Candidates include the controversial former head of the regime's religious police, Mohammed Qalamuddin, whose officers were responsible for some of the worst atrocities under the Taliban regime.
The US and UK have strained economies and they cannot wage wars in different parts of the world. This was an expected measure after the killing of Osama Bin Laden because they could not just walk out from Afghanistan without killing Bin laden.
But what will happen with the sunni militants if the US and NATO will leave Afghanistan? They will probably be unleashed in the coming sectarian civil wars between Sunnis and Shias that the US and its two regional allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia, have been cooking for a while now in the ME.
Russia's defence ministry said it was giving the secondhand MiG-29s to Beirut free of charge. The gift was part of a defence cooperation deal that would see Moscow train Lebanese military personnel.
Russia is also reportedly preparing to sell SA-20 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran.
Or they are maybe just doing business like everybody else. I don't think Russia will regain its former cold war role in the Arab world (an expression I really hate to use because, politically, there is no such a thing as an 'Arab world'). At the height of its power, the USSR was able to engage its military only defensively in Eastern Europe and Cuba. Their cold war role in the ME was minimal. It did not prevent Israel from expanding. Thanks also the the political divisions in the Arab world. One of the main reasons also for the short lived rule of communism in the USSR is that it was unable, and its leaders unwilling, to propagate and exert its military influence in far and away countries like Capitalism and the US did successfully. In fact, the cold war role on the international level of the USSR was pretty much exagerated by the US in order to instill fear, they have been doing the same with Bin Laden. Another reason to this rapprochement between Russia and the Arab world could be that Russia, after an initial period of hostility with the Muslim population in the former soviet republics, is trying to ease things with them and secure its borders at home. I see the move not as a defiance directed at the US and Israel but as a sign of consolidation of relations on its frontiers with Muslim republics, a security concern prompted by the Georgian crisis.
P.S. Contrary to what the article linked to here may suggest, Iran is not part of the Arab world.
Second, and concomittant to the first, pressure was being played on the shia community in Iraq to distract it from public critiques of the deal coming from the Lebanese shia community by spreading false rumours about Hezbollah's leader health.
Third, bombing Syria last night and killing civilians while the rehabilitation of this country, at least by some European allies of the US like France and Britain was well on its way, is one more sign that the neocons are willing to go to the extreme in the incoherence that became the hallmark of their foreign policy. What was the reason for the bombing ? Al-Qaida. But it turns out that they never considered the efforts made successfully by Syria against Sunni muslim extremism while the neocons themselves were cajoling many leaders in Arab countries who are rather sympathetic to the point of financing sunni muslim extremism. Well the reason for the bombing may be miles away actually from the declared narrative, it could be to prompt a response from Iran which the neocons and Cheney are salivating to go to war with.
I am a bit anxious of what will happen to us all in those remaining days that, according to all polls, will see the end of the neocons power. This doesn't mean that Washington will become more moral or more friendly to the oppressed in matters of domestic and foreign policy, it will only mean probably a bit of the much needed realism and pragmatism, which even cynical, will be a nice welcome and a relief from madness. While Arab rulers who tended to this madness in order to keep their positions must be panicking at the prospect of a more reasonable foreign policy in the region.
Photo The Guardian Of course, there are these pictures of Palestinian militants in Gaza who protest Bush's visit. But the western press and the Saudi controlled Arab press agree that Gaza is not part of the Arab world, it is not part of any world, it is somewhere between the axis of evil and nowhere, as far as Bush and Olmert are concerned.
In Al-Quds Al 'Arabi, columnist 'Abd-El-Bari 'Atwan takes on Bush's illogic and asks how Bush can tie the end of 'illegal' settlements* to the end of the launching of rockets on these same settlements when the rocket launchers are in Gaza and when the only Palestinian 'authority' Bush recognises and meet is in Ramallah and has nothing to do with Gaza ? How Bush can promise Abbas peace when he ties the peace process to the end of the rockets coming from a territory Abbas does not control ?**
'Atwan writes that not only Abbas does not control Gaza but he does not control Ramallah, for to enter Ramallah or to leave it he needs the approval of Israeli authorities. He cannot even smuggle a baby to or from Ramallah without the approval of Israeli authorities. 'Atwan doubts that Bush's intention in this visit is peace because if this is so he shouldn't have left peace for the last year of his two term presidency. 'Atwan ironically finishes his column by reminding the reader that his wife is not Iranian, his mother is not a Shia Muslim, and that he is an Arab to the bone, in case anybody reading his column might perceive his critique of Bush as motivated by the love of Iran. This kind of sectarian thinking is also symptomatic of the Arab press owned by the Saudi royal family and very submissive to it...The kind of freedom of expression and democracy Bush promotes in the Arab world...
