Iran's first nuclear reactor caps decades of living dangerously

What in the world is the West going to do about Iran? News that Iran had started loading fuel into its first nuclear power plant in Bushehr is a reminder of the limits of muscular foreign policy. Decades of confrontation with Tehran, including economic sanctions and diplomatic isolation, have served only to get us where we are now: less control over events combined with deepening mistrust and growing animosity. "Despite all the pressures, sanctions and hardships imposed by Western nations, we are now witnessing the start-up of the largest symbol of Iran's peaceful nuclear activities," Iranian nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi told a news conference on Iranian television as technicians prepared a fuel rod assembly at the plant, according to the Reuters international news service. Iran completed the plant with the help of Rosatom, Russia's state nuclear corporation, over the objections of the United States. But a U.S. State Department spokesman said Washington did not consider the Bushehr reactor to be a proliferation threat because Russia would be providing fuel and taking back spent fuel rods for reprocessing. "Russia's support for Bushehr underscores that Iran does not need an indigenous enrichment capability if its intentions are purely peaceful," spokesman Darby Holladay told Reuters. Russia backed a U.N. Security Council resolution in June that imposed a fourth round of economic sanctions on Iran to discourage Tehran from trying to develop nuclear weaponry. Construction of the reactor at Bushehr was started in the 1970s, before the Islamic revolution that toppled the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran and started what has now been more than 30 years of animosity between Tehran and Washington.

Refusing to sell fuel would be step toward war

Has it become the official position of the United States that war with Iran is considered the best way to move beyond the current stalemate over Tehran's suspected nuclear weapons development? That's how it seemed Monday after Iran complained that three U.S. allies had refused to permit Iranian planes to refuel at airports in their countries. If it's true, it's an extremely hostile and provocative act -- especially since it comes just days after the United States and European Union imposed a wide-ranging array of sanctions against Iranian business and government interests. "Since last week, our planes have been refused fuel at airports in Britain, Germany and UAE because of the sanctions imposed by America," the secretary of the Iranian Airlines Union, Mehdi Aliyari, told Iran's ISNA news agency, according to the Reuters international news service. "Refusing to provide fuel to Iranian passenger planes by these countries is a violation of international conventions." The governments in Britain, Germany and the United Arab Emirates immediately denied the allegation and said they were complying with worldwide agreements and fulfilling contracts with Iranian airlines. But will they when current contracts expire, and how much pressure will Iran endure before lashing out against its neighbors or against Israel? The new sanctions are aimed at restricting Iran's ability to import refined oil products, like gasoline, that it does not produce on its own, even though it is the world's fifth-largest exporter of petroleum. An Iranian lawmaker, Hesmatollah Falahatpisheh, told ISNA that his country would retaliate against any country refusing to service its airplanes, Reuters said. "Iran will do the same to ships and planes of those countries that cause problems for us," he said. But more countries and companies are agreeing to comply with the new sanctions regime. This summer, United Arab Emirates froze more than 40 accounts of Iranian individuals and companies suspected of helping Iran evade current U.N. sanctions, which are not as strict. Western countries think Iran is trying to use its civilian nuclear power program to advance its development of nuclear weapons, but Iran denies the allegation.

Obama grows into commander-in-chief role

Today's White House ceremony marking the signing of new economic sanctions against Iran illustrates the recognition by U.S. President Barack Obama that his well-meaning leftist ideology does not always translate well to international affairs. The kind of world Obama envisioned when he spoke so hopefully in Cairo just after taking office in 2009 is not the kind we have. Iran has not responded forthrightly to U.S. efforts to convince Tehran to abandon nuclear weapons development and, instead, has threatened the United States and its allies -- notably Israel. Iran denies trying to develop nuclear weapons and insists its program is for peaceful purposes. But Tehran has lied before and, given the tense relations between Iran and the United States almost continuously since the violent 1979 revolution that replaced the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran with an Islamic government, could reasonably be expected to do so again. Previous rounds of sanctions imposed by Western nations have not been effective in getting Iran to honestly discuss its nuclear ambitions. Obama's endorsement of further sanctions -- this time, expected to restrict Tehran's import of oil for domestic purposes and severely penalize private companies that enable Iran to get around them -- indicates that he, too, is frustrated by the lack of progress and convinced of the need to take determined action short of outright war. "There should be no doubt -- the United States and the international community are determined to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons," Obama said at the signing of the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act. "With these sanctions -- along with others -- we are striking at the heart of the Iranian government's ability to fund and develop its nuclear programs. We are showing the Iranian government that its actions have consequences." Iran has already starting feeling the effects of the newly toughened sanctions, Reuters said. French oil giant Total announced it would stop selling refined fuel to Tehran and Spain's Repsol withdrew from a contract to help develop Iran's South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf, the news service said.

