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Iran Must Cooperate or Face Isolation, U.S. Officials Say; Iranian Leaders Say They are Ready for Attack
Failure by Iran to cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency would result in international isolation for the Islamic republic, U.S. officials warned yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 2). U.S. President George W. Bush said the United States and the three most powerful countries of the European Union — France, Germany and the United Kingdom — “expect there to be full disclosure, full transparency of their nuclear weapons programs.” “We are working with our friends to keep the pressure on the mullahs to listen to the demands of the free world,” he added. White House national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Iran’s behavior warranted international isolation. “This regime has to be isolated in its bad behavior, not ‘engaged,” she said, adding that the United States, the European countries and other IAEA members were preparing “a very tough set of resolutions” for consideration at the agency’s board of governors meeting, scheduled for September. “Iran is going to be confronted,” Rice told Fox News, adding that if the Islamic republic refuses to cooperate, “They’re going to be isolated.” Asked whether France would support U.S. plans to increase pressure on Tehran, Rice maintained that the European powers objected to Iran’s nuclear activities. “The French and the Germans and the British have been very clear to the Iranians that the activities that they’re currently engaged in, or say that they are going to resume, are unacceptable, and we just have to keep working with the French and the British and the Germans to make certain that they stick to that position,” Rice said. “It’s been our position all along that the Iranians are dangerous in this regard, and that the international community has got to be tough and steadfast here,” she added (Adam Entous, Reuters/Yahoo!News, August 2). Meanwhile, Sayed Hossein Mussavian, chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, said yesterday that the United States and Israel would not “dare” attack Iran’s nuclear installations, the BBC reported. “These threats are part of a political and psychological warfare campaign and there is no truth to them at all. I don’t think that the Americans or the Israelis will dare to launch the slightest attack on Iranian nuclear installations,” Mussavian said in an interview with the official IRNA news agency. He added that Iran had taken measures to shore up its defenses against weapons of mass destruction since the use of chemical agent during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s. “The Islamic Republic of Iran has been taking the necessary measures with regard to chemical, biological and nuclear defense since [former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein] committed aggression against Iranian territory,” he said.
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