*A zionist oxymore since all settlements are illegal. **In my opinion, this can only be understood as a call for civil war among Palestinians until the end of all Palestinians, or at least that's how peace efforts of the Bush presidency can be caracterised.
DC: With your story on Lebanon about the US and Saudi Arabia supporting Sunni jihadists, including Fatah al-Islam, we then see the Lebanese army start to fight Fatah al-Islam in a refugee camp in Lebanon. What happened there?
SH: Look, I’m not being querulous but it doesn’t matter what I think. What obviously happened is that, assuming I was right, there’s a pattern here. If you go back two decades, when the war against Russia was being fought in Afghanistan, the Saudis convinced us that they could control the Salafis – Osama Bin Laden, etc. – and we overtly and knowingly aided them and it ended up biting our ass. So it’s not illogical to conclude that one of the things that happened is that people we thought we could control, we could not control. So, right now we are helping the Lebanese army fight people that we indirectly helped support. As usual, it’s complete madness.
DC: You met Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon some time ago. Is fear of him and his popularity their reason for supporting Sunni jihadists at this point?
SH: Sure. Of course.
DC: He’s been branded as a terrorist by the West and the media. What was your impression of him?
SH: I think in Europe he is seen much differently. The Germans certainly negotiated with him; the French do. In fact, Hezbollah was invited by the French government to a conference that may or may not take place on the whole Lebanese crisis. I hear it was delayed because of American protests. So basically this is an American point of view. I think the Brits even have a difference of opinion. And I don’t think there’s any question that, whatever he may have done two decades ago, today he’s certainly playing it responsibly, and his response to the crisis most recently has been pretty interesting, supporting the Lebanese army, etc. So his record speaks for itself. He’s also probably the most influential man in the Middle East right now.
DC: More so than [Iranian president] Ahmadinejad?
SH: Oh my God yes. I don’t think there’s any question. All the popularity polls show, particularly after the war against the Israelis, he was number one in the hit parade. I don’t know if this is true, but I think Ahmadinejad even wanted Hezbollah to come visit him publicly in Tehran at one point in the last six months. He wouldn’t do it, maybe for reasons as simple as his own security. But, he’s quite an imposing figure. And he’s somebody that, were we in the real world, we’d be dealing with. But we’re not in the real world here in Washington DC.
...DC: How do you see the media environment changing since that point (since the My Lai massacre story ) ?
SH: That’s a big question. Basically, it’s a little shocking to me that the mainstream press has so completely missed the story of this war in Iraq and this presidency. I think when we look back on this era we’re going to be very critical of the press. They really missed one of the great moral issues of our time, just as they missed Vietnam for many years. So it’s really pretty sad.
DC: Where do you see some good journalism happening right now?
SH: Dana Priest in the Washington Post did some good stuff. There’s a kid named Nir Rosen who does some good stuff and has spent a lot of time out there. There are a lot of good journalists out there doing stuff, not all of them necessarily where we can see it. My old newspaper, the New York Times, is basically a huge disappointment to me, not only because of Judith Miller but because they continue to flack for the war. And that’s sort of depressing. After all those years I spent there I am a little astonished that they haven’t figured out a way to be more critical of Bush.
By Henry Siegman, London Review of Books, Augut 16th, 2007
The Middle East peace process may well be the most spectacular deception in modern diplomatic history. Since the failed Camp David summit of 2000, and actually well before it, Israel’s interest in a peace process – other than for the purpose of obtaining Palestinian and international acceptance of the status quo – has been a fiction that has served primarily to provide cover for its systematic confiscation of Palestinian land and an occupation whose goal, according to the former IDF chief of staff Moshe Ya’alon, is ‘to sear deep into the consciousness of Palestinians that they are a defeated people’. In his reluctant embrace of the Oslo Accords, and his distaste for the settlers, Yitzhak Rabin may have been the exception to this, but even he did not entertain a return of Palestinian territory beyond the so-called Allon Plan, which allowed Israel to retain the Jordan Valley and other parts of the West Bank....
...Anyone familiar with Israel’s relentless confiscations of Palestinian territory – based on a plan devised, overseen and implemented by Ariel Sharon – knows that the objective of its settlement enterprise in the West Bank has been largely achieved. Gaza, the evacuation of whose settlements was so naively hailed by the international community as the heroic achievement of a man newly committed to an honourable peace with the Palestinians, was intended to serve as the first in a series of Palestinian bantustans. Gaza’s situation shows us what these bantustans will look like if their residents do not behave as Israel wants...
