Obama presses Iran on atomic deal, Tehran defiant | Reuters.

By Caren Bohan and Oleg Shchedrov

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – President Barack Obama said on Sunday time was running out for diplomacy in a dispute over Iran‘s nuclear programme, but a top Iranian official said it was up to the West to show it sincerely wanted a deal.

Russia and France, both involved in talks with Iran over what the West fears are its plans for an atomic bomb, also put pressure on Tehran, with French Foreign Bernard Kouchner saying the Islamic republic looked set to reject a U.N.-drafted accord.

Obama suggested patience was running low in the dispute with Iran, which faces possible harsher international sanctions or even Israeli military action.

“Unfortunately, so far at least, Iran appears to have been unable to say yes to what everyone acknowledges is a creative and constructive approach,” Obama said after talks with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit in Singapore.

“We are running out of time with respect to that approach.”

Repeating previous Russian language, Medvedev said “other means” could be used if discussions did not yield results, but did not specify what they might be.

A draft deal brokered by the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), calls on Iran to send some 75 percent of its low-enriched uranium (LEU) to Russia and France to be turned into fuel for a Tehran medical research reactor.

HOW SINCERE?

A senior adviser to Iran‘s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said no official response to the proposal had been announced.

“We are waiting to see how much sincerity the Western countries have in their pledges,” said Mojtaba Samareh-Hashemi.

Iranian parliament speaker Ali Larijani said U.S. policy including steps to renew sanctions showed Obama was no better than his predecessor George W. Bush. The remarks in the legislature prompted lawmakers’ chants of “Death to America.”

Iranian officials have said Tehran prefers to buy reactor fuel from foreign suppliers rather than part with its LEU, or at most swap small amounts of LEU for the reactor material on Iranian soil. They have called for more talks.

Iran has amassed enough LEU for 1-2 bombs, analysts say, if it were further enriched to reach weapons-grade.

Asked by an Israeli newspaper whether a final Iranian decision was pending, France’s Kouchner said: “You could phrase it that way, but in effect the answer has almost been given already, and it is negative. That’s a shame, a shame, a shame.

“We demanded to take a large quantity of (LEU) because we do not want them, while we are enriching uranium on their behalf, to continue themselves enriching uranium which could one day be used for military purposes,” he told Yedioth Ahronoth daily.

DEADLINE FOR IRAN

Iranian pledges in Geneva talks with six powers on October 1 won Tehran a reprieve from sanctions targeting its oil sector, but Western powers stressed they would not wait indefinitely for it to follow through.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said an end-of-year deadline for Iran remained.

Russian officials such as foreign minister Sergei Lavrov have said Washington was trying to push Moscow into a position of publicly threatening the imposition of sanctions soon if Iran did not play ball.

Iran says it is enriching uranium only for power plant fuel, not for nuclear warheads. But its history of nuclear secrecy and continued restrictions on U.N. inspections have raised Western suspicions it is covertly pursuing nuclear weapons capability.

The IAEA is consulting on possible compromises to save the deal, including Iran placing its LEU under escrow in a friendly third country, like Turkey, pending delivery of reactor fuel. Iran and Turkey discussed the idea in talks this month.

Iran‘s presidential adviser Samareh-Hashemi said regarding Turkey’s role: “Turkey is also on the cards but they have not come to a firm agreement or decision to act accordingly.”

Iran has an enrichment plant at Natanz and IAEA inspectors have visited a second, hidden enrichment site near Qom that Iran revealed in September after, Western diplomats said, discovering that U.S., British and French spy services had detected it.

(Additional report by Parisa Hafezi and Reza Derakhshi in Tehran; Writing by Charles Dick)

Middle East Views | The importance of the Syrian card.

Tariq Alhomayed

It makes no difference whether France has become involved in the peace process, and particularly the Syrian – Israeli peace, in order to punish Turkey or not. What is important is the continuation of the peace process, and achieving peace between Damascus and Tel Aviv. This is something that I have written about repeatedly, the goal of this is not to ignore the Palestinian issue, but rather peace between Syria and Israel will enhance the chance of a Palestinian – Israeli peace.

The importance of peace between Syria and Israel is due to several factors which are in the interests of the region and the peace process as a whole. Firstly, Syria regaining the Golan Heights will serve to enhance the credibility of the peace process, and result in Damascus having a positive role in the region. This is because Syria will be keen to promote stability across the region in a practical manner, and not just with slogans.

