Global Security Newswire

Iran will require 20 uranium enrichment sites within two decades to meet its energy needs, the nation's top nuclear official said Saturday (see GSN, Dec. 4).

The Middle Eastern state's nuclear program would need to produce 20,000 megawatts in 20 years, Iranian Atomic Energy Organization chief Ali Akbar Salehi said, according to the Associated Press.

The United States, Israel and some European governments suspect that Iran's uranium enrichment program is aimed at generating nuclear-weapon material; Tehran has maintained its atomic ambitions are strictly civilian in nature (Ali Akbar Dareini, Associated Press I/Google News, Dec. 5).

Washington plans next month to pursue additional international penalties against Iran if leaders there fail to move toward greater international cooperation over their nation's nuclear program, AP reported Friday. The U.N. Security Council has already hit Iran with three sets of sanctions over the disputed nuclear work.

Although the proposed set of economic penalties is still not "coherent," it could eventually incorporate measures targeting Iran's oil sector and Revolutionary Guard Corps, one official said.

The severity of the proposed penalties remains open to debate, the official added, acknowledging that certain measures could affect international petroleum markets. "We are looking to find what everyone can agree will be most effective and have the least impact on the Iranian people," the source said.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and other U.S. officials addressed Iran's nuclear activities during high-level discussions in Brussels and Athens last week. The Obama administration hopes the European Council summit set to convene in Brussels this week will release a stern message warning Iran it could face new sanctions for failing to comply with international demands over its nuclear work.

"There will be a broad discussion on next steps in that meeting," said State Department spokesman Ian Kelly. "The EU is expected to have a written statement on Iran."

"Our focus is shifting more towards the pressure track," Kelly said.

Washington has focused on winning support for new sanctions from Beijing and Moscow, which have opposed some Western calls in the past for tough penalties against Tehran. Clinton raised the Iranian nuclear dispute in talks last week with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and Undersecretary of State William Burns is set to discuss the issue in Beijing this week (Lee/Loven, Associated Press II/Google News, Dec. 5).

"In 2009 the Iranians weren't able to find positions that might divide the Group of Six," one Paris-based official told Agence France-Presse, referring to China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The five permanent U.N. Security Council member nations and Germany "all agreed that Iran should not get a nuclear weapon" and some of the countries "are actively drawing up new sanctions," the official said.

"Russia supports the idea of sanctions against Iran," said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of Russia in Global Affairs. "The real question will be 'what kind of sanctions'? There will be deep disagreement, and Russia will not support very tough sanctions like those sought by the United States."

"China has joined to put pressure on Tehran. In Western eyes this is progress, but this is not sanctions," added Shi Yinhong, an international relations expert at the People's University of Beijing. "China's position on sanctions on Iran is generally to dilute sanctions. I have not seen any indication that China is willing to put severe sanctions on Tehran. China still has huge energy cooperation with Iran."

"So there is some change, but if you want to see fundamental change, you will have to wait and see. I doubt that it will happen," he said (Philippe Rater, Agence France-Presse I/Google News, Dec. 4).

During talks today with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, U.S. President Barack Obama plans to address whether Turkey could support a new U.N. sanctions resolution against Iran, Bloomberg reported. Turkey holds a nonpermanent Security Council seat (Janine Zacharia, Bloomberg, Dec. 7).

The United States is still making an earnest attempt to reach out to Iran over the nuclear standoff, one analyst told Voice of America.

"There is a lot of behind the scenes activity going on in terms of not allowing this period to elapse before some kind of positive development takes place, irrespective of all this rhetoric, which is no more than rhetoric," said Mehrdad Khonsari, an expert with the London-based Center for Arab and Iranian Studies.

"It's like the case of the man who wants to develop 20 refineries in order to have enough gas for the car he does not own," he said of Salehi's call to expand Iran's uranium enrichment capacity (Edward Yeranian, Voice of America, Dec. 5).

The "clock is ticking" on Iran's opportunity to pursue nuclear talks with the United States, AFP quoted U.S. national security adviser Gen. James Jones as saying.

"The door is still open. But unfortunately the picture Iran is painting is not a good one. But we are still open to negotiations," Jones said.

The official added that a U.N. proposal for refining Iran's uranium in other countries is "very reasonable." Tehran has rejected key parts of the plan (Agence France-Presse II/Yahoo!News, Dec. 6).

Meanwhile, Iran's supreme religious leader defended his nation's nuclear program, AFP reported.

“We ask [Western powers] to stop lying and, as we have said in the past, the Iranian nation is pursuing nuclear technology and if we do not achieve it today, then tomorrow when the world economy is driven by nuclear power we will be late,” said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“The Iranian nation wants to achieve it so that it does not have to beg to Westerners 20 or 30 years later. But the Westerners through the false campaign are preventing us from getting it” (Siavosh Ghazi, Agence France-Presse III/Daily Star, Dec. 7).

Concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions have encouraged other Middle Eastern nations to cooperate with the United States, the head of U.S. Central Command said yesterday.

"President [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad and the [Iranian] leaders continue to be the best recruiters for Central Command as we embark on our partnership plans," Gen. David Petraeus told Fox News. "They've caused enormous worry and concern by those on the western side of the Gulf" (AFP III).

Elsewhere, Russia has confirmed it would supply the advanced S-300 air-defense system to Iran, Iran's ambassador to Moscow said.

"We had heard reports that Russia would not deliver these systems to Iran, but we asked the Russian side and they denied it," said Mahmoud Reza Sajjadi.

"The delivery deadline has already passed, but the Russian side has cited technical problems which it is working to fix," he added. "We feel that this question will be resolved in the space of one to two months."

Some analysts have expressed concern that Iran could use the system to defend its nuclear facilities from potential airstrikes (Agence France-Presse IV/Spacewar.com, Nov. 27).