Someone's not telling the truth in U.S.-Iran nuclear dispute

Lingering mistrust over the imperial attitude of the United States during the last administration no doubt took at lot of the sting off Monday's trade of hyperbole between Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the United Nations in New York. After Ahmadinejad delivered his expected tirade against the United States, which is trying to put together international economic sanctions to penalize Iran for trying to develop nuclear weapons, Clinton accused Tehran of ignoring its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and called for "a strong international response," according to Cable News Network. The two leaders spoke at the opening of a monthlong conference on nuclear nonproliferation, which has taken on additional urgency of late due to Iran's apparent progress toward developing nuclear weaponry and North Korea's detonations of two nuclear warheads since 2006. Diplomats from the United States, Britain and France walked out of Ahmadinejad's speech a few minutes after he began speaking, CNN said. But the diplomats no doubt heard Ahmadinejad denounce the United States for accusing Iran of nuclear activities without "even a single credible proof," and for permitting Israel to compile an arsenal of several hundred nuclear weapons. "Regrettably," Ahmadinejad told the conference, "the government of the United States has not only used nuclear weapons, but also continues to threaten to use such weapons against other countries, including Iran." Of course, Ahmadinejad speaks as if the world hadn't repeatedly heard him threaten Israel with annihilation. And, as if Israel hadn't already proved itself capable of maintaining a nuclear stockpile in a peaceful manner -- something no one wants to see unstable Iran try to do. Clinton, for her part, accused Iran of placing the future of the nonproliferation treaty in jeopardy with its actions and disingenuous remarks. Iran "will do whatever it can to divert attention from its own record and to attempt to evade accountability," she said. "I hope that we can reach agreement in the Security Council on tough new sanctions because I believe that is the only way to catch Iran's attention," Clinton told reporters after her speech. Ahmadinejad also called for a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East, a concept endorsed by the United States. Clinton said such a zone would be possible only after successful peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Clinton also called for creation of a $50 million Peaceful Uses Initiative by the International Atomic Energy Agency to bring the benefits of nuclear energy to more countries, no doubt a reaction to Ahmadinejad's oft-repeated complaint that the United States and Western nations were trying to monopolize nuclear technology.

Progressive nuclear policies sound good but mean nothing

While it'll been fun hearing right-wing blowhards blow a little harder this week, the most important thing about the new nuclear weapons policy unveiled Tuesday by U.S. President Barack Obama is that it doesn't mean anything. Rhetoric about when and where a country will or will not use nuclear arms is meaningless because neither situations nor temptations can be accurately predicted in advance. So, the Obama administration's Nuclear Posture Review, a document required from all U.S. governments by the Congress, can be full of lofty anti-nuclear sentiment yet not reflect what the country will actually do in the event of nuclear conflict. If another country launches a nuclear attack on the United States, sentiment loses all value. Critics of the administration must realize this, even as they launch what are sure to be bombastic attacks on the new policy. The Obama policy, which replaces the Bush administration's threat of nuclear retaliation in the event of chemical or biological attack, commits the United States to refrain from the use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear countries that comply with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970, according to the Reuters international news service. The new policy also declares that the United States will not develop any new nuclear weapons. "We are taking specific and concrete steps to reduce the role of nuclear weapons while preserving our military superiority, deterring aggression and safeguarding the security of the American people," Obama said in a statement released by the White House, Reuters said. The policy was released in time for Thursday's scheduled signing of a new arms reduction treaty with Russia and appears designed to enhance next week's 47-nation nuclear summit in Washington. Iran and North Korea, emerging nuclear powers that have not signed the treaty, were deliberately left out of the non-use guarantee, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said. "If there is a message for Iran and North Korea here, it is ... if you're not going to play by the rules, if you're going to be a proliferator, then all options are on the table in terms of how we deal with you," Gates told reporters, Reuters said. The document also expressed concern about China, which has a nuclear arsenal and has signed the treaty, but has not been forthcoming about its program. "China's nuclear arsenal remains much smaller than the arsenals of Russia and the United States," the document said. "But the lack of transparency surrounding its nuclear programs -- their pace and scope, as well as the strategy and doctrine that guides them -- raises questions about China's future strategic intentions." Obama is expected to hold talks with Chinese leader Hu Jintao on the sidelines of next week's summit that will possibly include China's nuclear program as well as the value of its currency, Reuters said.