This represents a gain for Syria, with the country being grouped with Egypt and Jordan, following the same path and sharing [mutual] interests. These three countries will be the countries that deal with Israel, and they will also be the countries who are at peace [with Israel]. They are supported by those countries that are united behind them; let us call them the political rational [countries] i.e. the Gulf States. These are led by Saudi Arabia, and all that Saudi Arabia represents with regards to its weight and position [in the region] as the driving force behind the Arab Peace Initiative.

The completion of a Syrian – Israeli peace will also facilitate the redrawing of the Syrian – Lebanese border, thus ending the problem of who has authority of the areas which are currently being occupied by Israel in Lebanon. Therefore with Israel withdrawing from these areas, Hezbollah will no longer have a pretext for arming itself, and this is a very important issue.

This will result in a [potential] crisis, or indeed an explosion, along the Israeli – Lebanese border being defused. It also means that a major impediment to social peace and stability in Lebanon will have been removed. Promoting Lebanese stability and ensuring that Lebanon stays away from regional maneuvering will be in Syria’s interests, especially when Damascus has an outright peace [with Israel] to maintain. It is enough that Damascus has succeeded in maintaining a thirty-year truce with Israel, so it will make sense that Syria will maintain peace [with Israel] as well, and this is something that will benefit the interests and stability of the region.

There is one other issue to discuss, and that is the Palestinian issue. In the event of peace being achieved between Damascus and Tel Aviv, inter-Palestinian reconciliation will be in Syria’s interests and national security. In this case, we will see whether Syria can influence Hamas, or whether [Hamas chief] Khalid Mishal will relocate to Tehran. In any case things will resolve [one way or another]. If Mishal goes to Iran, he will have destroyed his Arab playing cards, while if returns to Palestine, the Israeli – Palestinian peace process can get underway.

Finally there is the issue of Iran, and its interference in our region. One of the benefits of a Syrian – Israeli peace is that Damascus will no longer take ambiguous decisions [with regards to Iran] for its interests will be in supporting regional stability, from Lebanon to Iraq. Therefore the Syrians will by necessity have to take clear positions [on the Iranian interference], and this is something that it is difficult for Damascus to do today, and there is no blame on Damascus for this.

The final point here is that with all due respect to France’s role, Washington is far more capable than Paris of completing this Syrian – Israeli peace. If Obama wishes to achieve a genuine peace in the region, he must start with Syria. Washington should initiate this peace and it will then spread throughout the region.

Saudi Arabia is continuing to attack a Shia rebel stronghold in northern Yemen by air, while Saudi troops and Houthi rebels have been engaged in bloody clashes for more than a week.

At least two Saudi soldiers have been killed in the latest fighting, and the conflict is further raising tensions in the region, with Iran warning Saudi Arabia not to interfere in Yemen's internal affairs.

Ali Larijani, the speaker of the Iranian parliament, said on Sunday: “The intervention of Saudi government in Yemen and repeated bombardment of unprotected Yemeni Muslims by Tornado and F-15 fighters is astounding.

“How has his Excellency, the servant of the two honourable shrines, allowed Muslims' blood be split in Yemen by means of its military devices? The news proves that the US government has been the accomplice and assistance in such suppressive measures.”

The Iranian parliament also called on the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to intervene to stop the killing of Yemeni Muslims.

Hashem Ahelbarra reports from Sana'a, the Yemeni capital, where he's been gauging the fallout from this ongoing battle.

via Al Jazeera English – Middle East – Yemen conflict raises Gulf tensions.

Satcasters pull Iranian channel off the air

By ALI JAAFAR

Earlier this November, Iran's state-funded Arabic-language news channel Al-Alam — Arabic for “the world” — was suddenly yanked off Nilesat and Arabsat, two major Arab satcasting platforms.

Nilesat, which is majority-owned by the Egyptian government, and Arabsat, a joint venture between all Arab states but with a majority share from Saudi Arabia, are the two most important satellite platforms in the Middle East.

The satcasters' move, which provoked condemnation from the Iranian government, deprives Iran of a valuable tool in the ongoing battle for the hearts and minds in the region. Iran and its allies — namely Syria and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah — have been locked in a regional power struggle with Saudi Arabia, Egypt and their allies in recent years.

The hostility can go both ways.

