Global Security Newswire

The Obama administration yesterday urged five other world powers to endorse measures permitting the interdiction of weapons bound for Iran as well as deliveries that could support the Middle Eastern nation's disputed nuclear efforts, the Washington Post reported (see GSN, April 14).

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice provided details on the draft U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution in a briefing to delegates from China, France, Germany, Russia and the United Kingdom. The proposals -- which included penalties against Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard and curbs on new business with the nation's energy industry -- were prepared by Washington and several other Western governments suspicious that Tehran is edging toward a nuclear-weapon capability through its ostensibly civilian atomic energy work.

At a meeting of the six powers last week, Beijing took strong issue with the draft's energy trade restrictions and threatened to oppose any measures that would undermine its economic ties with Iran, Security Council diplomats said. China, which wields veto authority over council decisions as a permanent member of the body, took a more conciliatory approach in this week's meeting, the Post reported (Colum Lynch, Washington Post, April 15).

"We have just had a very constructive consultation," Chinese Ambassador to the United Nations Li Baodong said, according to Agence France Presse. "We now have a better understanding of each other's positions. We will continue these consultations."

Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin provided a similar assessment, adding that the next round of discussions would take place "very soon" (Agence France-Presse I/Spacewar.com, April 14).

One diplomat estimated that the countries had a 25-30 percent chance of agreeing on new Iran sanctions this month, Reuters reported.

"We're right at the beginning of the discussion on a text here, and it should be no surprise that they're quite far apart," the diplomat said of participants in the talks. "The Chinese want something much, much weaker and much, much narrower."

Although Beijing could agree to a new sanctions resolution, it would be "very difficult" to convince China or Russia to end sales of gasoline and other refined oil commodities to Iran, Undersecretary of State William Burns said in Senate testimony yesterday (Honan/Worsnip, Reuters I, April 14).

The United States hinted it might ultimately accept a substantially watered down set of U.N. sanctions, the Los Angeles Times reported.

"What is important about the U.N. resolution is less the specific content of the resolution than the isolation of Iran by the rest of the world," Defense Secretary Robert Gates said yesterday, adding that a new resolution "provides a new legal platform" for tougher, unilateral measures.

Even if punitive measures in a new resolution are relatively insubstantial, adoption of the text "gives you an international blessing that is worth a lot," he said (Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times, April 15).

Iran could acquire a sufficient amount of weapon-grade uranium for one nuclear weapon in just one year, but the nation would need up to five years to manufacture, test and field a bomb, U.S. defense officials said yesterday.

"The general consensus -- not knowing again the exact number of centrifuges that we actually have visibility into -- is we're talking one year," Defense Intelligence Agency chief Lt. Gen. Ronald Burgess said, according to Reuters.

"They have enough low-enriched uranium now that, if they further processed and enriched that, that in a year ... they would have enough material for one weapon," added Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

"Experience says it is going to take you three to five years" to progress from possessing an amount of material sufficient for a bomb to acquisition of a "deliverable weapon that is usable ... something that can actually create a detonation, an explosion that would be considered a nuclear weapon," Cartwright said.

Although the United States is capable of launching strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities, "there would be consequences to our readiness and to the challenges that we already face in this nation economically to pay for a war," he said, also noting that Iran could still push forward with its nuclear work in the aftermath of an attack.

The United States has not ruled out any possible course of action for addressing the nuclear standoff, Defense Undersecretary Michele Flournoy said.

"We see it as the Department of Defense's responsibility to plan for all contingencies and provide the president with a wide range of military options should they become necessary," the official said. "But ... military options are not preferable and we continue to believe that the most effective approach at this point in time is the combination of diplomacy and pressure" (Adam Entous, Reuters II, April 14).

Elsewhere, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad yesterday appeared to suggest his country could step up support for regional extremists in response to actions against its nuclear program, the London Telegraph reported.

"They (the U.S.) have security problems in the world and their influence in Iraq and Afghanistan is vanishing," Ahmadinejad said. "They see that waves of hope, justice-seeking and resistance are rising all over the world inspired by Iran. They want to dominate the world, but Iran doesn't let them."

Iran uses the term "resistance" to refer to religious extremist organizations, according to the Telegraph.

"We have progressed in nuclear technology so much that we are at an irreversible point," the Iranian president added. "The U.S. has two options. Either to continue this wrong policy, or to cooperate with Iran" (Richard Spencer, London Telegraph, April 15).