IRAN: Scoffing again at Western incentives
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Iran is pondering a Western-made offer for Tehran to drop its nuclear enrichment program. But the state-controlled local media has already scoffed at the package of political and economic incentives presented last week by the EU foreign policy chief, Javier Solana.
According to an Iranian official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, authorities in Tehran have explicitly requested local newspapers to play down the new offer.
In their Monday editions, newspapers close to the hard-line party of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that the new package presented nothing important. The Persian daily Kayhan wrote on its front page: ‘After opening the package, it turned out that it was empty again.’ The newspaper was referring to an older package offered in 2006 by Western powers and rejected then by Iran.
The conservative daily JameJam wrote that the proposed package does not open the way for any solutions. Even the reformist press carried a neutral report on the matter. The Etemad daily titled its front page article: ‘Diplomacy of packages, Solana: We can be in win-win situation.’
At the official level, Iran refrained from giving a response to the package of incentives made by the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany (the 5+1 group). Iran’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, said on Monday that his country would give an answer at the appropriate time after studying the offer.
Talking to reporters in Tehran, Mottaki shrugged off the possibility of a U.S. military attack against it: ‘Given the failures it has experienced in the decisions it has so far made concerning the region, I don’t think the U.S. would harbor any intention of launching a third war in this part and causing another crisis for the American people.’
Meanwhile, the United States and Britain warned that Western powers would toughen sanctions against Iran in case it rejected the latest ‘offers of partnership.’
At a news conference at Downing Street in London, U.S. President Bush said that he wanted to solve the conflict with Iran diplomatically without ruling out the use of force. Speaking after a meeting with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Bush said: ‘the Iranians must understand that when we come together and speak with one voice, we are serious.’
He added that the world would support Iran in implementing a nuclear energy program for civilian purposes but would not tolerate that Tehran continues to enrich uranium: ‘You bet you have a sovereign right, absolutely, but you don’t have the trust of those of us who have watched you carefully when it comes to enriching uranium.’
Brown said Britain would urge Europe to impose ‘further sanctions’ on Iran, and Europe would take action to freeze the overseas assets of the country’s biggest bank and impose new sanctions on oil and gas.
-- Raed Rafei in Beirut and Ramin Mostaghim in Tehran