Al-Arabiya, which is Saudi-owned and is the most-watched pan-Arab satellite news channels alongside rival Al-Jazeera, had its Tehran offices closed down by Iranian officials in June after the channel covered the anti-government protests that broke out following the disputed presidential elections.

The politico's family and much of the Egyptian film biz labeled Sadat a “traitor” for signing the 1979 peace deal with Israel, and celebrated his killer Khaled Istambouli as a martyr.

The move against Al-Alam comes against a backdrop of escalating tensions between Iran and some Arab states, particularly Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

In Yemen, for example, the government is locked in a vicious internecine battle with Houthi rebels in the country's northern regions.

Saudia Arabia and the Yemeni government have accused Iran's government of aiding the Houthi rebels, who are, like the majority of Iranians, of the Shia faith. Iranian officials in turn have accused Saudi Arabia of backing the Yemeni government's counterinsurgent campaign. Matters came to a head earlier this month when a Houthi-backed mission crossed the Saudi border and killed a Saudi official. A series of other events in recent weeks — such as the expulsion of dozens of Lebanese Shias from the United Arab Emirates as well as a bomb attack in Iran that targeted members of the country's Revolutionary Guards — have set relations between the two sides on edge, and the media is finding itself caught in the middle.

“You have Egypt, Saudi Arabia and their allies on one side with Iran and their allies on the other side and the media dancing in between,” says Al-Rached. “I don't know how the media war can escalate anymore given that it is so tense already. It reflects the situation on the ground.”

via Mideast hostilities on air – Entertainment News, International News, Media – Variety.

Sun Nov 15, 2009 3:39am EST

France’s Kouchner pessimistic on Iran uranium deal | Reuters.

* French foreign minister sees negative Iranian response

* Kouchner calls impasse ‘very dangerous’

JERUSALEM, Nov 15 (Reuters) – Iran appears set on rejecting a U.N.-drafted deal with world powers designed to deny it the means to produce nuclear weapons-grade uranium, French Foreign Bernard Kouchner said in comments published on Sunday.

Under last month’s proposal, Iran would export some 75 percent of its low-enriched uranium (LEU) abroad to be turned into fuel for a Tehran research reactor. Diplomats said Iran’s counter-offer would leave it enough LEU to convert into bomb material, a non-starter for France and the United States.

Asked in an Israeli newspaper interview whether a final Iranian decision was pending, Kouchner said: “You could phrase it that way, but in effect the answer has almost been given already, and it is negative. That’s a shame, a shame, a shame.”

“We demanded to take a large quantity of (LEU) because we do not want them, while we are enriching uranium on their behalf, to continue themselves enriching uranium which could one day be used for military purposes,” he told Yedioth Ahronoth daily.

Kouchner said none of the negotiation conferences between Iran and a group of six world powers had been especially successful. “We are waiting. This is not good, and very dangerous.”

Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons, but the secrecy around it projects and its vituperation of Israel have stirred war fears.

Israel, assumed to have the region’s only atomic arsenal, has hinted at possible preemptive strikes against its arch-foe.

“I don’t want to comment on a possible Israeli attack. I don’t want it to happen,” said Kouchner, who visits Israel later this week. “That is a big danger and therefore talks and peacemaking must be embarked on speedily.” (Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)

Russia and US join forces to put pressure on Iran – Telegraph.

Dmitry Medvedev implied that more sanctions could be forthcoming Photo: EPA

Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s president, said his country agreed that progress on talks with Iran was too slow and that “other options” might have to be pursued. That can be taken as a reference to more sanctions on the Iranian regime. “In case we fail, the other options remain on the table, in order to move the process in a different direction,” Mr Medvedev said after meeting Barack Obama, US president, at the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit in Singapore.

“As reasonable politicians, we understand that any process should have a final point,” said Mr Medvedev. The process of talks exists not for the pleasure of talking but for achieving practical goals.”

That arrangement would prevent the uranium being further enriched to a level where it could be turned into a nuclear weapon.

But Iran has yet to make clear its response, more than three weeks after a deadline elapsed. It has made a counterproposal under which it would buy more highly enriched uranium for the reactor without giving up its own stocks, which is unacceptable to the other negotiating partners.

Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister, said Iran had already effectively turned down the deal down by refusing to give a positive response and by demanding more talks. “In effect the answer has almost been given already, and it is negative,” he said in a newspaper interview. “That’s a shame, a shame, a shame.”

