US mission to Iran confirmed
From correspondents in Washington
31jan04
A GROUP of US congressional aides is to go to Iran in February on the first official US visit there since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Senator Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, today said the visit could set the stage for a later mission by US lawmakers.
The senator, who met the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations, Mohammad Javad Zarif, on Wednesday said: "The delegation is confirmed, they are going next month." He gave no exact date.
"The Iranian government is not willing to have government to government talks but they feel comfortable with a step at a time," he added.
"They are skittish about going too far and we have gotten to the point where they will accept a small delegation of staffers.
"I think that will set the stage for meetings with parliamentarians and I think we are laying the groundwork for trying to improve relations with Iran, which would be a big boost."
The United States severed relations with the Islamic government in Iran in 1980 following a crisis over hostages seized from the US embassy in Tehran. Only two years ago President George W. Bush said that Iran was part of a weapons proliferating "Axis of Evil" along with Iraq and North Korea.
But while the United States has expressed concern about Iran's suspected nuclear weapons research, relations have shown signs of a thaw.
The United States provided relief assistance to the Iranian city of Bam, devastated by an earthquake in December, and proposed sending a high-level humanitarian delegation to Tehran.
While appreciative of the US earthquake aid, Tehran said the visit of a delegation, that would have been led by Senator Elizabeth Dole and could have included a member of the Bush family, was best delayed.
Specter was among a group of US lawmakers who met Iran's UN ambassador on Friday. Dennis Hastert, the leader of the Republican majority in the House of Representatives, was also present.
Specter said the discussions were "fruitful".
"We talked about terrorism, we talked about co-operation against al-Qaeda. We talked about their nuclear programme."
Zarif's appearance in Washington was a significant gesture. He is basically confined to New York, where the United Nations has its headquarters, and was refused past requests for permission to travel outside the city.
Last Friday, Iran's Foreign Minister Kamal Kharazi met Senator Joseph Biden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
The State Department said today that the Bush administration would not oppose any trip by US lawmakers to Iran.
"In general, we've always encouraged people-to-people exchanges with Iran," spokesman Richard Boucher said.
"We certainly encourage congressional travel in general. It sounds like it would be fine with us, if that's what they decide to do."
A senior State Department official said later that if such a delegation did travel to Iran, the administration would expect the lawmakers to raise US concerns about Tehran's support for anti-Israel groups, its opposition to the Middle East peace process, human rights and its alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons.
In Tehran, the Iranian foreign ministry confirmed that Zarif had met several members of the US Congress, delivering a speech and then having dinner and talks on "regional and international questions".
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,8544443,00.htmlIran hardliners revoke a third of poll bans
By Parinoosh Arami
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's hardline Guardian Council on Friday lifted bans on only a third of the candidates it barred from next month's parliamentary polls and refused demands to postpone an election some reformists are calling a sham.
The council's decision could help split the reformist camp and still not give President Mohammad Khatami's allies enough candidates to be able to win another majority in the assembly.
The 12-man conservative watchdog had banned almost half of the 8,200 hopefuls for the February 20 vote, most of them Khatami allies and 80 of them deputies in the 290-seat parliament.
"More than 1,160 were reinstated," said a Guardian Council statement read out on state television. Some 3,300 out of 3,600 candidates banned by the council had appealed the decision.
Parliamentarian Ali Tajernia said none of the well known liberal firebrands had been cleared to run. "Those who have been approved are those who will not aid a competitive election," he told Reuters.
Reformist deputies have kept up a nearly three-week sit-in protest at parliament, cabinet ministers, vice-presidents and provincial governors have threatened to resign en masse and the Interior Ministry called for the polls to be postponed.
But the unelected council's six clerics and six Islamic lawyers were unmoved.
"The issue of postponement was discussed and was not agreed," Guardian Council chief Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati wrote on the watchdog's Web site.
Many reformists say they will settle for nothing less than the re-instatement of all candidates, but the moderate Khatami who has always stepped back from confrontation with the powerful conservatives, said he still believed compromise was possible.
Influential former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani called for a quick end to the dispute to stop enemies such as the United States making political capital out of it.
"If we hold a successful election with a large turnout they will be disappointed and step back," he told worshippers at Friday prayers, broadcast live on state radio.
But analysts say the hardliners are unconcerned about international opinion as they move to convert their implicit control of the levers of power in Iran to explicit rule.
The Guardian Council has vetoed most of Khatami's reforms passed by his supporters in parliament, while the conservative judiciary has jailed dozens of dissidents and shut down scores of liberal publications.
Students, a powerful political force in a country two-thirds of people are under 30 years-old and the minimum voting age is 15, have kept out of the fray wary of again being drawn into street protests only to be left high and dry by top reformers.
The public also has appeared largely unimpressed by the row, disenchanted by years of broken promises by reformers seemingly unable to bring about social and economic change.
Turnout in local council elections last year was down to as low as 15 percent in major cities and analysts say may not creep much higher in next month's polls either.
http://www.reuters.com/locales/newsArticle.jsp;:401b0d3a:51dea486ff1581e8?type=worldNews&locale=en_IN&storyID=4253863