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Iran: Bush keeps nuke option
18/04/2006 22:26 - (SA)
Tehran - US President George W Bush
refused on Tuesday to rule out nuclear strikes against Iran if
diplomacy fails to curb the Islamic Republic's atomic ambitions.
Iran, which says its nuclear programme is purely peaceful,
told world powers it would pursue atomic technology, whatever
they decided at a meeting in Moscow on Tuesday.
Iran's defiance of world pressure to halt the programme
drove oil prices to a record high of $72.64 a barrel, raising
fears of a cut in supplies from the world's fourth biggest crude
exporter.
Bush said in Washington he would discuss Iran's nuclear
activities with China's President Hu Jintao this week and avoided
ruling out nuclear retaliation if diplomatic efforts fail.
Asked if options included planning for a nuclear strike,
Bush replied: "All options are on the table. We want to solve
this issue diplomatically and we're working hard to do so."
Speculation about a US attack has mounted since a report
in New Yorker magazine said this month that Washington was
mulling the option of using tactical nuclear weapons to knock
out Iran's subterranean nuclear sites. Targeted sanctions
The United States, which accuses Iran of seeking atom bombs,
was expected to push for targeted sanctions against Tehran when
it met the UN security council's other permanent
members (Britain, France, China and Russia), as well as Germany.
Russia and China oppose sanctions and the use of force.
Deputy foreign ministers from the six nations are meeting
ahead of an end-April deadline for the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA) to report on whether Iran is complying with
UN demands that it halt uranium enrichment.
"I recommend that they do not make hasty decisions, be
prudent and study their path in the past. "Any time they have
pressured Iran they have got adverse results," Iran's foreign
ministry spokesperson Hamid Reza Asefi said.
"Whatever the result of this meeting might be, Iran will not
abandon its rights (to nuclear technology)," he added later. Strikes 'last resort'
Iran defied UN demands by declaring last week it had
enriched uranium to a level used in power stations and was
aiming for industrial-scale production, ratcheting up tensions.
US senator Joe Lieberman, a member of the senate armed
services committee, told Israel's Jerusalem Post the US probably could not destroy Iran's nuclear programme, but
could attempt to set it back by strikes as a last resort.
"I think the only justifiable use of military power would be
an attempt to deter the development of their nuclear programme
if we felt there was no other way to do it," he said.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, speaking at an annual
military parade, said the army was ready to defend the nation.
IAEA inspectors are due in Iran on Friday to visit nuclear
sites, including one at Natanz where Iran says it has enriched
uranium to 3.5%, the level used in nuclear power plants.
- Reuters
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