The US says Iran has until the end of the year to resolve the West’s concerns over its nuclear programme, or face further sanctions. The big question remains whether Washington can win the support of Russia and China in the United Nations security council and give the sanctions international effect.

Russia has given ambiguous signals, urging a negotiated solution while at times suggesting that it would be prepared to go further than the sanctions already in place.

Israel, whose right to exist has been repeatedly denied by Iran, has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear installations and Russia is thought to have refused to supply Iran with a missile defence system that Tehran is seeking. Senior Iranian officials are now threatening to build their own system instead.

“Naturally and in view of the capabilities it possesses, the Islamic Republic will be able to mass-produce this missile system in a not so distant future,” said Alaeddin Boroujerdi, who heads the Iranian parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee.

Mr Obama is likely to discuss the issue with the Chinese president, Hu Jintao, after travelling over the weekend from Singapore to China in the continuation of his Asian tour.

“Unfortunately, so far at least, Iran appears to have been unable to say yes to what everyone acknowledges is a creative and constructive approach,” he said after meeting Mr Medvedev. “We are running out of time with respect to that approach.”

Iran is also considering a compromise proposal under which the enriched uranium would be dispatched for safe-keeping to Turkey, which has good relations with both Iran and the West.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly – Vol. 9, Issue 421, November 13, 2009

Obama Thinks Ahead to Repercussions

The conversation President Barack Obama and prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu held Monday, Nov. 9, was the most open, productive and well-disposed of any of the three which have taken place since both were elected to office, because it focused on three subjects alone: Iran, Iran, and… more Iran.

Reporting this, DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s Washington sources disclosed that the widely-reported petty power games leading up to the meeting were staged by US Middle East envoy George Mitchell – until Netanyahu took matters in his own hands and called the rising man in the White House Dep. National Security Adviser Tom Donilon. He and the president quickly grasped the importance of an early meeting with the Israeli prime minister and it was soon arranged.

The usual news conference, communiqué and cameras were disallowed in the interests of total hush on the content of the crucial, unusually long (one hour, 20 minutes) conversation one-on-one in the Oval Office. The general impression of coldness between Obama and Netanyahu was enlisted to the same end.

Netanyahu made the trip to Washington for a scheduled address to the General Assembly of the North American Jewish Federations on Monday. But he arrived with defense minister Ehud Barak because he had decided to cash in the bond Obama gave him at their first encounter in the White House on May 18: The US president then pledged that diplomacy with Tehran on its nuclear program would be held to a deadline running to the end of December 2009, in return for which the prime minister guaranteed to refrain from military moves against the Islamic Republic and its allies until then – or even bandy Israel’s military option in public statements.

Washington opposes Israeli military action but can’t veto it

But now, Netanyahu needed to tell the president that while attacking Iran’s nuclear installations was the worst possible option for Israel, worse still was the possibility of Iran becoming a nuclear power. He found Obama calmly realistic and accepting of the reality that Israel had no recourse for cutting short Iran’s dr! ive for a nuclear weapon other than striking its nuclear installations. As president of the Unite States, he had begun looking ahead to the repercussions.

Obama’s response to the prime minister’s words came in three parts:

1. Chances have dropped to nil for Tehran to accept a deal for sending its enriched uranium to a third country.

2. Tougher sanctions, especially a fuel embargo, won’t work – not only because Russia and China object but because some Arab governments led by Abu Dhabi are committed to helping Iran make up the difference.

3. Although deeply averse to Israeli military action against Iran, the president saw that from Jerusalem’s standpoint time was running out. He only asked that if Israel did take up its military option, the prime minister keep him fully briefed and not blindside Washington by striking out in unexpected directions. Obama said he had directed his White House team, especially the National Security Council, to begin preparing for the aftermath of an Israeli strike on Iran.

The Palestinian problem can wait

DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s Washington sources disclose that Obama and Netanyahu were of one mind that other issues on the table must await their turn, among them the Palestinian situation and Mahmoud Abbas’ future, US relations with Turkey and Syria and where Israel stood in relation to both. They agreed that Israel’s decision in principle on whether to send the IDF after Iran’s nukes must take prec! edence over any other shared policy items. It was understood that the two leaders would get back to them after a potential Israeli attack takes place and only when its after-effects are recognizable.

Their conversation was described by both the Israeli prime minister and White House chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel as very positive. It was said to have “dealt with a range of subjects that are important for Israel’s security and our joint efforts to advance peace.”

