Clinton says nuclear proposal to Iran `will not change`
U.S. Secretary of State urges Tehran to accept uranium-exchange deal with U.S., Russia, and France.
By News Agencies Tags: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Iran nuclear Israel newsU.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday urged Iran to accept the six-powers proposal on its nuclear program, saying the offer would not be changed.
"We urge Iran to accept the agreement as proposed. We are not changing it," Clinton told a news conference in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh, adding that this was a "pivotal moment" for Tehran.
Earlier Monday, the outgoing head of the UN nuclear watchdog said Iran should reply as soon as possible to a proposal for an uranium-exchange deal with the United States, Russia and France.
Mohamed ElBaradei, who will leave the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna later this month, said the deal is part of measures to build confidence and trust for future dialogue between Iran and the international community.
ElBaradei said the Tehran government, which admitted concealing materials and activities that violated nuclear safeguards six years ago, has not come forward with explanations to allay fears of its future nuclear ambitions.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner also urged the Iranian leaders to accept the proposition by the IAEA proposed last month, in which Iran will not enrich it's own uranium, bet rather purchase enriched uranium for energy production from Russia, France and the U.S.
"We are waiting for Iran to formally accept the proposition made by the (UN atomic agency) IAEA. If the Iranian response is to stall, as it seems to be, we will not accept this," Koushner told reporters on Monday.
Meanwhile, Tehran's envoy to the IAEA said on Monday that Iran wants more talks on a United Nations-drafted nuclear proposal, including guarantees that it will receive the reactor fuel.
Iran has signalled that it wants fundamental changes to the draft deal, in which it would send most of its low-enriched uranium (LEU) abroad for further processing to turn it into more refined fuel for a Tehran research reactor.
The plan, backed by the other participants - Russia, France and the United States - aims to reduce Iran's LEU stockpile below the minimum quantity that could be turned into the highly enriched uranium needed for a nuclear bomb.
Western diplomats say Iran has also asked to receive fuel for the Tehran reactor before shipping out any of its own low-enriched uranium.
They say the Iranian demands are unacceptable because the deal in this form would not lessen Iran's capacity to build an atomic weapon if it chose to do so, something Israel and the West fears.
If Iran accepts the UN-backed plan, it would not be able to replenish its stockpile to levels that would again yield enough enriched uranium for further enrichment into weapons-grade material for about a year.
Since its clandestine enrichment program was revealed seven years ago, Iran has amassed more than 1,500 kilograms of low-enriched uranium at its cavernous underground facility at Natanz.
It is relatively simple to turn fuel-grade uranium into weapons-grade material. The West fears Tehran wants to do just that although President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government says it is not interested in nuclear arms and wants only to create fuel for a planned network of reactors.
But it will take decades before the network is in place, meaning Iran has no immediate use for the enriched uranium it has accumulated. This has led many in the West to wonder why it wants to have the stockpile now if not for other purposes.
Iranian Ambassador Ali Asghar Soltanieh said Monday that more talks were needed, "in order to ensure that our technical concerns and especially the issue of the guarantee of the fuel supply are taken into consideration."
"We are ready for the next round of technical discussions in Vienna at the IAEA headquarters," he said, adding that the IAEA should now arrange a suitable date.
Soltanieh gave the IAEA Iran's initial response to the draft deal on Friday after talks in Vienna on Oct. 19-21 with the three big powers.
"We are ready to buy the fuel from any supplier under the full scope of safeguards and surveillance of the IAEA," Soltanieh said.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki stressed Monday that the Islamic Republic has not rejected the plan.
"We have considered these proposals. We have some technical and economic considerations on that. Two days ago, we passed our views and observations to the IAEA, so it is very much possible to establish a technical commission in order to review and reconsider all these issues," Mottaki said.
Mottaki said Iran has three options to procure fuel for its reactor, which was launched 40 years ago. The first is to buy the fuel from other countries, the second is to enrich the uranium domestically and the third is to accept the UN-brokered plan, he said.
Tehran says it will ship out a small amount of uranium and wait until it comes back in the form of fuel rods before exporting the next small batch. But this proposal has been rejected by the U.S. and its allies, as it would leave Tehran with enough material to turn into a fissile core of a nuclear warhead.
Asked about Clinton's comments that Western powers are getting impatient with Iran over the nuclear deal, Mottaki replied: "Really?"
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Why should Iran comply with this proposal and ship its uranium capabilities to another country when the same demands aren't made of Israel? This is just another lopsided proposal. It won't work. Ben
Iran has not signed the Addional Protocol, so it is in its right not to abide with that. By a similar logic, Israel has not signed the NPT, so they are allowed to have nuclear weapons. You can't have it both ways. If Israel is not bound by treaties it did not sign, neither is Iran.
America is "celebrating" 30years, onwards, of The Teheran Hostages. With all the efforts to changing the narrative of the USA Embassy Occupation, here comes another "Carter" called Obama, and makes sure to stamble in the Iranian-American power struggle. What are we witnessing now? a tired (already) President Obama, his Administration is in a disarray, its Foreign policy under the baton of the Conductrice Ms. Hilary Clinton, disorientated, and the economy is still "Ballooning", hesitation upon hesitation in their internal "socialistic demenure", Afgan sitution is empiringly on the verge of collapsing, and now the Nuclear Game is on, under hostages of a Cartesian (sic) mentality.
