehran.
The Management and Planning Organization (MPO) and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development have been required to announce their expert studies in this respect within two months, he said, according to IRNA
http://www.iran-press-service.com/articles_2004/Jan_04/iran_us_5104.htm