...If the US and its allies were to take a stand forceful enough to persuade Israel that it will not be allowed to make changes to the pre-1967 situation except by agreement with the Palestinians in permanent status negotiations, there would be no need for complicated peace formulas or celebrity mediators to get a peace process underway. The only thing that an envoy such as Blair can do to put the peace process back on track is to speak the truth about the real impediment to peace. This would also be a historic contribution to the Jewish state, since Israel’s only hope of real long-term security is to have a successful Palestinian state as its neighbour.MORE...
From Le Monde. A poll of their readers (12550 polled) shows that more than 60% think that the nomination of Tony Blair as special envoy of the quartet to the ME will not help reinvigorate the negociations process in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Let alone the peace process. Le Monde's readers are center left and moderates.
Israel does not want peace. That's not only Gideon Levy's conclusion but also the conclusion of some in the Bush camp as it appears (i.e. Robert Novak). Indeed, nothing for now can move Israel and the neo-cons from their attitude toward conflict and peace in the ME, because public opinion in the US and the west in general are kept in ignorance of facts about the region. Western policy about the Middle east is divorced from facts and from informed public opinion, thanks mainly to the work of the neo-cons.
''To these people the interests of Israel are paramount, and if Israel is not interested in a two state solution that involves handing back settlements then neither are the neo-cons. And no matter what game they play publicly, their policy line remains tied to whatever the state of Israel wants.''
A blatant example of this willful ignorance is the death of investigative journalism and the reduction of the media, even the most prominent ones, to simple mouthpieces of their governments and their leaders. Homeyra points out to an article on the neo-cons where there is mention of the fact that most of them come from the news media which they tranformed into their echo chamber, a subjective one by their own admission. Le Monde yesterday published answers to questions sent to the three front runner candidates for the presdiential elections in France. The questions were about ten 'crucial' issues in foreign policy, as determined by le Monde. A third of the questions was about Iran, more than a third was about internal and foreign affairs issues related to Europe including attitudes toward China and Russia, and there was a question on Darfur, a recently zionist sponsored 'humanitarian' cause. There was no mention of the Israeli-Arab conflict, no mention of Iraq, and no mention of Palestine. Half of the questions on crucial foreign policy issues in France, as determined by le Monde, can be seen as neo-con issues. Le Monde is a center left mainstream French newspaper. The sounds of the drumbeats in the echo chamber are reaching distant neighbourhoods.
I realised yesterday that the neo-con thinking has become invasive, even among people and countries outside their own circles. This work of disinformation was achieved by a joint effort from Israel and its neo-con allies through means including shock and awe wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, lying, intimidation, mayhem, threats, and most of all, the devaluation of facts on the ground which were replaced and substituted by false narratives bearing no relation to Truth.
Take for example the present zionist narrative on the Israeli-palestinian peace process, the one that was fabricated since 9/11 with the help of the 'War on Terror'. We all know that the 'war on terror' has produced more terror, displaced three to four millions Iraqis from their homes while eight to nine millions need humanitarian assistance, killed another million of them, and destabilised the whole Middle East, not to mention Afghanistan. On the other hand, the 'war on terror' served as the main line in a narrative preventing any effort to reach peace in Palestine. The following were the main premices of the 'War on Terror' narrative:
-Sharon could not talk to Arafat because Arafat was a terrorist; -Sharon could not talk to Abbas because Abbas could not reign in on terrorists; And when Abbas was sufficiently weakened and Hamas took over democratically after having stopped suicide bombings: -Sharon, and consequently Olmert, could not talk to Hamas because not only Hamas are terrorists but they don't recognise Israel's 'right to exist'. Israel was frightened asking for the protection of the international community because, in Palestine, terrorists in government don't recognise its 'right to exist'; The international community followed Israel in this path and Israel felt enough support to conduct daily invasions and armed assaults on Gaza (Remember Jennine, Beith Hanoun ?) as well as daily harrassement of Palestinians, which continue to go on as I am writing. Israel felt enough support to conduct a bloody criminal war on Lebanon to get the pro-Bush Sanyura government rid of Hezbollah 'terrorists' which are roughly 40 % of the country's population and more if you count their popular support from other communities, killing, in one month, more than a thousand civilians, displacing a quarter of the population, destroying infrastructure and dropping some one million cluster bombs intended to kill well after the ceasefire.
