New Israeli-Palestinian talks are doomed to failure

Nothing constructive is likely to emerge from the latest talks between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas because both leaders are too weak and the two sides are too far apart. Netanyahu cannot maintain his majority in Israel's parliament without the support of conservative settler parties that oppose further territorial concessions, and Abbas does not even have authority over all the territory he expects to make part of the Palestininan-dominated new country to emerge from a comprehensive peace agreement. The talks, which would not have even been scheduled without diplomatic pressure from the United States, have started just in time to resolve the still widely misunderstood issue of Israeli settlements when Israel's freeze on such construction expires Sept. 26, according to the Reuters international news service. The Abbas-led Palestinian Authority considers a freeze extension to be a necessary condition of its continued participation in the talks; Israel insists on continuing to build housing for its population, and obviously considers such construction to be its prerogative as a conquering power. But these people have been over this same issue for decades. It should be obvious to everyone involved that somebody is going to have to blink first. But whom? It doesn't help, of course, that both sides think they have already blinked numerous times with questionable results. Israel has maintained its occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip for more than 40 years, and the Palestinians -- people who did not even exist as a people until they were disowned by their Arab brethren after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war -- have a functioning government and observer status at the United Nations. Complicating matters is the breakaway Hamas government in Gaza, which broke off from the West Bank government in 2007 to protest the PA's moves toward settlement with Israel. In the midst of the pessimism is U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who said recently that her view is that the issues could be settled within one year. Good luck with that.

Billions earmarked for Haiti rebuilding projects

News that an international commission announced $1.6 billion in projects to help build new homes, improve agriculture and rebuild schools in earthquake-ravaged Haiti is welcome, albeit late, news. The quake that killed 300,000 and reduced cities to rubble in the poor Caribbean nation was in January, after all, and hurricane season is approaching. The news was announced Tuesday during a meeting of the Interim Haiti Recovery Commission in the nearly destroyed capital city of Port-au-Prince, according to the Reuters international news service. The commission, chaired by Haiti's prime minister, Jean-Max Bellerive, and former U.S. President Bill Clinton is responsible for distributing more than $5 billion dollars in international aid pledged to the relief effort in the next two years. Foreign governments and nongovernmental aid agencies pledged a total of nearly $10 billion for Haiti's recovery in March, Reuters said. Projects approved Tuesday included $200 million to create 50,000 jobs in agriculture and increase production, a United Nations rubble-removal program and construction of a teaching hospital to train new doctors and nurses. More than 1.5 million people are still living in refugee camps in Port-au-Prince, Reuters said.

Israeli move to stop flotilla explodes into shooting and damaging rhetoric

It looks like Israel has a lot to answer for after its commandos killed at least nine activists trying to outmaneuver the county's blockade of the Gaza Strip territory controlled by Hamas. The commandos staged a predawn raid to try to stop the six-ship flotilla of 700 activists after it refused orders to stop. The flotilla was bringing thousands of tons of supplies to Gaza's isolated Palestinian population, but violence broke out before the boats could be secured and brought to the Israeli port of Ashdod to be searched, according to the Reuters international news service. European countries that had been steadily warming to Israel for two decades were quick with condemnations including, as expected, the usually hostile General Assembly of the United Nations. Turkey, the Muslim country that has been trying to join the European Union for years and has recently been facilitating negotiations between Israel and Syria, also joined the anti-Israel chorus. But Israel rightly contends that it had a right to enforce its blockade, which was imposed to prevent material that could be used to make weapons from reaching Gaza. Militants have fired thousands of missiles from the territory into southern Israeli cities. Egypt has cooperated with Israel in officially sealing the territory, but there have been reports of massive amounts of smuggling through tunnels under the border between Egypt and Gaza. But Israel is being sadly unrealistic if it ignores the magnitude of its miscalculation. That the commando raid went awry is not entirely Israel's fault, since the supposedly peaceful activists had obviously expected something to happen and came armed with, at least, crude weapons. But Israel did send paratroopers to seize control of the flotilla instead of using navy vessels to force the activists into Ashdod so the cargo could be searched. Israel will investigate the conduct of its soldiers and, hopefully, figure out what went wrong. But Israel will be forced to do it alone, since the rhetoric coming from the Palestinian Authority and other Arab states shows they are less interested in preventing violence than in scoring propaganda points against the Jewish state. Turkey called Israel's actions "terrorism," a comment so illogical it precludes any reasonable response. The Palestinian Authority called the attack on the flotilla "a massacre," which it obviously wasn't. Israel certainly did not expect its commando raid to go so terribly wrong. U.S. President Barack Obama got it exactly right when he said he regretted the loss of life and demanded a full accounting of what transpired at sea.