Arab League can't decide whether to endorse talks with Iran or between Palestinians and Israelis

News from Libya that the Arab League was unable to agree whether to endorse indirect peace talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel should be no surprise to anyone after the PA expressed outrage over Israeli plans to build 1,600 homes near east Jerusalem. The league's two-day summit in Sirte ended abruptly after the 22 nations were unable to agree on either a new endorsement of the peace talks or on formulating a new approach to Iran, according to the Reuters international news service. The Arab League did endorse U.S.-mediated proximity talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority earlier this month. "Within the next few weeks, we have to decide what to do: whether to continue with the negotiations or to completely shift course," Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said at a news conference after the summit closed down. Moussa said Arab states were frustrated by the slow pace of negotiations between Jerusalem and Ramallah and would propose alternatives if there was no progress soon, Reuters said. "We cannot enter into a vicious circle to be added to the hundreds of previous vicious circles that will end in another zero result," Moussa said. "We are fed up with this." The stalemate is bad news for the stalled peace process, since Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas probably will be reluctant to conduct substantive talks without the Arab League endorsement due to the threat from hardliners in his own community. Of course, there is no reason to expect anything from the Arab League if the Palestinians themselves are unwilling to pursue an actual peace agreement with Israel. And, of course, nothing is what came of the proposal before the Arab League to start talks with Tehran about Iran's nuclear program, Reuters said. Foreign ministers were unable to agree on their next step, even though Persian Gulf states near Iran had expressed concerns about problems if Tehran develops weapons or is prevented from doing so by Western states. "I do not believe the time has come where we can see that Iran has changed its behavior toward Arab countries," said Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia's foreign minister. Iran has insisted that its nuclear development is intended solely for peaceful purposes, even though it doesn't make sense for the country with the world's third-largest oil reserves to pursue nuclear power to generate electricity.

U.S. and Russia appear on verge of nuclear arms reduction deal

With Western nations focused on emerging nuclear powers North Korea and Iran, word from Washington on Wednesday that the United States and Russia are on the verge of reaching a new agreement to reduce the world's largest nuclear arsenals comes as quite a surprise. But it's a good surprise for a change. Officials from both countries say U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev have managed a way around the last remaining obstacle to a deal to replace the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty of 1991 that expired in December, according to the New York Times. The two leaders reportedly need one more meeting to finalize the new agreement, which would require their countries to reduce warheads and launchers by more than 25 percent, the Times said. The White House and the Kremlin declined to comment on the reports, but officials on both sides confirmed the breakthrough on the condition of anonymity, the newspaper said. A signing ceremony is planned in Prague early next month. The deal caps a year of sometimes problematic negotiations that was originally intended to wrap up a new deal by the end of 2009. But the talks got hung up on verification, sharing information and limits on missile defense systems, the Times said, even though Obama agreed not to construct a planned European-based missile shield authorized by his predecessor, former President George W. Bush. The planned Prague ceremony would help jump-start an international summit on nuclear nonproliferation that Obama has scheduled for April 12 and 13 in Washington, the Times said.

Russia moves toward backing sanctions against Iran

Just when it seemed that international efforts to convince Iran to stop its nuclear weapons program were failing comes word that Russia was dissatisfied with Tehran's level of cooperation and might be willing to support sanctions in the future. Speaking to the press following a meeting between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton just outside Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said his country did not rule out the possibility that sanctions could be necessary to convince Iran to stop trying to develop nuclear weaponry, according to the Reuters international news service. Lavrov said reports from the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency indicated that Iran did not appear to be close to developing such weapons at this time. "The reports that the IAEA director-general publishes on a regular basis contain very precise assessments that do not give reason for any sort of alarm," Lavrov said. "But that does not mean that we are satisfied with Iranian actions. What we see is that they are letting the opportunity to establish normal, systematic, mutually beneficial dialogue with the international community slip away." U.S. officials have been trying to convince the UN Security Council to agree to impose severe international sanctions on Iran's Islamic government, with which it has exchanged threatening dialogue over the past few years. Iran has threatened to attack Israel, a close U.S. ally, and has been involved in sharp public exchanges with both countries over the years since the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis. But both Russia and China will have to agree before the Security Council can impose new sanctions on Iran. "As President Medvedev has said, sanctions rarely work, but situations can arise when they are unavoidable, and we do not rule out that such a situation may arise in relation to Iran," Lavrov said, according to a Reuters report citing the Interfax news agency.

