USA: Russia wants extensive changes to measures being planned by the Security Council on Iran

Russia proposed extensive changes on Friday (November 3) to soften and shorten a U.N. draft resolution that would impose tough sanctions on Iran for its nuclear ambitions, U.S. and Russian envoys said. With opposition from Russia and China, the negotiations among six major powers promise to be difficult on the U.N. Security Council draft drawn up by Britain, France and Germany. The United States too wants amendments. The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council met on Friday (November 3) to discuss a resolution which would apply sanctions to Iran. European nations last week proposed sanctions -- banning the sale of missile and atomic technology to Iran and ending most U.N. help for its nuclear programmes -- after weeks of exploratory talks with a European Union negotiator ended without progress. The EU had proposed that Iran at least temporarily freeze enrichment as a condition for multilateral talks aimed at erasing suspicions it may be trying to build nuclear arms in violation of its treaty commitments. Tehran refused, saying its uranium enrichment programme aims only to generate electricity. The United States and others suspect it is a cover for building atomic weapons. A key concern for Moscow is the future of its $1 billion contract to build Iran's first nuclear power station in the southwestern Iranian city of Bushehr. Sanctions, as laid out in the European draft resolution, would impose certain limits on the Bushehr project but would not force an end to it. Russia has steadfastly rejected U.S. demands to halt work at the site, which is due to go online in September. At the Friday meeting, Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin shared the Moscow's revisions on the text. Emerging from the meeting, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton said, "Okay, the meeting has finished, so it's over and others will be coming out. It lasted about an hour. The Russians gave us a complete line in-line out version of edits and I said the United States would have some other suggestions to make and we'll distribute our line in-line out text this afternoon and in light of the extent of the Russian changes, we've decided that we'll refer all this back to capitals and meet again at some later date. That's basically all that we decided." He continued by saying that the changes that were suggested at the Friday meeting were extensive, which is why they did not get into a line in-line out discussion the same day but expected to circulate their own changes and meet the following week. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said several times this week the resolution was too harsh on Iran's nuclear programme, which the West believes is a cover for bombmaking but Tehran says is for peaceful uses. Churkin on Friday would not detail the changes his country wants, but he noted that Moscow does not consider its work in Bushehr as having nothing to do with nuclear non-proliferation concerns. Russia had earlier too objected to including Bushehr in the resolution, arguing it was a legal power plant under the 1970 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. "We do believe that the Bushehr project does not have anything to do with concerns about non-proliferation because it is clearly a peaceful nuclear power plant that we'll helping Iranians to build. In doing that we're are acting in full conformity with the non-proliferation treaty which actually makes it imperative on nuclear powers to help non-nuclear countries to develop their peaceful nuclear energy," said Churkin. He emphasized that the draft resolution should leave the doors open for our talks with Iranians. The draft resolution exempts from sanctions the $800 million Bushehr reactor in southwestern Iran, expected to go into operation next year. But it says Russia must check with a Security Council committee if it delivers material that can be used for weapons, such as a fuel cycle. The Chinese representative, Wang Guangya, said his country feels the current version of the resolution is "too tough." "I think it's a bit too tough," he said. "It might corner the Iranians. But I believe that China always argues that, first of all this case of the Iranians is different from North Korea, so you cannot just apply the same standards. Secondly, we believe that sanction measures taken by the security council has to be in in stage. Thirdly, we believe that the sanction measures has to be in a way putting some political pressure on the Iranians to come back to back to negotiations," said Guangya. Wang said it resembled the resolution recently adopted against North Korea and "you cannot just apply the same standards." The new draft is in response to an earlier Security Council resolution demanding Tehran suspend its uranium-enrichment activities by Aug. 31. It was drawn up after Iran rejected earlier U.N. demands that it suspend enrichment, which can be used in the production of either power stations or warheads. The European Union has offered economic and energy incentives if Iran temporarily suspends enrichment as a condition for talks on a peaceful nuclear programme.

ITN Source | November 4, 2006

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