UN report blames Pakistan government in aftermath of assassination

Sometimes, the audacity of government officials who violate the public trust is truly breathtaking. How else to describe Thursday's conclusion by a United Nations investigation that Pakistan's political and law enforcement establishment deliberately failed to adequately protect former prime minister Benazir Bhutto after she returned from exile in 2007 or to conduct a proper investigation into her assassination in Rawalpindi two months later? This question has no doubt been asked millions of times in the Western-aligned Asian nation since the death of Bhutto, who was expected to oppose then-president Pervez Musharraf in the 2008 election. After her death, Bhutto's husband, Ali Asaf Zardari, took the reins of her Pakistan's People's Party and defeated Musharraf at the polls. Musharraf, who has since retired from politics, is the former army chief who seized power in a 1999 coup. The United Nations commission's report does not name any suspects but does blame the Musharraf government for failing to prevent the attack and for not investigating the assassination properly, according to the Reuters international news service. "While she died when a 15-and-half-year-old suicide bomber detonated his explosives near her vehicle, no one believes this boy acted alone," the report said. "Ms. Bhutto's assassination could have been prevented if adequate security measures had been taken." The three-person commission of inquiry, impaneled after a formal request by Zardari, was headed by Chile's U.N. ambassador, Heraldo Munoz. The 65-page report also blamed government officials for trying to obstruct the investigation. "The commission was mystified by the efforts of certain high-ranking Pakistani government officials to obstruct access to military and intelligence sources," the report said, and recommended that the new government conduct a new investigation. Speculation continues in Pakistan that she was killed by Musharraf supporters trying to prevent her from capturing the presidency, Reuters said, particularly after authorities in Rawalpindi did not collect evidence but hosed down the scene immediately after the assassination, and failed to conduct an autopsy on Bhutto's body. The Musharraf government blamed Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud for the assassination, but Mehsud, an al-Qaida ally, was killed by a U.S. drone strike last year, Reuters said.

How do you solve a problem like Hamid Karzai?

In case anyone still was thinking that the U.S.-backed president of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, who is suspected of stealing re-election last summer, was the best person to head his war-ravaged country, his comments Thursday slamming Western governments that keep him in power cost could change a lot of minds. Karzai, under fire for alleged corruption in his government as well as election fraud, blamed Western governments and the United Nations for the election fraud and Western news organizations for putting too much "pressure" on him. "There is no doubt the fraud was very widespread," Karzai said in a televised speech from Kabul, according to the New York Times, "but this fraud was not committed by Afghans, it was committed by foreigners." Karzai criticized by name United Nations special representative Peter Galbraith and European Union election monitor Philippe Morillon, who helped reveal the election fraud, the Times said. "This fraud was committed by Galbraith, this fraud was committed by Morillon and this fraud was committed by embassies," Karzai said in his speech, delivered several days after U.S. President Barack Obama visited Afghanistan to advise Karzai about cracking down on election fraud and corruption. "In this situation there is a thin curtain between invasion and cooperation-assistance,” Karzai said, warning that if foreign forces assisting his government were seen as invaders, the insurgency "could become a national resistance." Well, if this sounds crazy, it probably is. Western countries have committed thousands of soldiers and billions of dollars to oust Taliban insurgents from Kabul and to keep Afghanistan's government from being overrun, yet Karzai speaks as if their sacrifice is not the reason he's still in office. The question now, even as the United States commits tens of thousands of more soldiers to the battle, is whether the president is listening.

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.