Brazil's refusal to join Iran sanctions regime means only one thing

Brazil's continued refusal to join Western efforts to deny nuclear weapons to Iran can lead to only one conclusion -- Brasilia is more interested in keeping open its own options to build atomic weaponry than in international peace and security. Does anyone really think that the world will be a safer place if Iran and its crazy leader, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, have nuclear weapons? Of course not, yet Brazil turned down U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's latest offer to the country to join the multination effort to sanction Iran today in Brasilia, according to the Washington Post newspaper. Western nations meeting at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna denounced the recent Iranian decision to enrich its uranium to nearly 20 percent, well beyond the 5 percent needed for nuclear reactors, the Post said. "Iran seems determined to defy, obfuscate and stymie," said Ambassador Glyn Davies, who leads the U.S. delegation to the UN nuclear watchdog agency. Iran says it has no designs on nuclear weapons but needs higher-grade uranium for its medical isotope reactor, a claim dismissed as untrue by Western leaders. Of course, anybody hoping that Brazil, the world's eighth-largest country, would soon be taking its place among the world's most-responsible powers, must be sorely disappointed. Instead of signing up for the world effort, Brazil's leader, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, told a news conference it would not be wise "to push Iran into a corner" on the nuclear issue after his meeting with Clinton. The nonprofit Institute for Science and International Security released an analysis Wednesday that said a stockpile of 20 percent-enriched uranium could be made into a bomb's worth of weapons-grade fuel in about a month, the Post said.

U.S. urges sanctions against Iran's Revolutionary Guards

Could Iran have finally run out of time to comply with Western demands that it stop trying to produce nuclear weapons? Monday's comments threatening international economic sanctions against the country's elite Revolutionary Guards raises the stakes even further by exposing the men behind the curtain. The Revolutionary Guards are the power behind the theocracy -- and now, finally, Western nations have gotten personal. What else to make of Monday's comments by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton threatening to include the group in the next round of economic sanctions aimed at forcing Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program. Speaking in Qatar on her way to Riyadh, the Saudi capital, Clinton said the United States would not "stand idly by" while Iran pursued nuclear weapons, according to the Reuters international news service. "We are planning to try to bring the world community together in applying pressure to Iran through sanctions adopted by the United Nations that will be particularly aimed at those enterprises controlled by the Revolutionary Guard, which we believe is, in effect, supplanting the government of Iran," Clinton said. The Revolutionary Guard group, which was set up after the 1979 revolution to protect the country's rulers, has 125,000 soldiers and includes army, navy and air divisions, Reuters said. The group is separate from Iran's 350,000-soldier army and is under the command of the country's top religious authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The group has steadily expanded its reach and is now involved in construction projects, international trade and oil and gas development. Clinton said the United States thinks the Revolutionary Guards group was overpowering Iran's civilian government and aiming to set up a military dictatorship. "We see that the government of Iran, the supreme leader, the president, the parliament, is being supplanted and that Iran is moving toward a military dictatorship," she said. "That is our view." Clinton also made a point of stating that the United States was not contemplating war with Iran. "We are planning to try to bring the world community together in applying pressure to Iran through sanctions adopted by the United Nations that will be particularly aimed at those enterprises controlled by the Revolutionary Guard, which we believe is, in effect, supplanting the government of Iran," she said. But what politicians say is not always what they mean. It should be fairly obvious to everyone where this is headed, unless Iran drops its pretenses and agrees to give up its uranium enrichment programs.