Our sources disclose its main headings:

1. Netanyahu filled Obama in on the latest Israeli intelligence estimates regarding the domestic situation in Tehran. Iran, he said, had completed its political and military preparations for war on the assumption that an Israel-Iran clash had become inescapable.

2. His briefing encompassed the thinking in Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip and the preparations they had set in train for this conflict. (See DEBKA-Net-Weekly 419 of Oct. 30 on the military understandings reached by Turkey and Iran.)

3. The Israeli prime minister enlarged on some of Israel’s opening moves in the projected conflict.

4. The leaders then went into a discussion on how the US and Israel would coordinate their military and diplomatic steps in the short term.

5. They examined the outcome of the large-scale US-Israeli Juniper Cobra 10 military exercise in Israel which ended Monday Nov. 9.

(A separate article in this issue discusses results of the exercise and the picture it presented of the possible effects of an Iranian missile attack.

6. Obama agreed to send a team of high-ranking Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Intelligence Agency officials to Israel next week to discuss US-Israel interaction in the run-up to a potential Israeli attack.

Franco-Israeli relations, the barometer for Iran

From his encounter with Obama, Netanyahu returned to his hotel and closeted himself for several hours with Barak, who had previously given defense secretary Robert Gates a preview of the prime minister’s appraisal to the president. After three hours’ sleep, he took off for Paris to clue President Nicolas Sarkozy in on his talks with Obama and their conclusions. Their talks also ran past the 45 minutes allotted by an extra hour and took place in the president’s private apartment in the Elysee to black out their content. Like the Israeli leader’s White House talks! , the media was not briefed on this conversation either.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly military sources observe that elite Israel officials’ trips to France have become the barometer for measuring the level of military tensions between Israel and Iran. The needle shot up on April 3 when, during President Obama’s visit to Europe, a specially chartered plane flew Israeli Chief of Staff Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi to Strasbourg for a conference with! the Chairman of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and again on Oct. 4, when Ashkenazi flew to Normandy to see Mullen. They met in the French War Room together with French Chief of Staff Gen. Jean-Louis Georgelin.

These comings and goings and palavers were set in motion by the deal Obama and Sarkozy struck for France to join any US military actions arising from a new Middle East war. Aware of this deal, Tehran cut Paris out of any role in big power nuclear diplomacy and arrangements for reprocessing its enriched uranium.

The Iranians are not just sitting there waiting upon developments. Tuesday, November 11, the day a new unity government was installed in Beirut, they organized a leak to the Lebanese media alleging that Israel was on the point of striking Hizballah’s military bases in Lebanon to disarm its ballistic capabilities for retaliation as the opening salvo of its war on Iran.

In Jerusalem, Gen. Ashkenazi told the Knesset’s security and foreign relations committee that in his view, the Iranian issue should be resolved by the end of the year. “The IDF is preparing all the necessary options,” he said “and the decision-makers will have to consider which paths to take.” He added: “If the Iranians understand they will have to be a steep price, it wouldn’t be illogical or unreasonable to say they may change their current direction.”

November 14, 2009, 10:05 PM GMT+02:00Iranian president looks over his shoulderIranian president looks over his shoulderThe Iranians are frenziedly digging hundreds of new missile launch silos in central and Western Iran in readiness for a US or Israeli attack on their nuclear installations, DEBKAfile's intelligence sources report. Some Western sources have noticed that they are creating more silo bases than they have operational missile batteries in order to mislead their enemies about the locations of the genuine launch pads. The dummy silos are fully equipped with air defenses including anti-air missiles which too are fake.According to our military sources, the commanders of the two-week Juniper Cobra 10 joint US-Israel exercise which ended last week knew all about Iran's expanding silo project. It is managed by Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps which is responsible for its missile program.The Iranians are working at the same frantic tempo to turn out Shehab-3, Shehab-4 and Sajil-2 ballistic missiles, as well as a fourth secret ICBM which is thought believed designed to carry a nuclear warhead. Our sources believe it is modeled on Pakistan's Ghauri 3, a three-stage weapon powered by solid fuel with a range of 3,000 km. If they can get this secret weapon off the production line, it would be the first three-stage missile in Iran's armory.

via DEBKAfile – Iran digs hundreds of missile silos – some for misdirection.

Diplomats say Iran nuclear facility was built 7 years ago | Iranian – Iran News | Jerusalem Post.