Agreement in Sudan could resolve one of world's most intractable conflicts

Reports from Sudan say the rebel Justice and Equality Movement and the government in
Khartoum have agreed to a ceasefire that could help end a seven-year insurgency that has left hundreds of thousands dead in the east African nation. The deal was reached Tuesday at a four-way summit in Qatar attended by JEM representatives and the leaders of Sudan, Qatar and Eritrea, according to Cable News Network (CNN). A permanent ceasefire is expected to be signed by March 15, Tahir al-Fati, chairman of the rebel movement's legislative assembly, told CNN. Qatar has been mediating negotiations to resolve the conflict, which began with the start of the insurgency in 2003, CNN said. Sudan's government launched a brutal counterinsurgency that killed thousands and displaced as many as 2.7 million residents. The brutality of the insurgency, aided by Arab militias, resulted in the International Criminal Court filing genocide charges against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, CNN said. Those charges are still pending. The United Nations has reported that more than 300,000 people were killed in the conflict as a result of the fighting, disease and malnutrition, CNN said. Other participants at the summit were Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, the emir of Kuwait; Idris Deby, the president of Chad, and Assais Afwerki, Eritrea's president.

China says cooperation with United States threatened by proposed arms sale to Taiwan

Word from Beijing is that China is "strongly indignant" and threatening to disrupt ties if the United States goes ahead with a planned $6.4 billion sale of advanced armaments to Taiwan. Chinese Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei said Saturday that Beijing considers the proposed sale of Black Hawk helicopters, advanced Patriot missiles and other equipment to be "crude interference in China's domestic affairs and seriously harm China's national security," according to the Reuters international news service. "The United States' announcement of the planned weapons sales to Taiwan will have a seriously negative impact on many important areas of exchanges and cooperation between the two countries," He said in remarks given to the U.S. ambassador and published on the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Web site. "This will lead to repercussions that neither side wishes to see." China considers Taiwan to be a breakaway province, but Western nations know it is where the Nationalist Chinese fled after being defeated by the Communist Chinese in 1949, and is now a democratic nation of 23 million. But it has been a source of friction between the China and the United States for 60 years, since Beijing wants to incorporate it into the mainland and the United States has pledged to defend its independence. In fact, the United States refused to recognize the People's Republic of China until 1979, eight years after Beijing replaced Taiwan at the United Nations. U.S. officials said Taiwan needed the advanced armaments to strengthen its position in negotiations with China, particularly since a "thaw" in relations that began in 2008, Reuters said. Despite all the rhetoric, it is difficult to see how the sale of arms to Taiwan affects the relationship between China and United States, except to make Beijing a little uncomfortable. In 2008, when Washington sold $6.5 billion worth of weapons to Taiwan, and Beijing reacted by delaying a meeting on military cooperation with the United States. But Washington and Beijing are too intertwined economically to let even this do more than perhaps delay their burgeoning cooperation in financial and military sectors. There are simply too many advantages to such cooperation to turn back now.

Venezuela's Chavez could lose control of Congress

Venezuelans returned to the streets today in protests over the country's deteriorating economic picture as this year's parliamentary elections drew nearer. Observers say President Hugo Chavez's hold on Congress could be in danger after devaluation of the currency and in the face of water and power outages caused by a severe drought. An opposition legislature could prevent Chavez from ruling by decree, a tactic he has used to make fundamental socialist-inspired changes in the Venezuelan economy, according to the Reuters international news service. Pro-Chavez marchers also took the streets on Saturday in a show of support for the government's aid programs for Venezuela's poor. "Tremble, you oligarchs -- this is the joy of the patriotic revolution," Chavez told his supporters, Reuters said. "The streets no longer belong to the oligarchs." The pro-Chavez march also was celebrating the 11th year of his presidency, which ushered in years of friction with the United States. Chavez called former U.S. President George W. Bush "the devil" at the United Nations in New York in 2006, no doubt because he was briefly removed from power in 2002 by a coup he blamed on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. But Chavez returned to office and has since consolidated government control of the economy, including the state oil company and the judicial system. Chavez gained control of the legislature in 2005 after opposition parties boycotted parliamentary elections, Reuters said.

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.