Biden says China will sign on to Iran sanctions

Say whatever you want to about U.S. Vice President Joe Biden -- and, indeed, many people say a lot of things that are not complimentary -- he does tell it exactly how it is. Of course, you're not always sure if he's speaking with the approval of U.S. President Barack Obama, the head of the government, or if he's just revealed something that would have been better kept unsaid, but his comments do have the ring of truth. That is a rare quality in a politician these days. So when Biden told the NBC-TV program "Meet the Press" on Sunday that the United States expected China to agree with international efforts to impose punitive economic sanctions against Iran for refusing to end its nuclear weapons program, he was making perfect sense. "We have the support of everyone from Russia to Europe," Biden told NBC, according to the Reuters international news service. "I believe we'll get the support of China to continue to impose sanctions on Iran to isolate them, to make it clear that in fact they cannot move forward." China, which depends on Iran for oil imports, is the fifth veto power on the UN Security Council and must agree before international sanctions can be imposed or enforced. Iran, for its part, continues to deny trying to build a nuclear weapon and insists its nuclear technology development is intended only for peaceful purposes. But it's illogical for the world's third largest reserves of oil to seek nuclear power for energy -- it has oil. Iran's pursuit of nuclear technology only makes sense if it seeks nuclear weapons. And China certainly understands the threat to the world economic order, in which it is just now getting the upper hand, if an unstable head of state like Iran's Mahmoud Ahmedinejad figures out how to build nuclear bombs.

Iran puts into writing what everyone knew all along

Well, it's finally put up or shut up time for the West on Iran's nuclear program, as if what happened wasn't obvious all along. We're discussing, of course, Tehran's formal rejection of a United Nations proposal to send most of the country's enriched uranium abroad for processing. The International Atomic Energy Agency announced that it had received a letter from Iran rejecting parts of the proposed deal, designed to prevent the country from developing nuclear weapons, according to the Reuters international news service. Western nations had backed the plan offered by former IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei but Iran allowed the proposal's Dec. 31 deadline to pass despite threats of economic penalties for noncompliance. The plan would have required Iran to transfer at least 70 percent of its nuclear fuel to a European nation for enrichment to levels suitable for power but not for weaponry. Iran reportedly agreed to the deal in principle in October at six-party talks in Geneva, but has raised objections to its provisions ever since. Now, it's up to the United States, European Union and other Western nations to either come up with a sanctions regime that will force Iran's capitulation or raise the stakes and put some threat of force on the table. Parties to the October talks -- the United States, France, Britain, Germany, Russia and China -- have started to discuss future actions, Reuters said. Of course, that only makes sense if the six powers really thought Iran would comply with the terms of the deal -- a considerable reach given Iran's behavior in the past. The six powers, and the West, surely already have plans in place for what to do now -- hopefully, they'll let the rest of us know soon, because the security of the entire world would seem to be at risk.

U.S. oil companies launch new Iraq invasion

And they're off! We're talking, of course, about the latest charge by U.S. companies toward financial nirvana in Iraq, where their expertise is apparently essential for the world's second largest proven oil reserves to be re-equipped for full production. Iraq officials are aiming for a five-fold increase in production to more than 11 million barrels a day in the next seven years, according to the New York Times. That level of oil production would rival Saudi Arabia and Iran for No. 1 in the world, the Times said. Such an increase means billions of dollars in contracts for new oil drilling, repairs to thousands of miles of pipeline, updating current facilities and construction of many more -- including, possibly, a new port on the Persian Gulf. U.S.-based oil-services companies Halliburton, Baker Hughes, Weatherford International and Schlumberger have either started sending workers and equipment to Iraq or have plans to, and construction and engineering giants KBR, Bechtel, Parsons, Fluor and Foster Wheeler are not far behind, the Times said. But Halliburton and its former subsidiary KBR, which used to be run by former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, Bechtel and Parsons were criticized by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction for earlier work in the country, and could be headed for trouble before they're offered more. The companies have denied intentional wrongdoing and say that their experience in Iraq and in other oil-producing countries in Central Asia gives them an advantage, the Times said. “KBR has historic experience on previous oil and gas production projects ranging from Azerbaijan to Kazakhstan,” said Heather Browne, KBR’s director of corporate communications, in an e-mail to the Times. “Our pursuit of additional contracts in the region is based on this experience in addition to KBR’s work on Project RIO (Restore Iraq Oil).” David Lesar, Halliburton’s chief executive, said in October that his company was already doing work on oil wells there. “I think you see everybody trying to establish a base there, and we’re no exception,” he said. “Clearly, a great future there and one we will participate in — in a big way.” Iraq has signed 10 production contracts with international oil companies in the past few months and officials say they hope to drill at least 430 oil wells during the next two years, the Times said.

Isn't it time to get tough with Iran?