Iran’s recently revealed uranium enrichment hall is a highly fortified underground space that appears too small to house a civilian nuclear program, but large enough to serve for military activities, diplomats told The Associated Press on Thursday.

This satellite image shows a suspected nuclear facility under construction inside a mountain northeast of Qom, Iran.
Photo: AP

Iran began building the facility near the holy city of Qom seven years ago, and after bouts of fitful construction could finish the project in a year, the diplomats said.

Both the construction timeline and the size of the facility – inspected last month by the International Atomic Energy Agency – are significant in helping shed light on Teheran’s true nuclear intentions.

Iran says it wants to enrich only to make atomic fuel for energy production, but the West fears it could retool its program to churn out fissile warhead material.

One of the diplomats – a senior official from a European nation – said Thursday that the enrichment hall is too small to house the tens of thousands of centrifuges needed for peaceful industrial nuclear enrichment, but is the right size to contain the few thousand advanced machines that could generate the amount of weapons-grade uranium needed to make nuclear warheads.

The pauses in construction may reflect Teheran’s determination to keep its activities secret as far back as 2002, when Iran’s clandestine nuclear program was revealed.

Citing satellite imagery, the diplomats said Iran started building the plant in 2002, paused for two years in 2004 – the same year it suspended enrichment on an international demand – and resumed construction in 2006, when enrichment was also restarted.

Since then, Iran has defied three sets of UN Security Council sanctions aimed at forcing it to again freeze uranium enrichment.

All of the diplomats have access to information compiled by the IAEA, and demanded anonymity in exchange for discussing confidential matters with the AP.

Iran informed the IAEA only in September that it was building the facility near Qom, leading the US, British and French leaders to denounce Teheran for keeping its existence secret. IAEA inspectors visited the plant last month.

Iran says it fulfilled its legal obligations over when it revealed the plant’s construction, though IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei has said Teheran was “outside the law” and should have informed his agency when the decision to construct was made.

Western officials suspicious of Teheran’s nuclear program believe the Islamic Republic only decided to inform the IAEA after it became convinced that the plant’s existence had been noted by foreign intelligence services.

The Qom facility is the second known Iranian plant designed for enrichment. The first facility at Natanz, revealed by Iranian dissidents in 2002, has since grown to house around 9,000 centrifuges and has churned enough low-enriched uranium to turn into material for one or two nuclear warheads.

Low-enriched material is suitable for what Iran says will be a nationwide nuclear power grid. But that stockpile can be enriched further to weapons grade warhead material.

After years of expansion, the Natanz program, which relies on antiquated centrifuges based on black market imports, appears to be running into problems associated with increasing the number of operating centrifuges.

The senior diplomat said Iran was only using about 5,000 of the centrifuges set up at Natanz which were turning out about 80 kilograms – less than 200 pounds – of low-enriched uranium a month. That, he said, amounted to roughly the same output using the same number of machines as in September, when the IAEA last reported on Iran to its 35 board member nations.

He said breakdowns and maintenance of the old centrifuges appeared to account for the stagnation. In contrast, the facility near Qom appears designed to shelter fewer but more modern models configured to churn out more enriched material faster.

International hopes that Iran was ready for at least a partial concession on enrichment were raised after Teheran signaled in early October it was ready to send most of its enriched Natanz stockpile abroad to be turned into metal fuel for its small research reactor. Teheran would have needed at least a year to produce enough new material to replace what it shipped out, thereby delaying its ability to produce weapons-grade uranium should it have chosen to do so.

Since then, however, Iranian officials have overwhelmingly – if unofficially – rejected exporting most of their enriched uranium.

The senior diplomat said nuclear negotiators from the US, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany – the six nations trying to entice Teheran into enrichment concessions – planned to meet next week to discuss further strategy, including the possible threat of new UN sanctions on Teheran for its nuclear defiance.

US moves to seize 4 mosques, tower linked to Iran | International News | Jerusalem Post.

Federal prosecutors have taken steps to seize four US mosques and a Manhattan skyscraper owned by a nonprofit Muslim organization long suspected of being secretly controlled by the Iranian government.

 

US Marshals post copy of federal government’s complaint on door of Razi School in Queens.
Photo: AP

In what could prove to be one of the biggest counterterrorism seizures in US history, prosecutors filed a civil complaint Thursday in federal court against the Alavi Foundation, seeking the forfeiture of more than $500 million in assets.

