IAEA Sends Inspectors to Natanz and Isfahan Facilities
•The International Atomic Energy Agency sent a team to inspect the Natanz and Isfahan uranium enrichment facilities, IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said on Wednesday. Iran postponed the inspectors' visit for eight days. The delay may have given the Islamic authorities time for camouflaging their activities, diplomats in Vienna said. Iran had made alterations prior to the inspectors' visit last year to the Kalaye Electric company near Tehran, where traces of enriched uranium were found. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said in Egypt today that in his upcoming visit to Tehran he will ask for full cooperation.
•The Russian foreign ministry spokesman called on Iran to cooperate with the IAEA. Head of the newly formed atomic energy department Alexander Rumyantsev postponed his April trip to Iran until May.
•“We will continue to cooperate with Iran in the peaceful civilian nuclear field as there have been no instructions to the contrary by relevant international bodies,” Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said today. “Russia will fully accomplish its duties regarding the construction of a nuclear power plant in Bushehr, he added. (Mani Kasravi, Moscow)
•Russia denied today that it has stopped cooperating with Iran on Bushehr nuclear plan, but a few days ago a Russian official said financial and organizational obstacles have prevented the timely completion of the project. Due to the US pressure, and Russia's own concern for relations with the European countries, the Bushehr nuclear plant would not be completed in three or four years' time, Glasgow University international relations professor Reza Taqizadeh tells Radio Farda. Russian officials' contradictory statements are nothing new, he adds. (Jamshid Zand)
•Iran has no intention of stopping its nuclear weapons program, and wastes time by trying to negotiate, Italian daily Il Folio writes. (Ahmad Ra'fat, Rome)
Judiciary Blocks Former Reformist MP from Traveling Abroad
•The judiciary banned foreign travel for reformist Tehran MP Fatemeh Haqiqatjoo, who left the Majles last week after the Majles voted to approve her resignation. she found out about her travel ban when she arrived at the airport for a trip to London to attend a students' New Year gathering, she tells Radio Farda. She adds that the travel ban maybe linked to her conviction last year to 10 months in prison for a speech she gave at the Majles. The sentence had been suspended until the end of her term, she adds. Two other resigned MPs, Armin and Yegnanegi, may have also been banned from leaving Iran, she says. (Fereydoun Zarnegar)
http://www.radiofarda.com/transcripts/topstory/2004/03/20040324_2030_0157_0536_EN.aspIRAN LASHES OUT OVER US RELUCTANCE TO ENGAGE IN DIALOGUE
Jim Lobe: 3/22/04
Iranian officials have characterized Washington’s policy-making process as "childish" after a top Bush administration official downplayed the chances of a rapprochement between the United States and Iran. Meanwhile, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has called on Iranians to be vigilant against foreign efforts to destabilize the country.
Iran’s conservatives, who regained control over the Iranian legislature in February’s parliamentary election, have been reportedly eager to pursue a rapprochement with Washington. The rationale for normalization, from the point of view of Iranian conservative leaders, is that a greater sense of international stability is needed to increase the chances for the successful implementation of their domestic agenda, which is aimed at providing an outlet for public frustration over the country’s flagging economy. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
Over the last year, Iran has made repeated overtures to the United States, expressing a desire to restart a dialogue on the normalization of relations, according to a March 16 report in the Financial Times. [For additional information see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Tehran’s main aim would be the lifting of US sanctions, an act that would make it immeasurably easier for conservatives to invigorate Iran’s struggling economy.
To demonstrate its good faith, Tehran reportedly offered to cut its support to a variety of radical groups in the Middle East, including the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas. Iranian officials also may have held out the prospect of talks concerning Tehran’s ongoing efforts to develop nuclear capabilities. Iranian leaders insist that the country’s nuclear program is designed to meet civilian energy needs. International experts worry, however, that Iran’s program may develop weapons-making capabilities. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
The Bush administration never responded to the Iranian feelers. Apparently, fierce differences among top presidential advisors caused policy gridlock within the White House, the Financial Times report suggested.
Iranian officials did not comment on the Financial Times report. Then, in a March 18, television interview broadcast by the CNN network, US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice dismissed the need for US-Iranian talks. She cited US concerns about the Iranian nuclear program. Rice also mentioned Washington’s suspicion that Tehran may be sheltering leaders of the al Qaeda terrorist organization, and trying to disrupt US stabilization efforts in neighboring Iraq. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. "I don’t think anybody needs to have a conversation with the Iranians, because they know what the problem is," Rice told CNN.
On March 20, the official Iranian news agency IRNA ridiculed Rice’s comments as "another example of contradictory and non-coherent stances in the American policy-making apparatus." The report went on to say that Washington had sent "contradictory" signals in recent months, mentioning specifically the US goodwill gesture of providing humanitarian aid to victims of the late December 2003 Bam earthquake, and the tough US stance on Iran’s nuclear program.
The IRNA commentary suggested that Iran was looking for a more consistent policy coming out of the White House. "Only a fundamental change in US policies would change the existing atmosphere of hostility between the two arch-foes [the United States and Iran]," the IRNA commentary said.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hamid Reza Asefi, also heaped scorn on the Bush administration. "America’s childish persistence on its wrong policies has led to an escalation of insecurity in the world," the foreign ministry spokesman said. He added that the US reconstruction struggles in both Afghanistan and Iraq raised questions "about the appropriateness of American policies among its [Washington’s] own allies."
Iranian leaders are now concerned that, rather than engaging Tehran, Washington will undertake measures aimed at destabilizing the Islamic republic, especially in the event that Bush wins re-election in November. Many in Tehran apparently believe that ongoing problems with reconstruction efforts in both Iraq and Afghanistan could prompt the Bush administration to attempt to cast Iran as a scapegoat.
In public comments March 21, Khamenei, the supreme leader, said the United States was "stuck in a quagmire" in Iraq. He went on to caution that the United States was likely to try to destabilize Iran. "The most important duty of people and officials is to be vigilant," IRNA quoted Khamenei as saying. "The enemy should know that any decision it is making against the Iranian nation will be thwarted because Iranians are awake and vigilant."
The shrill tone of recent Iranian rhetoric may be indicative of the conservatives’ profound disappointment over the Bush administration’s refusal to engage. The inability to count on a rapprochement with the United States means the conservatives’ ability to implement their domestic stabilization agenda is in doubt.
Just a few months ago, many observers in both Washington and Tehran believed that a thaw was in the offing. This idea gained momentum in January when the United States dispatched planeloads of emergency aid to Bam earthquake victims, and followed up with an offer to send a high-level delegation to inspect the damage.
In addition, while Washington was highly critical of February’s parliamentary election, it refrained from mounting an intensive effort to discredit the results. Meanwhile, in Iraq, the US-dominated Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) approved plans for the construction of an oil pipeline across the Shatt al-Arab waterway to the Iranian port of Abadan, a project that is expected to be completed by the end of this year. Iranian conservatives had hoped such signals meant that the United States was prepared to parlay. But subsequent events have shown that such hopes were misplaced.
http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav032204.shtml