Does the United States really think additional economic sanctions will force Iran to come to the conclusion that its future depends on peaceful relations with Western nations? That years of international economic pressure -- which so far have only made Tehran more belligerent -- can be raised to a level that Iran cannot continue to ignore with impunity? Just hearing the words out loud makes it easy to see how preposterous that is. Yet Washington is at it again, trying to convince reluctant allies that depend on Iran for oil to power their economies to comply with stricter economic sanctions. "We have already begun discussions with our partners and with like-minded nations about pressure and sanctions," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters Monday at a news conference in Washington, according to the Reuters international news service. "Our goal is to pressure the Iranian government, particularly the Revolutionary Guard elements, without contributing to the suffering of the ordinary (people), who deserve better than what they currently are receiving." If this sounds familiar, it should. Every president since Jimmy Carter has tried some measure of the same tactic to influence Tehran but has failed. There is no reason to think the strategy will succeed this time. Look at the way Iran's government is trying to repress the reform movement -- arrests and mistreatment of detainees. If this also sounds familiar, it should. But making things a little more difficult for Iran will not be good enough -- things have to be a lot more difficult before Tehran will be forced to care. Iran has obviously realized that despite all the rhetoric, Western nations do not actually want to cut their crippling dependence on oil from the Middle East -- even though that has always been the only way to get Tehran to take notice.

Death of leading opposition cleric could spark new unrest in Iran

Sunday's death of reform-minded Shiite cleric Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, the most senior member of Iran's religious establishment, plunges the conservative government in Tehran into perhaps its most precarious state since the 1979 revolution that brought Islamic fundamentalists to power. Tens of thousands of supporters of Montazeri, 87, a founder of the modern Islamic republic who later broke with inspirational leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini over policy, are expected to converge on the holy city of Qom for his funeral next week over the objections of the government in Tehran. Coming just months after the disputed presidential election in June that resulted in street protests, mass arrests and charges of mistreatment against authorities, Montazeri's funeral could pose a direct challenge to the rule of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Prime Minister Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, according to the New York Times. The government was said to be preparing for a showdown by dispatching legions of riot police to the Qom area and closing the main highway from Tehran. Opposition leaders, such as former presidential candidates Mir Hossein Moussavi and Mehdi Karoubi, urged mourners to travel to Qom for the funeral, just days before a national day of protest planned for the Moslem holiday of Ashura on Dec. 27, the Times said. Montazeri, known throughout Iran as the plain-spoken cleric, had become an outspoken critic of the regime. He criticized Khameini and Ahmedinejad's government as non-Islamic and non-democratic, and accused the Basij militia, which has violently suppressed street rallies, of forsaking the "path of God" for the "path of Satan." Montazeri also has apologized for the 1979 sacking of the U.S. embassy in Tehran and the holding of 53 hostages for more than a year, an event celebrated by the current government. “A political system based on force, oppression, changing people’s votes, killing, closure, arresting and using Stalinist and medieval torture, creating repression, censorship of newspapers, interruption of the means of mass communications, jailing the enlightened and the elite of society for false reasons, and forcing them to make false confessions in jail, is condemned and illegitimate,” Montazeri wrote. Montazeri is considered the father of the concept of clerical rule, an idea he later said was misinterpreted by Iran's leaders, and was placed under house arrest in 1997 for criticizing Khamenei. The house arrest was lifted in 2003 after legislators appealed to then-president Mohammed Khatami, who also was a reformer, the Times said.