During this time, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority were caving to international pressure to form a unity government so the west could send aid, halted at the election of the Hamas government, to palestinians who are in critical conditions and starving. Rice, Bush and Olmert tried their best, and behind the scenes, to stop a unity government, by giving money and arms to corrupt Palestinian factions (Fatah) pushing Gaza into a civil war. Things were starting to look really ugly when Saudi Arabia, the first official US and Israel implicit ally in the region, worried by a rise of anti-Saudi sentiment in the Arab street and among Muslims, stepped in and brokered a unity government. The Palestinian Authority government that resulted has not only a third of its members from Fatah, an organisation seen now as 'moderate' by the US and Israel (it wasn't moderate enoug for them when it was time to negotiate with Arafat), but it has also more than a third of its members from the civil society and independant groups. Israel ignored the government. The saudis relaunched their peace initiative, with an implicit agreement from the present Palestinian government, Israel continued to ignore it, until a week ago. Meanwhile, Olmert is mulling the Arab peace offer. If it is good for him on the internal level, he may engage in talks but he seems reluctant to accept it as such. Read here how Israel and most Israelis view the peace initiative, which is minimal to a two state solution, and here an appraisal of the initiative.
During the five years and a half since 9/11, chances for peace in the ME were squandered by a simple narrative, the 'war on terror' narrative, making all Arabs and Muslims potential terrorists, ennemies of the West, unfit for talks and undeserving peace. It is a convenient lie and it is a new dehumanising tactic for the New Orientalism enabling the continued and renewed occupation of Palestine, the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the invasion and bombing of Lebanon, the extraordinary renditions, torture, at scales unseen before, by modern western democracies, enabling Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and the reorientation of the international foreign policy agenda away from the Israeli-Arab conflict to new satellite but nonetheless important conflicts like Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Darfur, and Somalia. And it does not stop there. Al-Qaida, which is an objective ally of the neo-cons in the 'war on terror', because Al-Qaida exists as long as the 'war on terror' exists (see the Adam Curtis documentary, 'The Power of Nightmares'), was trying recently to spread this 'war' to the Maghreb, Algeria and Morocco. The Algerian government, which dealt with a murderous and state threatening wave of Islamist terror whose scale was much wider than 9/11 related directly to an internal social and economical malaise, and which is trying to revive the state, the economy, and national reconciliation, was very very angry with the US ambassador's reaction to the recent bombings in Alger. It accused the US embassy, who issued a warning on future and imminent Al-Qaida terror attacks in Alger, of interference in internal affairs of a sovereign state. The present US ambassador in Alger had a previous job in occupied Iraq as an ambassador. The Algerian government is labeling the shocking attitude of the US ambassador as the 'Iraqi' attitude, a coloniser attitude. Algerians fought a bloody war of decolonisation and they are, more than other Arabs, very sensitive to the colonialist attitude.
This New Orientalism is unlike others because it uses as a proxy an occupying state, Israel, which is politically and strategically, and at the same time, an integral part of the ME and an integral part of the West. Unlike other occupation endeavours, and with the exception of the European occupation of the new World, this one, the Israeli occupation of Palestine, is here to stay. If it refuses peace, if it refuses to merge into a uniquely Middle Eastern state strategically and politically different from the West's military power and in peace with its neighbours, and if the West refuses to dissociate itself from this occupation, the only logical outcome, and history is here to testify to this outcome, will be a dramatic outcome and either one of these: The end of the existence of the Palestinian state. It happened already; The end of the Israeli state. It could not happen given the military and economic power of Israel; The extermination and dissemination of the Palestinian people. This is happening before our eyes.
If Israel does not want a two state solution, giving a viable state to Palestinians and retreating behind the 1967 occupation lines, neither a one state solution integrating all Palestinians and giving them rights equal to Jewish citizens, the only outcome will be the slow extermination of the Palestinian people. This is the simple truth we are trying to hide from by listening to neo-con lies.
UPDATE: I am relieved that no Arab or Muslim was behind the horrible shooting at Virginia Tech on Monday April 16th. Otherwise, Bush would have to invade the Arab or Muslim country of the shooter. That's the meaning of the war on terror; waging wars with organised armies against a bunch of fools and thugs. Now, is Bush going to attack South Korea ?
I was trying to find some meaning in the recent moves the US was making in its foreign policy in the ME as they were seen by many as a Turn. I came down to the conclusion that it was only a cosmetic move meant to hide the fact that the US is intent to reject the blame of the Iraqi nightmare on Iraq's neighbours in order to continue its belligerant policies in the ME.
The US should look back at its foreign policy in central and Latin America and ponders what the Middle East would look like in fourty years from now should we be able to grow leaders like Castro, Chavez, Morales, Lula, Bachelet and Kirshner (L'impossible rêve !).
