[NYTr] Iran: Nuke report means US should ease tensions

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

AP - Dec 4, 2007
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IRAN_NUCLEAR?SITE=CTDAN&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Iran: Nuke report means US should ease

By ALI AKBAR DAREINI
Associated Press Writer

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iran on Tuesday touted a new U.S. intelligence
report as vindication that its nuclear program is peaceful. But it was
unclear if the finding would lead to any immediate warming in
U.S.-Iranian relations, including on key issues like Iraq.

Iranian officials insisted Washington should take a less hawkish stance
and drop attempts to impose new sanctions in light of the report's
conclusion that Iran stopped its nuclear weapons program in late 2003
and has shown no signs of resuming.

President Bush ruled out any change in policy. He said sanctions were
still needed to force Iran to stop uranium enrichment, which he warned
could be used for building atomic warheads someday. France and Britain
also said pressure must be maintained on Tehran.

Even Russia, which urges continued negotiations rather than more
sanctions, said Iran must open its nuclear program fully to
international scrutiny and keep it under control of the U.N. atomic
watchdog agency.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, meanwhile, disputed the U.S.
conclusions, saying Israeli intelligence believes Iran is still trying
to develop nuclear weapons.

Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said that "it is vital to
continue efforts to prevent Iran from attaining (nuclear) capability."
Israel is believed to have its own arsenal of nuclear weapons, the only
stockpile in the Mideast.

David Albright, a former U.N. nuclear inspector and now head of the
Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, said
Israel's view meant the military option hasn't been taken off the table
by the report.

Albright said Israel is looking not just at Iran's solely military
efforts but at its uranium enrichment processes, which have potential
military applications. "The situation can become tense if they decided
their red line has been crossed," he said.

But Iran is clearly hopeful the unclassified summary of the National
Intelligence Estimate, released Monday, will weaken the Western push
for new sanctions over Tehran's refusal to obey a U.N. Security Council
order to suspend uranium enrichment.

"The U.S. and its allies should accept nuclear rights of the Iranian
nation. There is no other way, of course," President Mahmoud
Ahmadeinejad said during a meeting with the Swedish ambassador, without
directly mentioning the new report, according to the presidency Web
site.

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said the U.S. will face more
failure if it doesn't change its stance. "Our advice is that they
correct their mistakes regarding Iran's nuclear issue," he told state
television.

Mottaki's spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, said the U.S. report prove
Washington's warnings over the danger of the Iranian nuclear program
"are baseless and unreliable."

The report, a dramatic change from past U.S. intelligence assessments
that Iran was determinedly pursuing a nuclear weapon, will "certainly
undercut any push to get new sanctions," said Suzanne Maloney, a
foreign policy senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington.

Russia and China, which have veto power as permanent members of the
U.N. Security Council along with the U.S., Britain and France, already
were arguing against a third round of sanctions against Iran.

They are likely to push harder for a focus on further negotiations with
Tehran to resolve international desires that Tehran agree on ways
ensure its nuclear program is not used for developing weapons.

Mohammed ElBaradei, head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the
International Atomic Energy Agency, urged all sides to "enter without
delay into negotiations," saying the U.S. report "should help to defuse
the current crisis."

China's ambassador to the United Nations, Wang Guangya, said the U.S.
report made the prospect of new U.N. sanctions less likely. "I think
the council members will have to consider that, because I think we all
start from the presumption that now things have changed."

Still, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the top Iranian nuclear
negotiator, Saeed Jalili, that Iran must cooperate fully with the U.N.
investigation of the nuclear program.

"We expect that your programs in the nuclear sphere will be open,
transparent and be conducted under control of the authoritative
international organization," Putin said at the start of a meeting with
Jalili in Moscow.

Anthony Cordesman, Mideast expert at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies in Washington, said there could be a window of
opportunity if the West puts forward incentives for Iran, "such as
investment with Europe and the U.S."

But "negotiations will probably grow harder rather than easier in the
near future," he said.

That view was echoed by Maloney, who said the report could make both
sides less willing to compromise.

"The U.S. doesn't want to be in a supplicant position to Iran ... and
if anything the Iranian reaction has been to exult in what they
describe as an American mistake," she said.

Movement on the nuclear issue could also become tangled in other
disputes between the U.S. and Iran, as Washington tries to stem what it
says is increasing Iranian influence in the Middle East.

Last week's U.S.-sponsored Mideast peace conference was widely seen as
an attempt to rally Arab moderates to isolate Iran and even try to woo
away Tehran's close ally Syria. Iran denounced the meeting.

U.S. officials accuse Iran of supporting Palestinian and Lebanese
militants and of arming Shiite militants in Iraq who have been involved
in attacks on U.S. forces.

In recent weeks, U.S. military officials said the flow of weapons from
Iran to Iraqi Shiite militias appeared to have been curtailed, although
the Americans were careful to say it was too early to say whether this
represented a change in Tehran's policy.

Iraqi officials say the Iranians pledged to stop the weapons flow
during a visit to Tehran last August by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki.

[Associated Press writers Lily Hindy and Carley Petesch in New York
contributed to this report.]

© 2007 The Associated Press.