Doubts about Iran's intentions increase after IAEA censure

So, what is Iran thinking now? Today's announcement that the Islamic republic plans to build 10 new uranium enrichment plants to add to its known facilities at Natanz and Qom can only be seen as a rebuke, even if a petulant one, to Friday's censure by the International Atomic Energy Agency. But why? Does Iran think it is impervious to international economic sanctions, or to military action if it starts developing nuclear weapons? Is it? The UN's nuclear monitoring agency voted 35-0 to condemn Iran for secretly building an underground enrichment facility near Qom, including votes from usual Tehran supporters Russia and China, according to the Reuters international news service. The existence of the plant, which apparently had been suspected by Western countries' spy agencies for some time, was revealed by Iran in September and discussed publicly for the first time in October by U.S. President Barack Obama at a conference in Geneva. The revelation added renewed urgency to Western nations' effort to prevent Iran, the world's fifth-largest oil exporting nation by volume, to develop nuclear weaponry, because the enrichment plant is not suitable for civilian nuclear power, Tehran's stated intention. Iran has backed away from an agreement with Western nations to surrender its uranium stockpiles in exchange for a guaranteed supply of low-level enriched uranium to power a medical research reactor, adding to Western suspicions. "We have a friendly approach toward the world but at the same time we won't let anyone harm even one iota of the Iranian nation's rights," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad said Sunday, Reuters said. Ahmedinejad maintains Iran has a right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy. But Ahmedinejad does not discuss why a major oil producer like Iran would even need nuclear power for electricity when it has such an abundant supply of petroleum, a safer fuel. The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, told Iran's Mehr News Agency that "10 new enrichment plants will be built," Reuters said, and that locations for five of them had already been decided. The 10 proposed enrichment plants would be the same size as the facility at Natanz, Iran's main enrichment site.

Kremlin says U.S. and Russia to sign weapons-reduction deal in December

Anybody still remember the Cold War? Remember air-raid sirens and fallout shelter drills? Remember Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev saying "We will bury you?" Remember the Soviet Union? Those days were brought to mind Friday when Russia said it expected to sign a new agreement with the United States to destroy a portion of the two countries' arsenals of thousands of nuclear weapons, according to the Reuters international news service. The new deal, designed to replace the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty that expires Dec. 5, got a boost in April when Russian President Dimitry Medvedev and U.S. President Barack Obama issued a joint statement about reaching a new agreement and again in July when the two agreed to cut their arsenals by a third. Diplomatic frictions that damaged Russia-U.S. relations were relaxed in September when Obama said he would roll back plans for a missile shield in Eastern Europe, even though outstanding issues from Russia's brief war with U.S. ally Georgia remain unresolved. Today's report was attributed by Reuters to an unnamed source in Minsk, where Medvedev was meeting with regional leaders. "This treaty is a great move ahead and will improve relations between the United States and Russia," Roland Timerbayev, a former Soviet ambassador and nuclear arms negotiator, told Reuters. But both sides said it is possible that they will not be able to reach a deal before the Dec. 5 expiration of the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. "The delegations of Russia and the United States are working incessantly but not looking at the time," the Russian Foreign Ministry said. "The timeframe for signing new agreement is important but does not define the negotiating process; rather, (the process is defined) by the striving of the leaders of Russia and the United States to agree a full, properly working bilateral agreement." Diplomats from both countries say continuing cooperation between Russia and the United States on dealing with Iran's nuclear ambitions have helped them to resolve remaining issues on a new treaty.

Islamic cleric's anti-government views achieve new stature in Iran

From Iran comes word that a high-ranking Islamic cleric once close to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the inspiration of the 1979 revolution, has emerged as the spiritual leader of ongoing opposition to the reigning government in Tehran. Followers of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, regarded as the most knowledgeable Islamic scholar in the country of 66 million, could pose a real threat to the Shiite theocracy headed by current Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and to the conservative government of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, Iran's president. Montazeri has long been critical of Khamenei in his religious edicts but has stayed out of trouble during the post-election crackdown, probably because of his religious credentials and his role in the 1979 revolution, the New York Times said Saturday. Montazeri, now in his 80s, was seen as Khomeini's successor following the revolution that toppled the U.S.-backed Shah of Iran. But the two had a falling out over what Montazeri saw as as abuses of power by the Islamic government during a series of executions of political prisoners in 1988, the Times said. The crackdown on opposition following the June election, in which Ahmedinejad claimed to have been re-elected but his chief opponent, former prime minister Mir Hussein Moussavi, alleged a fraudulent ballot count, has refocused the country's attention on Montazeri. Thousands have been arrested and many executed, and those imprisoned have complained about terrible treatment by authorities. "A political system based on force, oppression, changing people’s votes, killing, closure, arresting and using Stalinist and medieval torture, creating repression, censorship of newspapers, interruption of the means of mass communications, jailing the enlightened and the elite of society for false reasons, and forcing them to make false confessions in jail, is condemned and illegitimate,” Montazeri said in written comments posted on Web sites since the election, the Times said. Mehdi Kalaji of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a former seminary student in Qom, said Montazeri is the leading cleric criticizing the theocracy from a religious perspective. “We have many intellectuals who criticize this regime from the democratic point of view,” Khalaji told the Times. "He criticizes this regime purely from a religious point of view, and this is very hurtful. The regime wants to say, ‘If I am not democratic enough that doesn’t matter, I am Islamic.’ He says it is not an Islamic government.” Montazeri's contentions also make sense to the West, where political observers wonder about religion's role in the Iranian government's excesses, including its apparently single-minded pursuit of nuclear weaponry.