Reading about Bush's recent visits to central and Latin American countries, I had to come down to the same conclusion. Bush never showed a real interest in this America except when he actively sent logistic support to the Venezuelian opposition to undemocratically throw Chavez. After he failed, he didn't show the same persistance as in the ME, he gave up. So what he is up to now visiting what is becoming increasingly anti-Bush territory ? I mean this is like Bin Laden visiting New York. US foreign policy in the Americas during the last forty years has left many American countries with more dead bodies than Bin Laden's terrorist foreign policy toward the US. Chavez wanted to tell Bush this simple fact by meeting with the Argentinian mothers in a show of protest in Buenos Aires.
And it appears that Bush and his administration are up again for some cosmetic surgery trying to help salvage, on the internal front, an embattled republican party, and an increasingly negative image of the US in the world. The failing of US foreign policy in the Americas, a place where this policy could have sized many opportunities to succeed, given the natural geopolitical and historical proximity, should remind the world that the US would in no way be better in dealing with radically different cultures and faraway countries and that the world would be better off without this kind of international leadership than with it.
Looking at the disastrous results of the US foreign policies in the Americas and the ME, citizens across the globe understand one thing: they are better off without this foreign policy than with it !
On the subject of US foreign policy from an anti-Bush perspective Candide's Notebooks writes 'What Bush squandered'. But I think it even started before Bush and Bush took the paradigm of bad foreign policy to a point of no return.
The New US Foreign Policy 'Turn' convening Iran and Syria to a conference on the stabilisation of Iraq is taking its closest allies and puppet governments in the ME by surprise.
Lebanese Sanyura's US/Saudi puppet government and its champions on the Lebanese Political scene are afraid they might be 'Sedotta e Abbandonata' by the US once again - it happened in the past- in favor of talks and normalisation of relations with Syria. Rice had to reassure former militia leader and present leader of the pro-Sanyura government March 14th movement, Walid Jumblatt, that Lebanon is still dear and close to her heart (as when it was bombarded by Israel and its children dying by the hundreds).
In its March 3rd electronic edition (link not available yet), Le Monde publishes an article Titled: 'Iraq: Paris is cautious (circumspect) towards US diplomatic turn'. The article author, Nathalie Nougayrède, reminds us that Chirac became very close to US policy on matters related to Lebanon. In addition, the personal and close ties Chirac entertains with some Lebanese anti-Syrian Politicians supported by the US, like Saad Hariri, have contributed to France's isolation from Syria and the Middle East scene the US seems to be opening now. Meanwhile, the six members of the UN security council have agreed on a framework for another resolution on Iran if it does not stop enriching Uranium. They seem to be heading for specific economic sanctions which can become more and more constraining for Iran.
It is no coincidence that this agreement of the UN security council comes at a moment the US is inviting Tehran to a conference on Iraq. In exchange for showing a will to stabilise Iraq and talk with Syria and Iran, the US was able to extract from the members of the security council an agreement of principle on future sanctions against Tehran. If Iraq is not stabilised, the US, who had a hard time making the case against Iran, will at least complain about Iran's uncooperativeness in the Iraqi dossier and push further the case of Iran helping the Iraqi insurgency. Tehran's decision about the conference on Iraq is not known yet, and the US made it clear that the question of Iran's nuclear program will not be discussed neither weighed in during the Iraq talks. Iran is cornered. Should it participate or not, its role in the stabilisation of Iraq and the US's willingness to implicate Iran in this process are now a public opinion matter and the US will make sure to pin the blame on Iran turning public opinion in the west against Iran when it comes to justify the situation in Iraq. It seems that the US has at least set the stage for Iran, which is to exert continuous and increasing constraints, including the increased military presence in the Gulf, manufacturing a consensus both inside the US and outside on the international scene against Iran. The goal will be to weaken and isolate Iran on the regional and international scenes while making the case against it more stronger.
In this context, the invitation sent to Iran and Syria for a conference on Iraq appears to me more about Iran then it is about Iraq. It is part of the US maneouvers to keep Iran pressured while appearing at the world stage as willing to talk. We should not therefore expect any miltary action against Iran soon but surely escalation in the threats and the sanctions. Unable to go to war against Iran, the US has chosen to weaken it before any military action, while appearing at the same time to be outside a logic of war by inviting Iran to talks on Iraq...The conference on Iraq is more than two years late and is likely to produce nothing for the Iraqi people. Le Monde's Corine Lesne published an analysis of the US strategy toward Iran on february 17th in which she argues that the US is trying to 'strangle' Iran economically as it did against Hamas, North Korea, and recently Sudan. Lesne concludes: ''Affaiblis sur le plan politique et militaire, les Etats-Unis entendent utiliser la puissance qui reste entière : Wall Street.'' which translates: weakened politically and miltarily, the US wants to use against Iran the power that is still theirs, Wall Street.