Clashes with Maoists in Nepal could spell end of political peace

Clashes on the streets of Kathmandu on Sunday could signal the end of a tense political peace that has held for seven months since Maoists resigned en masse from Nepal's central government in a protest. Riot police fired tear gas and beat protesters with batons after demonstrators threw rocks at officers, the Reuters international news service reported. As many as 100 protesters and 17 police officers were injured. The protests kicked off a three-day strike aimed at returning the Maoists to power, which they gave up in a constitutional dispute with Nepal's president over control of the military. The Maoists, who gave up a 10-year-long insurgency to enter politics in 2006 and won a majority of parliament in a special election two years later, left the government after the president, Ram Baran Yadav, reinstated the army chief after he was fired by Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the Maoist leader also known as Prachanda. Prachanda tried to fire the army commander over his refusal to integrate some 19,000 former Maoist rebels into the country's armed forces, as required under the 2006 settlement. United Nations human rights observers said Nepal's police used excessive force in charging the protesters and beating them with batons, Reuters said.

Concerns over cybercrime bring United States back to Internet talks

News from Geneva that the United States has agreed to discuss Internet security with Russia and the United Nations raises hopes of a new treaty between the world powers to demilitarize cyberspace. The very existence of the talks represents a huge shift in U.S. policy since a new president took office in January, since the previous government in Washington had refused to discuss the subject with Russia for years, according to the New York Times. The negotiations also are further evidence of friendlier relations between Moscow and Washington since Barack Obama became president of the United States in January, as they are proceeding in tandem with talks expected to lead to a new round of cuts in the two countries' nuclear weapons arsenals. Talks with UN disarmament negotiators are expected to resume in January along with informal discussions at an Internet security conference in Germany. The renewed efforts apparently mean the Obama administration is taking the issue of computer security seriously despite differences with the Russians on enforcement issues, the Times said. Some experts say the two superpowers are trying to avoid an Internet arms race in which countries develop increasingly powerful cyberweapons to disrupt computer systems that control weapons and security in other nations, which is why UN arms control negotiators are becoming part of the talks. The United States had previously considered the negotiations as a purely economic matter. But last month, high-ranking Russian security officials met in Washington with representatives of the National Security Council and the U.S. departments of state, defense and homeland security, the Times said, setting up the January dates for serious negotiations.

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.

Afghanistan situation just keeps getting worse

Just when it seemed the chaotic political situation in war-torn Afghanistan was about to get some clarity comes word that presidential challenger Abdullah Abdullah had withdrawn from Sunday's runoff election. Abdullah's decision to withdraw casts further doubt on the legitimacy of the troubled Western-backed government in Kabul led by Hamid Karzai, which has been wracked by a growing insurgency, corruption charges and fraud allegations from the first round of balloting in August, according to the Reuters international news service. With tears in his eyes, Abdullah told thousands of supporters in a tent in Kabul that he was dropping out because Afghani authorities would not meet his demands to ensure a fair runoff, including sacking the country's top election official. Karzai got the most votes in the first round but a United Nations investigation found widespread fraud, triggering the runoff, Reuters said. The fraudulent election was an embarrassment to the United States and its allies, who have dedicated more than 40,000 troops to defend Afghanistan's government against resurgent Taliban forces battling for control of the country. The Taliban had threatened to disrupt the first round of voting with limited success and also is threatening to disrupt Sunday's balloting. The election crisis comes as U.S. President Barack Obama was said to be waiting for the outcome of the voting before deciding on a proposal to send 30,000 additional soldiers to bolster Afghanistan forces. But Abdullah's withdrawal could be even more embarrassing to Western countries, because it leaves an election with only one candidate -- hardly an example of vibrant democracy. The prospect and promise of democratic government was expected to help the West make its case against Taliban influence. "It is a shocking failure of efforts by the West and other international communities to build a democracy in Afghanistan," said Norine MacDonald of The International Council on Security and Development, a policy research group. Nevertheless, Karzai defiantly refused to consider a unity government with Abdullah and the Independent Election Commission said the election must proceed as scheduled on Nov. 7. "It is now a matter for the Afghan authorities to decide on a way ahead that brings this electoral process to a conclusion in line with the Afghan constitution," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Reuters from Morocco. "We will support the next president and the people of Afghanistan, who seek and deserve a better future." British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Karzai must fix his government's corruption problem, improve the country's security forces and speed up efforts to improve economic conditions in the impoverished countryside.