Why does Iran need more time to decide if it will fulfill its nuclear obligations?

Monday's report from Vienna that a top U.S. diplomat said Iran should get more time to decide whether to fulfill the obligation to give up most of its nuclear fuel under a deal negotiated in Geneva in September does not make sense unless something else is going on that has been left out of the public record. Iran agreed to the deal to secure enriched uranium for its nuclear medicine facility and avoid stepped-up economic sanctions by the United States and other world powers; if Tehran wants out of the agreement, it should drop pretending and continue on the road to pariah statehood. "There have been communications back and forth. We are in extra innings in these negotiations. That's sometimes the way these things go," said Glyn Davies, the U.S. ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations-sponsored entity that monitors on nuclear activity worldwide. "We want to give some space to Iran to work through this," Davies said. "It's a tough issue for them, quite obviously, and we're hoping for an early, positive answer from the Iranians." But the Iranians have a history of stalling for time to continue developing their offensive capacities, and not to contribute to peaceful resolution of ongoing disputes. Iran contends its nuclear development is intended for peaceful purposes, despite its huge oil reserves and the revelation in September that it was building a secret enrichment plant at a military base near Qom. U.S. experts say the plant could not have enriched enough uranium for a civilian nuclear power plant and was almost surely designed for nuclear weaponry. Turkey has offered to mediate the international dispute, but it is apparent that Tehran is not willing to halt its activities despite the risk of sanctions. That's why Iran has not yet offered a formal reply to international demands that it comply with the agreement, and why it doesn't make sense to give the Islamic republic even more time to stall. If the international community's patience is "not infinite," as Germany's chief negotiator said the other day, it's time to bring on the "consequences" that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned of in Berlin. There is no reason to wait until the end of the year. Iran can continue to protest diplomatically all it wants, but it should do so without its stash of nuclear fuel and without its ability to threaten nearby countries.

Nuclear deal with Iran faces crucial test tomorrow

Iran's effort to forestall tightening international economic sanctions over its nuclear program faces its first major test tomorrow when UN inspectors are scheduled to enter its formerly secret uranium enrichment facility near Qom. Nobody except the Iranians even knows if the experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency will actually be admitted to the site, even though Iran agreed to that in Geneva last month under pressure from Western nations, according to the Washington Post. The meeting was noteworthy for several developments, including the first public announcement of the existence of the enrichment plant and the highest-level official contact between Iran and the United States since 1979. Iran acknowledged the plant's existence in a letter to the IAEA last month, just before the Geneva conference. Tehran insists it has no designs on nuclear weapons but is merely developing nuclear power for electricity, which it insists it has a right to. But the plant, still under construction on the side of a mountain at a military base yet apparently known about for years by intelligence agencies worldwide, only is suitable for weapons development, the Post said. Iran plans to place only 3,000 centrifuges at the site, which is not enough to enrich uranium for a civilian nuclear plant, the Post said citing expert sources. Analysts say it would take Qom's centrifuges at least 20 years to produce enough uranium to power a 1,000- megawatt nuclear power reactor for a year. But the equipment could produce enough enriched uranium to build three nuclear bombs annually, the Times said. "There is no Iranian document saying the facility is designed for a military program, but what else can it be good for?" a senior Middle East-based intelligence official who studies Iran told the Times. In fact, the Qom plant has forced the United States to reconsider the 2007 conclusion of its intelligence agencies that Iran had halted nuclear weapons research in 2003. "Qom changed a lot of people's thinking, especially about the possibility of secret military enrichment" of uranium, another former officials told the Times. The revised assessments are classified, the Times said. But the public revelations about the plant do raise obvious questions about Iran's intentions, despite its protestations to the contrary. Of course, it never made sense that Iran needed to pursue civilian nuclear energy when it sits atop a sixth of worldwide oil reserves. If Russia and China are sufficiently alarmed, Qom could be the catalyst for further tightening of worldwide economic sanctions, just when it seemed Iran wanted to rejoin the nations trying to figure out how to live in peace.