PrintIran will not give up "a single iota of its nuclear rights," President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced last week, snubbing an informal deadline to stop expanding uranium enrichment or face more sanctions. The Iranian president declared, "In whichever negotiation we take part ... it is unequivocally with the view to the realization of Iran's nuclear right, and the Iranian nation would not retreat one iota from its rights.”
Ahmadinejad made the remarks during discussions with Syrian President Bashar Assad, who arrived in Tehran for a two-day visit. Assad was in Tehran to discuss Iran's uranium enrichment at the behest of French President Nicolas Sarkozy. Many observers viewed Assad’s visit as an almost “last ditch” effort to avoid a military confrontation.
Tehran was given an informal two-week deadline, set July 19 by the UN Security Council's five permanent members, plus Germany, to stop expanding uranium enrichment – at least temporarily – in exchange for their commitment to stop seeking new UN sanctions. Ahmadinejad's stance signaled both a failure of Assad's mission and a rejection of the deadline.
Iranian foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki issued a similarly clear response to whether Iran would respond according to the Western timeframe: "Iran does not recognize the deadline for the nuclear issue…We answer to the incentives package whenever it fits us." Mottaki’s remark was followed a declaration by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei: "Backing down one step in the face of the arrogance [of the West] will encourage it to come one step forward." Khamenei added, "The idea that retreating and giving up right stances and words will make [the U.S.] change its policy is totally wrong and baseless."
Iran's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Asghar Soltanieh, also stated that Iran will not suspend its program, but does want to keep talking. Many Western diplomats wonder whether talking will eventually lead to a suspension or merely stretch out the negotiations until the Bush administration runs its course and Iran further masters the enrichment cycle.
After Iran neglected to give a clear response to an offer made by world powers in Geneva on July 19, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Iran could expect more sanctions to be imposed by the United States and the European Union as early as late August or September and may then be hit with a fourth sanctions resolution at the U.N. Security Council.
"We will see what Iran does in two weeks, but I think the diplomatic process now has a new kind of energy to it," she said. "If they do not decide to suspend then we will be in a situation where we have to return to the Security Council."
That two week deadline lapsed, and the AFP quoted White House press secretary Dana Perino as saying, "Negative consequences await if they don't have a positive response to our very generous incentives package, and that would possibly come in the form of sanctions."
At the State Department, however, the response was slightly different: "I didn't count the days. [The deadline]'s coming up soon," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters.
Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier urged Iran to stop playing for time and deliver a "clear answer" to the latest initiative. "Stop dallying," Steinmeier was quoted as saying in an interview with the weekly Der Spiegel.
Steinmeier said he expected "a clear signal for a mutual freeze. We would freeze our sanctions efforts and Iran the development of its centrifuges." He warned it would be "negligent" for Iran to pass on the opportunity and added that in case of Tehran's refusal, the six nati
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