Global Security Newswire

Iran this week denied a report that it faces a rapidly shrinking stock of unrefined yellowcake uranium to carry out its nuclear activities, Iran's Press TV reported (see GSN, Jan. 30).

The United States and other Western nations have expressed concern that the Middle Eastern state's uranium enrichment program could produce a key nuclear-weapon ingredient, but Tehran contends the effort is strictly aimed at fueling civilian nuclear power plants.

“Iran is not only capable of supplying fuel for the Bushehr nuclear plant, but can also act as a major exporter," Iranian envoy Mahmoud Mehdi Soltani said Wednesday, adding that the country has access to between 3,000 and 5,000 metric tons of uranium. Three new uranium deposits were discovered in 2006 in the country, he said, reacting to a London Times report that Iran's yellowcake uranium reserves are within months of depletion (see GSN, Jan. 26; Press TV, Jan. 28).

Meanwhile, the Obama administration denied a London Guardian report that it is preparing a potential conciliatory letter to Iran, United Press International reported yesterday.

"I've had a number of conversations this morning about this issue," said U.S. State Department spokesman Robert Wood. "Nobody from the administration has tasked anyone within the White House, the State Department to draft any letter to the Iranians."

Washington is conducting a broad evaluation of its Iran strategy, "but until that review is completed, we're not going to be able to outline how we're going to go forward with regard to engaging Iran," Wood said. "But I can tell you with certainty that no one -- the secretary, the president -- no one has tasked anybody within the administration to draft any kind of a letter to Iran. ... We don't do freelance diplomacy here. It's coordinated diplomacy" (United Press International, Jan. 29).

The White House yesterday said it is considering every possible approach to addressing disputes with Iran, Reuters reported.

"We must use all elements of our national power to protect our interests as it relates to Iran. That includes, as the president talked about in the campaign, diplomacy where possible," spokesman Robert Gibbs said. "We have many issues to work through -- an illicit nuclear program, the sponsorship of terrorism and the threatening of peace in Israel are just a few of the issues that this president believes the Iranian leadership must address."

Addressing whether President Barack Obama has ruled out military action against Iran, Gibbs said: "The president hasn't changed his viewpoint that he should preserve all his options."

It remains uncertain which Iranian leader the United States would approach if it decided to take that route, Gibbs added. "In order for this to happen, there has to be some preparation and an understanding ... by both sides," Gibbs said.

Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has the final word on all Iranian policies; President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is believed to be running for June re-election (Ross Colvin, Reuters, Jan. 30).

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei yesterday expressed support for U.S.-Iranian talks, the Associated Press reported.

"That is the way to go. ... It is long overdue," ElBaradei said (Edith Lederer, Associated Press/Google News, Jan. 29).

He called past U.S. efforts to alter Iran's nuclear policy "a total failure" and urged the sides to start "direct dialogue at a high level, with no preconditions," the Wall Street Journal reported.

Once in talks, Washington should push for a "freeze-for-freeze" arrangement under which Tehran would not expand its uranium enrichment program and world powers would suspend efforts to impose new economic penalties on the Middle Eastern state, he said. With such an arrangement in place, the sides could move to negotiate a permanent halt to Iranian uranium enrichment in exchange for political and diplomatic incentives, according to ElBaradei.

A feasible compromise must address Tehran's desires for security and regional influence, he said, adding that Iran and other countries must be convinced that nuclear weapons cannot guarantee them safety or enhance their world standing.

The Obama administration has vowed to pursue direct diplomacy with Iran, but it has not established any public schedule for doing so, according to the Journal (Marc Champion, Wall Street Journal, Jan. 30).

Appearing at a discussion with ElBaradei at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki declined to state whether Tehran would welcome dialogue with Washington or address the U.N. nuclear watchdog's lingering questions about Iran's nuclear program (Lederer, AP).

He said U.S. officials have adequately voiced their positions and "it is time for them to listen," CNN reported.

"The president of the United States needs more time to express his ideals and objectives. ... The U.S. should see why it needs to change. These are strategic issues, not tactical measures," Mottaki added.

"The U.S. needs to change because the world has changed drastically. Therefore a new framework should be realistic. President Obama has courage and he must tell us which aspects of the Bush administration he is against," he said (Simon Hooper, CNN, Jan. 30).

in Tehran, Former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani added: "Saying that all options are on the table, even the military one, and that if Iran wants to end its isolation it must suspend its nuclear program will not work," Agence France-Presse reported (Agence France-Presse/Spacewar.com, Jan. 30).

Obama administration insiders previously expressed key differences on how to pursue dialogue with Iran, the Washington Post reported today.

Preliminary contacts between the nations should be conducted through a "direct, secret back channel," said Dennis Ross, expected Iran adviser to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"Keeping it completely private would protect each side from premature exposure and would not require either side to publicly explain such a move before it was ready," Ross wrote in a report published last September. "It would strike the Iranians as more significant and dramatic than either working through the Europeans or nonofficials -- something that is quite familiar."

He said a significant obstacle would be establishing "a direct channel that is also authoritative" due to Khamenei's sway over Iran's elected leaders.

Obama adviser Gary Samore co-authored a paper supporting public, wide-ranging talks without preconditions. The negotiations would ideally include a Khamenei representative among other Iranian officials, wrote Samore, a Council on Foreign Relations vice president who is set to become the White House WMD nonproliferation chief.

White House counterterrorism head John Brennan called in a report for Obama to dispatch a direct representative to Iran and urged Washington to brush off anti-U.S. statements emanating from Tehran while reducing its own criticism of Iran.

To pave the way for improved relations, Brennan said the administration must muster the "political courage" to acknowledge Iran's declining support for terrorism over the last 10 years.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates called for narrowly focused talks aimed at incremental progress when he co-chaired a CFR panel on Iran. "A 'grand bargain' that would settle comprehensively the outstanding conflicts between Iran and the United States is not realistic," the panel stated in 2004 (Glenn Kessler, Washington Post, Jan. 30).