The assets include bank accounts; Islamic centers consisting of schools and mosques in New York City, Maryland, California and Houston; more than 100 acres (40 hectares) in Virginia; and a 36-story glass office tower in New York.

Confiscating the properties would be a sharp blow against Iran, which has been accused by the US government of bankrolling terrorism and trying to build a nuclear bomb.

A telephone call and e-mail to Iran’s UN Mission seeking comment were not immediately answered.

John D. Winter, the Alavi Foundation’s lawyer, said it intends to litigate the case and prevail.

He said the foundation has been cooperating with the government’s investigation for the better part of a year.

“Obviously the foundation is disappointed that the government has decided to bring this action,” Winter told The Associated Press.

It is extremely rare for US law enforcement authorities to seize a house of worship, a step fraught with questions about the constitutional right to freedom of religion.

The action against the Shi’ite Muslim mosques is sure to inflame relations between the US government and American Muslims, many of whom are fearful of a backlash after last week’s Fort Hood military base shooting rampage, blamed on a Muslim American major.

“Whatever the details of the government’s case against the owners of the mosques, as a civil rights organization we are concerned that the seizure of American houses of worship could have a chilling effect on the religious freedom of citizens of all faiths and may send a negative message to Muslims worldwide,” said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

The mosques and the skyscraper will remain open while the forfeiture case works its way through court in what could be a long process. What will happen to them if the government ultimately prevails is unclear. But the government typically sells properties it has seized through forfeiture, and the proceeds are sometimes distributed to crime victims.

“No action has been taken against any tenants or occupants of those properties,” US attorney’s office spokeswoman Yusill Scribner said. “The tenants and occupants remain free to use the properties as they have before today’s filing. There are no allegations of any wrongdoing on the part of any of these tenants or occupants.”

Prosecutors said the Alavi Foundation managed the office tower on behalf of the Iranian government and, working with a front company known as Assa Corp., illegally funneled millions in rental income to Iran’s state-owned Bank Melli. Bank Melli has been accused by a US Treasury official of providing support for Iran’s nuclear program, and it is illegal in the United States to do business with the bank.

The US has long suspected the foundation was an arm of the Iranian government; a 97-page complaint details involvement in foundation business by several top Iranian officials, including the deputy prime minister and ambassadors to the United Nations.

“For two decades, the Alavi Foundation’s affairs have been directed by various Iranian officials, including Iranian ambassadors to the United Nations, in violation of a series of American laws,” US Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement.

There were no raids Thursday as part of the forfeiture action. The government is simply required to post notices of the civil complaint on the property.

As prosecutors outlined their allegations against Alavi, the Islamic centers and the schools they run carried on with normal activity. The mosques’ leaders had no immediate comment.

Parents lined up in their cars to pick up their children at the schools within the Islamic Education Center of Greater Houston and the Islamic Education Center in Rockville, Maryland. No notices of the forfeiture action were posted at either place as of late Thursday.

At the Islamic Institute of New York, a mosque and school in the city’s Queens borough, two US marshals came to the door and rang the bell repeatedly. The marshals taped a forfeiture notice to the window and left a large document sitting on the ground. After they left a group of men came out of the building and took the document.

The fourth Islamic center marked for seizure is in Carmichael, California.

The skyscraper, known as the Piaget building, was erected in the 1970s on posh Fifth Avenue under the shah of Iran, who was overthrown in 1979. The tenants include law and investment firms and other businesses.

The sleek, modern building, last valued at $570 million to $650 million in 2007, has served as an important source of income for the foundation over the past 36 years. The most recent tax records show the foundation earned $4.5 million from rents in 2007.

Rents collected from the building help fund the centers and other ventures, such as sending educational literature to imprisoned Muslims in the US The foundation has also invested in dozens of mosques around the country and supported Iranian academics at prominent universities.

If federal prosecutors seize the skyscraper, the Alavi Foundation would have almost no way to continue supporting the Islamic centers, which house schools and mosques. That could leave a major void in Shiite communities, and hard feelings toward the FBI, which played a big role in the investigation.

The forfeiture action comes at a tense moment in US-Iranian relations, with the two sides at odds over Iran’s nuclear program and its arrest of three American hikers.

But Michael Rubin, an expert on Iran at the American Enterprise Institute, said the timing of the forfeiture action was probably a coincidence, not an effort to influence Iran on those issues.