There is no turn in the recent moves we are witnessing in US foreign policy. What we are witnessing is an administration weakened abroad and at home, trying to pursue its belligerant policy by other means, even if it means doing so on the expanse of the stability of the entire ME. I did not discuss the frenetic diplomatic intiatives of Saudi Arabia because I think they are irrelevant. They are dictated by Bush and Co and intended to lull the defiance, suspicion and mistrust the Arab public opinion hold now against the US and its closest ally in the region, Saudi Arabia.
In light of all this I can say that I am not among the wonderers ! And I predict another turn when the time will come this administration will feel stronger enough to wage a military war Iran . And everybody, including the dovish left and anti-war movements worldwide, will be taken by surprise ! We should not look for TURNS in US policies in the ME right now, we should look for logical continuities and how an administration which is weak, both on the domestic and international fronts, is building the case for another illegal war in the ME. This is not a turn in foreign policy, this is political deception !
Ali Akbar Velayati has served for almost 17 years as foreign affairs minister in the successive governments of the Iranian Islamic revolution and became, 10 years ago, special advisor on foreign affairs for the supreme guide of the revolution, Ali Khamenei. He is very much in the spotlight since the recent escalation opposing the US and Israel to Iran on the development of Iran's nuclear capacity for civil purposes, as Iranians insist and repeat (within the Non Prolifeartion treaty) while the US and Israel are maintaining that Iran's nuclear activity is not for civil purposes. However, as I mentioned before, Velayati's presence is not felt in the anglo press or the press 'corps' of the countries advocating a war against Iran; US and UK.
I took it upon myself, with some fellow bloggers, Naj, Homeyra, Loopy, and others, to fill in the void, as much as possible, by translating the interviews from the Francophone press and posting some basic knowledge on Iran and its two recent revolutions. Indeed the Islamic revolution is called as such because it was encouraged by the US over another revolution, the leftist secularist revolution that fought the Shah in an alliance with Islamists to find itself overwhelmed by the Us hostility from the outside and the Islamists from the inside.
This is the latest interview with Velayati published by le Monde (february 21st, 2007, link at the end) and it was made while the UN security council was considering another resolution for sanctions against Iran. I have updated with some comments at the end.
In this interview, Velayati confirms Iran's willingness for open and non conditional negotiations while suggesting that the international community should not be intimidated by the agressive slogans of some leaders (in the context it must be understood that he is alluding at the same time to Bush and Ahmadi-Nejad. Read what follows). He maintains that only the supreme guide of the revolution has the last word in all matters. He also lamented the absence of an active role for European countries in the Middle East, especially France. Velayati seemed to suggest that this role is much needed to counter the US unilateralism in the ME.
Le Monde: What was Ali Larijani's (Iranian negotiator)message when he met on February 20th the IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei ?
Velayati: The message is we want to pursue negotiations. There is no disagreement that cannot be resolved by discussions . At the same time, one cannot dictate a solution in advance of any negotiation. This dossier has two red lines: the first is the fundamental right of Iran to nuclear technology for civil purposes given by the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the other is the guarantee that Iran must give on the absence of any plan for military escalation by developing nuclear energy. Between these two lines everything is possible in negotiations or discussions about our nuclear program.
Le Monde: Even a temporary suspension of Uranium enrichment ?
Velayati: M. Larijani is open to all propositions without exclusion. We have already suspended enrichment during two years and a half but this suspension didn't solve the problem. There are also other ideas we must not discard like the one we came with to create an international consortium on Uranium enrichment on the Iranian soil managed by Europeans and open to IAEA control (Russia has defended this idea in the previous crisis in the Iranian nuclear row). france has the capacity to form such a consortium. We have a history of nuclear collaboration and mutual trust with France who, in the past, had the project for a nuclear reactor for civil purposes at Darakhoin near Ahwaz in the 70s. We are and still shareholders in Eurodif. All this might facilitate the resuming of the discussions with France on our civil nuclear projects and adress the concerns of other countries on our nuclear capacity. The moment is suitable for such a move.
You know Iran is four times larger than Iraq and is three times more populated with a higher degree of mobilisation and a ready army. I don't see them risking war against us in these conditions.