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.

Israel calls UN report on Gaza "unfair"

Okay, Israel's rejection of a United Nations report that accused Jerusalem of committing war crimes in its three-week Gaza offensive was more than expected. The Jewish state has actually been speaking out loudly against the findings of the report, which was approved last week by the UN Council on Human Rights. The report blamed both Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement, which controls the Gaza Strip, for committing "actions amounting to war crimes, possibly crimes against humanity," during the offensive that ended in January, according to Cable News Network (CNN). Israeli President Shimon Peres, a former prime minister, told CNN on Monday that the report was "one-sided" and "unfair" because his country had the right to defend itself against the barrages of missiles fired from Gaza since Hamas took control of the territory in 2007. "The right of self-defense is non-negotiable," Peres said. "I think we have shown courage in war and we have shown devotion in peace and we shall continue to struggle for peace." Not to be outdone, Hamas also rejected the portion of the report accusing it of war crimes while endorsing accusations against Israel. Hamas and Israel also disagree about the number of casualties, with the Palestinian Center for Human Rights putting the Palestinian death toll at 1,419, including 1,167 civilians, and the Israeli military saying 1,166 Palestinians were killed.

IAEA plans inspection of Iran's formerly secret uranium enrichment facility

News that Iran has actually scheduled a team of experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect a formerly secret uranium enrichment facility being built near Qom appears to be a clear signal that the Islamic republic has changed course and decided to cooperate with the world community on nuclear proliferation. Iran agreed last week to permit inspectors to tour the underground facility, which previously had been kept secret in violation of IAEA notification requirements, according to the Reuters international news service. "IAEA inspectors will visit Iran's new enrichment facility, under construction in Qom, on 25th of October," said Mohammad ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency said at a news conference with Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran's nuclear effort. "It is important for us to have comprehensive cooperation over the Qom site. It is important for us to send our inspectors to assure ourselves that this facility is for peaceful purposes." Details of the inspection will be worked out at a meeting on Oct. 19, Reuters said. Western nations believe Iran is covertly developing nuclear weapons and has imposed a series of international trade sanctions against the country to force it to end or curtail its program. Tehran insists its nuclear work is aimed at the peaceful development of nuclear power for electricity, even though Iran's underground oil reserves are among the world's largest. But Iran has not exactly been truthful over the years, probably because of suspicions about the United States, which it regards, along with Israel, as its enemy. So, the disclosure of the secret facility caused an international furor culminating in last week's meeting in Geneva between Iran and the world's six strongest military and economic powers -- the permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany. The plant is not expected to be operational for 18 months. The Geneva meeting, at which Iran also agreed to send most of its nuclear material to France and Russia for processing, was the highest-level diplomatic contact between the United States and Iran since the 1979 revolution that overthrew the U.S.-backed Shah and brought religious leaders to power. U.S. President Barack Obama's top adviser on national security, James Jones, said Iran did not appear to be closer to having a nuclear weapon, contradicting a New York Times report on Saturday that a separate IAEA assessment had concluded Iran's program had advanced sufficiently to begin building a nuclear weapon.

