Another setback on Iran
Posted: Wednesday, October 14, 2009 1:27 PM by firstread
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Andrea Mitchell, State Dept.
from NBC's Andrea Mitchell
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin today expressed skepticism about sanctioning Iran over its nuclear program. Putin made his comments in Beijing, in what will be widely viewed as a diplomatic rebuke to the U.S. and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Clinton just wrapped up a two day trip to Russia and is now flying back to DC.
"There is no need to frighten the Iranians," Putin told reporters in Beijing after a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organizatin, the AP writes. "And if now, before making any steps [towards holding talks] we start announcing some sanctions, then we won't be creating favorable conditions for them to end positively. This is why it is premature to talk about this now," he said.
Clinton had her own difficulties over Iran on the trip, as Russia's hardline Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov restated his opposition to sanctions yesterday. Later yesterday, she met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who did not publically disagree with his Foreign Minister.
Privately, according to State Department officials traveling with the Secretary, Medvedev repeated assurances that he'd given President Obama at the UN: that sanctions would be unavoidable if Iran did not disclose its nuclear program.
Following up on commitments made in Geneva two weeks ago, Iran is supposed to meet next week in Vienna with International Atomic Energy Agency experts to discuss turning over its declared low-grade enriched uranium to Russia for reprocessing--eliminating that part of the stockpile from any potential future weapons fuel use.
Iran has also commited to invite IAEA inspectors into its Qom facility by October 24th, and to meet again with Western diplomats before the end of the month.