Le Monde: How do you analyse French policies toward what is going on in Lebanon ? (to my readers, France is much more close to the US policies when it comes to Lebanon)
Velayati: France is wasting the political and culutral investments it had in this country. It threw itself in the hole digged by the US. If Paris does not want to lose its credit in Lebanon, it must abstain from taking sides with a small fraction of the population. In addition, France has withdrawn its support to an old time ally, general Michel Aoun, the chief of the Free Patriotic Movement, which is christian (allied to Hezbollah and Amal in their will to enlarge the present US backed Sanyura government to all sects and make it more representative of Lebanese, you can read their statement by clicking on the front page banner on this blog)
Le Monde: Jacques Chirac had previously thought od sending an envoy to tehran to discuss the situation in Lebanon. What do you think of this ?
Velayati: This is an excellent idea. There is a common interest to Iran and France in joining efforts to defend Lebanon. Talks between france and Iran could not only be beneficial to Lebanon but to all the ME and the Gulf regions. As we are speaking, the US is the only powerbroker in the ME and this unilaterlaism, which is denounced also by president Putin, is Bad. We aknowledge with much regret that Europe is absent from this scene, it does not play any role in the region and I deplore this fact. A European presence in which france plays a major role can potentailly reequilibrates the situation in the ME.
Le Monde: M. Chirac refuses to talk to Syria. What is your opinion ?
Velayati: Frankly, I must admit that France's position toward Syria is extreme and it is counterproductive to France. Other countries are profiting from this hostility. However Iran can play a role in future medations between the two countries.
Le Monde: Wars in Afghanistan, Irak and Lebanon have reinforced your central role in the region. Iran promotes stability but at the same time helps moveents like Hezbollah and Moqtada Sadr in Irak. The US is accusing Iran of arming the insurgents in Iraq. Why don't you make a move toward calming the situation by withdrawing your financial support for Hezbollah for example ?
Velayati: Certainly not ! It is not by abandoning Shi'a and Hezbollah in their fight against Israël that we are going to be useful in the region. As for the rest, Iran needs stability at its frontiers. Do you believe that the coalition forces in Afghanistan could have defeated the Talibans without our support ? In Iraq, we support the Maliki government and we work toward peace. There are no insurgents in Iraq, there are only resistants to the occupation
Interview by Marie-Claude Decamps
My Comments: Between the previous interview, published initially by Le Temps on February 14th, and this one which appeared on February 21st, Iran's position has evolved for the worse. What happened in one week ? A second resolution against Iran is being submitted by the US to the countries of the UN security council.
While Velayati is maintaining the possibility for open negotiations as well as the two red lines drawn by Iran for these negotiations, Iran's right to civil nuclear energy and its duty to account for its nuclear activity within international standards and IAEA rules, he seems to be more on the offensive both on the diplomatic and the psychological fronts. This attitude can be seen in the following elements:
-When he suggests that a war against Iran is unlike the war against Iraq because of the internal mobilisation, the size of both the country and the people, when compared to Iraq, as well as the state of readiness of the Iranian army;
-When he reminds us that Iran was instrumental in the victory against the talibans in 2001;
-When he reminds us of Iran's influence in the ME notably on regimes and political groups in Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, making a war against Iran a risk for the region;
-When he suggests a bigger role for France and Europe in general in the development of Iran's civil nuclear energy. Iran is looking for a partner for dialogue because it knows that the US is not interested in dialogue;
- When he suggests that Iran's influence in the region be used to promote peace and not war as when he mentions the mediation role Iran can play between France and Syria regarding the crisis in Lebanon. Clearly, Mr. Velayati has gone from being defensive in the first interview to offensive. What changed in one week is not only the fact that a second more hostile resolution is being prepared against Iran but that this resolution is being prepared on the sole basis that Iran is pursuing Uranium enrichment, something the IAEA was able to check, even though this enrichment is still, at this stage of the negotiations, at a non threatening level, for civil purposes. The attitude of the US is purely unacceptable because while Iran is poised for dialogue, compromise and open to control of its nuclear activity, the other side wants it to surrender this activity even though it is done within a legal framework, for civil purposes and within the NPT rules. This is why Velayati says that one cannot just set up the results for any negotiations before they actually take place. Indeed the US is asking that Iran stops any enrichment of Uranium in order to start negotiations while the halt to the Uranium enrichment should be the result of the negotiations !
What will happen next is that severe sanctions, if voted by the UN security council, will stop dialogue and Iran will be able to pursue its nuclear program outside international rules. This catastrophic scenario had already been played in North Korea where it yielded catastrophic results. One has to understand that we are here more close to the north Korea case than to Iraq. the US does not have the means going to war against Iran, and I really hope the neocons know that. The only thing that the US will be able to implement are sanctions and verbal escalation making, once again, the world less safe, more agressive and less productive for economies, except those sponsored by Cheney, Bush and Israel, arms trades and any other war related economy...
