Surprise!
And not a pleasant one, I'll wager. The Jerusalem Post is reporting that a senior Iranian diplomat has promised a "surprise" about Teheran's nuclear program.
A senior official in Teheran said Wednesday that in the next few days, a "surprise" was expected regarding Iran's nuclear program, Al-Jazeera reported.
Teheran's apparent refusal to suspend uranium enrichment set the stage for a showdown at the UN Security Council later this month.
The United States said Wednesday that a proposal by Iran for nuclear negotiations falls short of UN demands for a halt to enrichment, and began plotting "next moves" with other governments.
Diplomats from Europe, the US, Russia and China pored over details of Iran's counterproposal
Wednesday, a day after Teheran presented it.
Initial comments from Russia and China, however, made clear that the US is likely to face difficulty getting at least those nations to agree to any tough sanctions against Iran.In Paris, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy made clear that his government was sticking by the UN demand for Iran to halt enrichment by the end of this month as a precondition to further talks.
"I want to point out again that France is available to negotiate, and to recall that, as we have always said … a return to the negotiating table is linked to the suspension of uranium enrichment," Douste-Blazy said.
I am not at all happy with surprises. I suspect I will be even less so than usual with this one. Remember that UN inspectors found traces of highly enriched uranium at Iranian facilities before. As has been speculated in comments here, what if the surprise has to do with North Korea's apparent test preparations? Sleep tight, folks.
By Roland Hesz, August 24, 2006 @ 2:57 am
I remember you said in a post, that Iran is far far away from having sufficient technology to make a nuclear bomb.
You retake that opinion?
Just curious, as your analysis at the time sounded good and well based.
By Santay, August 24, 2006 @ 5:53 am
Newt said if North Korea ships Iran a nuke tomorrow how close are they then?
By Gaius, August 24, 2006 @ 5:57 am
I don’t believe I ever said that, Roland. I remember writing a post that said that some analysts said Iran was some (small) number of years away from a bomb and that I found that of very little comfort. But if you find it, let me know.
By Roland Hesz, August 24, 2006 @ 8:48 am
Ok, I may be mistaken, there certainly were quotes, and you made some comments that was quite good, and made this impression.
I will look up the post – though you got a bunch of them, so it will take some time