The rest of the world are saying that about Zionist Israel - open your eyes and your mind.
The reason Iran disperse high value infrastructure is because they have been under threat of US attack (and have actully been attacked by US backed Iraq) since the late 70's. Any sensible planner will not concentrate all potential targets in one area so the enemy can take them out in one big hit, nor advertise thier locations to make it easy for the enemy to plan a series of opperations, nor would they leave them vulnerable (ie unhardened and without air defence). Stop being taken in by 'psudo-evidence' and apply a little objective thinking.
The Iranian regime is menace to the world and it's own people and must be stopped. There is no negotiating with these insane Islamist.
Iran has no nuclear weapons. Other nations simply judge Iran to have the same devious policies as themselves. What started as a proposal now sounds more like a threat which is demeaning to an ancient nation. Iran does not trust Russia or France on the deal, and certainly does not trust the US. Who would? So they prevaricate? Just like Israel over the humanitarian horrors in Gaza? No nation should stockpile nuclear weapons, and certainly not in remote semi-secret deserts areas.
As we all have witnessed, Ms Clinton is failing, drastically and dramatically, at all of her tasks in foreign policy. Exactly how many enemies has she created in the past week? I expect that she will be back-benched immediately, if for no other reason than her incredibly stupid comments regarding the legitimacy of the Hamid Hamid regime. She has shot her bolt, and ever so foolishly. Iran has nothing to fear from her ever-so-empty verbal pomposity.
Transferring the Iran nuclear bomb making facilities to Syria didn`t work.The West is becoming more and more aware of the possibility of Iran looking for an alternative. Another country to host the nuclear facilities or...better...to sell Iran the bomb. It could be one of the former Soviet Union countries, North Korea or Pakistan
Have you heard from North Korea: "we reprocessed 8,000 nuclear fuel rods to obtain weaponized plutonium"..... Now what?
iran wants nuclear weapons. iran will not give up its goal of acquiring nuclear weapons. you need to have a plan b.
Or does she only care about Israel?
If they acquire nukes, they can do whatever they want without being afraid of ours, just because they could kill half the Israelis with only one bomb, while we can't do so. Do you even know what that means? It means thye can give Hamas and Hezbollah whatever they want through Syria to turn the attention against Israel and blaming it at the same time. They could also protect the allies they'll be making over time by threat of 'preemption' too and can keep them. Is so is done, humanity is doomed. Besides, just to make my point that Iran leaders go on talking irony (and my post isn't completely pointless), the Iran economy is doing worse than ever precisely because of the isolation of Iran with their nuclear program...
The fallout from the Clinton gaff on settlements continues. Who prompted the gaff? Clinton on her own? Was it thought out or ad lib? Was it an Obama idea? or was it just sucking up to Netanyahu? That 3:00 AM call is being prompted by the gaff. And the call appears to be about potential nuclear issues in Iran. Will North Korea follow? Damage control party - - start your work.
Who is Iran and what more can we do to stop them from making us bomb them? We are begging them to give us other options as it will be ugly but Iran is a rogue nation lead by insane zealots so they will have to make their people suffer even more in order to keep the peace.
Bibi got Hillary Clinton to toss Obama's foreign policy under the bus on a key issue in the Arab & Muslim world, Israeli settlements. That thoroughly discredited lots of US policies. Now we are reaping what has been sown, even as Clinton tries to backtrack. Did Obama know he was going to have his policy (and that of all former US Presidents) tossed under the bus? Was Clinton just winging it, ad lib, or was it truly a gaff? Did Netanyahu manipulate the statement out of her? Doesn't really matter. It's damage control time.
Oh Hilary, your word is worthless in the Middle East now. Why should anyone believe anything you say anymore?
Neither China nor Russia will support sanctions so early in the negotiations process. If Hillary is saying things just for an Israeli audience, thats understandable. But besides that, it means nothing.
The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran technocrats want the deal as it was announced. Many in the Supreme Leader's junta AND the Opposition are suspicious of the west, particularly France and America. They fear that once their Low Enriched Uranium is out of the country they will be stiffed. The AEOI 'trusts' the rest of the world, but Iran doesn't. And the rest of the world doesn't trust Iran.
If the Irainians were building a reactor for energy purposes, then why hide all the locations and disperse them around the country so if attacked they can't all be destroyed at once? If they were all out in the open and declared to everyone from the start, there would be no suspicions. In the open means peaceful purposes, hiding means bomb pursuit.
Why are you warmongers still going on about Iranian nukes? Firstly they don't have any, secondly if they did they couldn't deliver them, and thirdly even if if they had 10 or even 50, and the means to deliver them, they would never be used preemptively. The Warmongers will eventually have to answer to a higher authority.
SERIOUS ACTION AGAINST IRAN.
Even if Iran accpet the deal, they can still continue to enrich 30% of their low-grade uranium stockpile.
The Iranians are being given just enough rope to be able to continue in the happy illusion that they can spin out the negotiations long enough to acquire a nuclear weapon capability. But "the Yank" is coming. Count on it.
..just as long as the West keeps talking and we can keep getting more time to complete the building of our nuclear weapons .