Stef from Famous for 15 megapixels is one of the best in the British blogosphere. He has recently posted two stories on the Iranian weapons found in Iraq.
However, in countries supporting the war against Iran the press seems to be lending credibility to US lies. I detected in yesterday's coverage of the news about Iran a clear difference between Le Monde and The Guardian. Le Monde insisted on Ahmadi-Nejad's and Iran's will to negociate and to find solutions within the international legal framework, IAEA, etc...: ''Today, we are announcing that Iran's will is to achieve a negociated deal with the international community through a constructive dialogue... We don't want to aggravate the security situation in the region.'' declared Iran's supreme council chief of national security Ali Larijani in Munich. Even Ahmadi-Nejad showed restraint in face of the US frenzy to throw fabricated accusations at Iran. He declared yesterday that Iran's nuclear activity will stay in the framework of the IAEA and within the non proliferation treaty*. While Mark Tran in the Guardian shows an Iranian president and a British PM both on the offensive: ''The Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, today accused the US of seeking to blame others for its problems in Iraq.'' ''Britain today weighed into the issue of alleged Iranian support for the insurgency by backing US claims of Iran's complicity at the highest level with insurgent attacks on American and allied forces that have left 170 soldiers dead.'' Added Mark Tran.
Are we witnessing here a repeat of the divergences we saw in the run up to the Iraq war; each newspaper expressing the official position of its government ? Are we going to witness another Freedom fries campaign on Capitol hill ? Are we going to hear the same spin, lies, relayed and broadcasted to us by our media hundreds thousands times in order to prepare the public opinion for war ? Are we going to let the Bush administration and Israel drive us into a silly war again ?
* Israel, who possess not less than 200 nuclear war heads ready to strike anywhere in the region, does not subscribe to the non proliferation treaty and is not inspected by the IAEA. Yet, the western press wants us to believe that Iran, who does not possess nuclear war technology, is a biggest threat than Israel. Actually, nobody is talking about Israel's nuclear war capacity.
To some people it may look as a fantasy but the commitment of what is now known as Christian Zionism to a total hegemony of Israel over large territories in the ME, extending from the river of Egypt to the river of Euphrates and including modern day Iraq and Lebanon (Palestinians having to find some another place to live), is real.
Money is being raised by Christian Zionists on the basis of this belief and channeled to Israel to support its present hegemony and criminal wars in the ME. This belief also entails that the realisation of this hegemony is achieved through an apocalypse, precondition for the return of the Christ and the believers' access to paradise.
"Put baldly, millions of evangelical Christians see forewarnings of Armageddon in the crisis in the Middle East. Followers of dispensationalism, a major strain within American evangelical Christianity, they believe that the return of Jews to Israel and the restoration of Jewish sovereignty over the TempleMount is a precondition for the rapture, the apocalypse and the return of Christ... For them, there can be no negotiation over what they call 'Judea and Samaria' despite the fact that many Israelis, and Jews worldwide, hope Israel eventually pulls out of the territories. Randall Price, jet-setting founder of World of the Bible Ministries, says, 'In the book of Genesis, there are territorial dimensions for the land that is given to Abraham and his descendents. It's from the river of Egypt to the river of the Euphrates.' In his view, Israel's right to that land, which extends into modern-day Iraq, is absolute. As for the Palestinians, Price says, 'Ishmael has said that his descendants would live to the East of their brother. There's a much larger geographical territory alloted to them.''
This unholy alliance of the Christian right and Zionism may make Osama Bin Laden look a small player on the international terror scene. After all, didn't USrael achieve more destruction and more mayhem than OBL during the last six years ? And this is why Osama has been off the Bush administration agenda, even since the beginning, serving only as a symbol for Islamist terror, a powerful symbol nonetheless amplified by CNN and Fox news and the images of September 11th. There is however one problem, the rising regional influence of nuclear Mullah's Iran and its allies, thanks to the ill conceived Iraq and Lebanon wars. A rational mind with no apocalyptic religious beliefs might think, at that point, that caution and diplomacy might replace the last six years political folly that has taken hold of the world and the ME. But if you were a Christian Zionist or a Zionist tout court you might think otherwise. This is a unique occasion to realise the prophecy: the hegemony of Israel in the ME, the Apocalypse and the return of the Christ ! Paradise Now !
Never before in our modern democracies the line was so blurred between politics and religion and the fate of many people's lives jeopardised by a bunch of extremist ideologists and religious fools, thanks to Bush, American christian Zionists, Israel and of course OBL.
Since March 29th 2006