Abbas puts gap between Israel and Palestinians on display at United Nations

Friday's speech to the United Nations by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was a clear demonstration of the gap between Palestinian and Israeli political leaders -- following, as it did, Thursday's address by Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Abbas said Israel was blocking progress toward peace by refusing to comply with Palestinian conditions for reopening peace talks, by refusing to fulfill its obligations under negotiated agreements and by refusing to comply with "hundreds" of U.N. resolutions. "All of these active efforts and initiatives, which have been welcomed and supported by us and by the Arab states, are, however, confronted with Israeli intransigence, which refuses to adhere to the requirements for relaunching the peace process," Abbas said. But Netanyahu said a day earlier that the PA was unwilling even to take the most "elementary" step toward peace of recognizing Israel as a Jewish state. "We asked the Palestinians to finally do what they refused to do for 62 years, say 'yes' to a Jewish state," Netanyahu said. "As simple, as clear, as elementary as that, just as we are asked to recognize a nation-state for the Palestinian people, the Palestinians must be asked to recognize the nation-state of the Jewish people. The Jewish people are not foreign conquerors in the land of Israel. It is the land of our forefathers." The two sides are not even listening to each other -- maybe they do when they're face-to-face at the negotiating table. And, maybe, that explains their reluctance to meet. Any agreement they do reach will likely be of historical proportions and result in region-changing upheaval. Israel will have to give up sovereignty over the homes of 100,000 Israelis on land the Palestinians expect for a state; the Palestinian people will have to give up claims to land they left in 1948 and to Jerusalem. The PA has not even begun to educate its citizens on the realities and responsibilities of peace -- it may not understand them itself. For one thing, the PA does not appear capable of controlling all of the territory that has already been ceded to it. There is a very long way to go -- the current leaders may have to think of the future, not the present, if they truly want to make peace happen. But, remember, Israel, Egypt and Jordan -- formerly bitter enemies -- have reached peace deals that have held together for years.

UN report says Israel and Hamas committed war crimes

What are we to make of yesterday's UN report finding both Israel and the Hamas government in Gaza committed war crimes during Israel's three-week incursion that ended in January? The report, released Tuesday by South African Judge Richard Gladstone, head of the UN Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, found Israel responsible for "war crimes, possibly crimes against humanity," and called on the Palestinian organization to investigate alleged war crimes, respect human rights and release an Israeli soldier captured in 2006, according to the Cable News Network (CNN). We know what the combatants think -- Israel and Hamas immediately rejected all findings of wrongdoing by their own fighters. Israel's Defense Ministry released a statement saying it had refused to cooperate with the investigation because it expected the Fact Finding Mission, and its findings, to be "one-sided." A Hamas spokesman applauded the report as "evidence of the crimes committed" by Israel but rejected any suggestion that its conduct also violated international law. The report highlighted what it termed violations by Israel, including using the chemical agent phosphorous in civilian areas, even though it is not proscribed by international law, firing shells at hospitals, which is, and failing to properly warn citizens before attacks. If Israel did these things, there is no excuse and leaders of the Jewish state should explain themselves beyond standard denials. We know Israel is trying to defend itself from hostile regimes in the Middle East yet attacking defenseless civilian populations only exacerbates the conflict and makes it even more difficult to resolve. But Hamas should likewise be required to take responsibility for its indiscriminate firing of missiles into population centers in southern Israel, near the border of the Gaza Strip, which precipitated Israel's attack. The Palestinians have to solve their governmental crisis and unify their leadership before they're going to be able to figure out what they want and reach a meaningful and beneficial peace with Israel.

Honduras suspends diplomatic relations with Argentina

Will coup leaders in Honduras ever accept the inevitable and allow the country's duly elected president to return to power? That question, which has been asked repeatedly in regional capitals since the military seized power in June, was back in the news again this week when Honduras suspended diplomatic relations with Argentina. The move was in retaliation for the South American country's expulsion of Honduras' ambassador a week earlier for what it said was a failure to protest the coup, according to Cable News Network (CNN). The ambassador, Carmen Eleonora Ortez Williams, was appointed by Jose Manuel Zelaya before his ouster and remained in her post as Honduras' new government, led by the legislature's leader, Roberto Micheletti, took over. The United Nations, the Organization of American States and the European Union have refused to recognize the Micheletti government and have called to Zelaya to be restored to power. Argentina had asked Ortez to leave for "for supporting the de facto government of Roberto Micheletti," CNN said, so Honduras ordered Argentina's diplomatic personnel to leave Tegucigalpa, the capital, within 72 hours. Honduras said its relations with Argentina would be "channeled" through the Argentine embassy in Israel, CNN said. The Honduran military seized power after Zelaya insisted on holding a referendum to extend term limits, even though the legislature had outlawed the vote and the supreme court said it was illegal. Micheletti, who was named provisional president by the legislature after Zelaya was sent into exile by the military, denied that a coup had taken place and said Zelaya was removed constitutionally.