cookie wrote:my friend just emailed me to tell me that this is a part of the American strategy:

"Keep the economy in Iran as high as possible!
The better the economy, the more the Iranian people will get economic resposability.
This is a part of the strategy to win the hart and mind of the Iranian people."

cookie wrote:Oh sh*t,
I didn't read everything there:

"The US has imposed a wide-ranging embargo on Iran for more than 25 years and it has made no difference to Iran's policy. "

UN talks on anti-nuclear sanctions against Iran

October 8, 2006

SIX world powers have agreed to discuss possible UN Security Council sanctions to punish Iran for failing to halt its nuclear program, but said they were still open to negotiations with Tehran.

The US, which has accused Iran of trying to build a nuclear bomb, portrayed the agreement with Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China as a decision by the six powers to impose sanctions, with just their scope yet to be determined.

"The decision has been made - we'll go for sanctions; the question is what the extent of the sanctions will be," US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns told reporters after the London ministerial-level meeting on Friday.

Mr Burns said the six powers would hold talks early this week and that their UN ambassadors were expected to begin discussing a sanctions resolution the following day.

While the US, backed by Britain, is lobbying hard for sanctions, Russia and China have opposed this route.

Russia reiterated after the meeting that talks with Iran were the way forward and that it would continue to pursue that goal at the UN.

"We have firmly confirmed that we will hold consultations in the UN Security Council on what additional measures to take to incite the Iranian party to accept the proposals that the sextet made in early June," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.

In June the six powers offered Iran economic and political incentives to halt uranium enrichment. In its reply, Iran hinted at some flexibility over suspension, but not as a precondition for talks.

Iran, which says its nuclear program is only for power generation, missed a Security Council deadline of August 31 to stop uranium enrichment.

Apart from Germany, the powers that met in London were veto-wielding Security Council members.

"Further pressure [on Iran] is needed," British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett told reporters.

In July, a UN resolution authorised the Security Council to "adopt appropriate measures" to press Iran under article 41, Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which refers to commercial or diplomatic sanctions but excludes military force.

"We are proposing to consult on measures under article 41," Mrs Beckett said.

"That means not military measures, but it does mean other measures which can put pressure on Iran in order to bring them to the negotiating table."

International Herald Tribune
Wednesday, April 6, 2005

Nuclear Iran: The Principle is Set,
Now What's the Price?
by Stanley A. Weiss

LONDON - "I've got principles," Groucho Marx once quipped. "If you don't like them, I've got other principles."

Since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, Washington has made much of its self-righteous principles. No negotiations. No lifting of the U.S. economic embargo. No diplomatic relations. At least not until Tehran stops supporting terrorism and pursuing weapons of mass destruction.

But these high principles yielded low returns. Washington's do-nothing, say-nothing stance toward Shiite Iran failed to change Tehran's behavior yet succeeded in depriving the United States of a valuable partner, from combating the Sunni terrorism of Al Qaeda to stabilizing Iraq.

So now that Tehran is perhaps three years away from having a nuclear weapon, Washington has wisely decided it has other principles. With the recent decision to join the European Union in offering Iran economic incentives to give up its nuclear program, the Bush administration is now negotiating with the Islamic Republic, with Europe as the middleman.

Negotiations will reveal the answers to key questions.

Does Tehran see a nuclear weapon as an end in itself or as a bargaining chip for economic and security concessions from the West?

Is the EU prepared to embrace the one stick that Tehran fears most - not American airstrikes against its nuclear sites (which would only rally all Iranians around the clerical regime), but Security Council sanctions backed by Europe and Japan, Iran's main trading partners?

Is the Bush administration willing to offer perhaps the only carrot for which the Islamic Republic might give up the bomb - meaningful U.S. economic and security guarantees?

A grand bargain with Tehran? As George Bernard Shaw said in another context, the principle has been established, all that remains is the haggling over price.

Exemptions to the U.S. embargo have already made Iran a major customer for American wheat and corn. Americans already buy more than $150 million worth of Iranian dried fruits, pistachios, carpets and caviar every year.

The Bush administration now says it is prepared to stop blocking Iran's application to the World Trade Organization and to allow the sale of spare parts for Iran's aging civilian aircraft. Iranian negotiators predictably dismissed this opening offer as "ludicrous" and "insignificant."

President George W. Bush concedes that the principle of all sticks, no carrots has failed. Explaining why he has let Europe take the lead in nuclear negotiations, he recently said, "We're relying upon others because we've sanctioned ourselves out of influence with Iran."

Washington learns an old lesson anew. Multilateral sanctions can succeed in changing behavior (as with the end of South Africa's apartheid regime and Libya's decision to give up weapons of mass destruction). But unilateral sanctions almost always fail (as with the 45-year U.S. embargo against Fidel Castro's Cuba and sanctions to prevent Pakistan from going nuclear).

The U.S. embargo has failed in its primary purpose of isolating Iran economically. While American companies watch, European companies have invested heavily in Iran's energy sector. Iran has agreed to a $40 billion natural gas deal with India and a $70 billion gas deal with China. So much for American threats to penalize foreign companies that invest in Iran's oil and gas sector.

Worst of all, the American embargo perversely reinforces the very regime it was meant to undermine. Why do Tehran's theocrats sabotage every step toward rapprochement with the U.S., thwart privatization of state enterprises and oppose foreign ownership of Iranian companies? Because the embargo props up the mullahs' own business monopolies.

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and his fellow klepto-clerics pocket billions from bonyads, corrupt Islamic "charities" that control an estimated 70 percent of Iran's non-oil economy. The Revolutionary Guards, the iron fist of the regime, profit from black market smuggling. The dilapidated banking system has meant a windfall for bazaari merchants and money lenders, another pillar of the regime.

Want to really undermine this mullahtocracy? Lift the embargo and begin a business invasion. But with the mullahs unlikely to sign their own death warrant and Iran's reformist movement all but dead, who's left to strike a grand bargain with Washington?

Re-enter Hashemi Rafsanjani, the powerful former president who is expected to run in June's presidential election. A leading pistachio exporter, the ever-pragmatic Rafsanjani knows that reducing the country's double-digit unemployment requires ties and trade with America. Iranians know that he is perhaps the only leader with the political clout and revolutionary credentials to strike a bargain with the Great Satan without being tagged a traitor - precisely why hard-core clerics have tried to keep him from running.

A Rafsanjani victory would be Iran's way of saying to the world, "Let's make a deal." But regardless, Washington should act in its own national interest and put all options on the table - major diplomatic and economic carrots included.

If Tehran is willing to submit to intrusive international inspect-tions to assure the world that its nuclear program produces energy not bombs, restoring diplomatic relations and lifting the trade embargo would be a price worth paying. Let the haggling begin.

BKKSTAN wrote: You know cookie,I am worried about allowing Iran getting and proliferating WMDs,that doesn't mean that I hate the Iranian people or feel that civilian airliners should not be safe!I think the answer provided was sufficient and right on.

The United States will allow the sale of plane parts to
Iran's flagship airline
"Our recommendation is consistent with the US government's commitment to promote international safety-of-flight standards and ensure the safety of all aviation passengers, including the citizens of Iran," the State Department said.

I thought the embargo already did cover equipment for the oil industry. Companies like Halliburton just go around it by using non-US subsidiaries.

This decision to supply parts was purely a financial sop to the big US corporations, nothing to do with concern for peoples safety.