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Bush may cut a deal with Iran
SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Monday, January 22, 2001
WASHINGTON — As Russia advances its own strategic ties with Iran, the Bush
administration wants to encourage a dialogue with Teheran on trade and
regional security while cracking down on neighboring Iraq.Administration
officials said President George Bush will quietly launch an effort to improve
relations with the Islamic republic. But they said Bush will make it clear
that this is dependent on Teheran scaling down its missile and
nonconventional programs and ending support for terrorism.The officials said
Bush will require Iran in any effort to crack down on Iraq, Middle East
Newsline reported. This would include Iranian help for opposition activities
as well increased supervision of the Gulf waters to prevent Iraqi oil
smuggling.Meanwhile, leading strategists say Moscow will no longer pay much
attention to U.S. concerns regarding Russia's military relationship with
Iran.Russian strategists predict that after years of coordinating policy with
Washington, Russia will restore its military ties with Iran regardless of
U.S. objections. They said the Russian goal will be to advance its national
interests rather than confront the United States.Alexander Konovalov,
president of the Institute of Strategic Assessments, said Russia is prepared
to pay the price of U.S. sanctions in advancing military ties with Iran. "It
can be said the transaction with Iran has been restored, the transaction to
sell arms," Konovalov told a Moscow news conference. "Our desire will be not
to do something pleasant for the United States but to pursue our national
interest as our leadership understands it."Konovalov, who is also a professor
at Moscow State University, envisioned the prospect that the United States
would end commercial space cooperation with Russia. But he said Washington
has few pressure points on Moscow."True, there are many risks because we may
be thrown out of the International Space Station, it may be decided not to
use our Proton missiles to deliver payloads," Konovalov said. "Of course the
Americans have more possibilities to exert economic influence on us than vice
versa. But these possibilities, really, are not so numerous. You see, many of
the channels linking us were destroyed in recent times."Strategists said
Russia will join with other countries that object to U.S. policy. Moscow's
major ally in this effort will be China.Konstantinovich Oznobishchev,
director of the Institute of Strategic Assessments, said Russia will have to
choose between close relations with Washington or those with Teheran.
Oznobishchev said the choice will be whether Moscow wants Western financial
and technological aid or Iranian arms sales."We simply have to choose what is
more important to us," he said, "the several billion that we will get from
the sale of weapons or cooperation in the field of high technology we can
well count on or the prospect of easier access to loans without which we
cannot run our budget." Secretary of State Colin Powell said the
administration will be reviewing policy toward Iran. Powell said he envisions
changes in policy that will serve U.S. interests in the Middle East."We have
serious problems in our relationship with Iran, I'm not going to minimize
that," Powell said. "But, at the same time, we can see in recent years that
there is change happening."Iranian officials said they will be carefully
monitoring changes in U.S. policy.
Monday, January 22, 2001
