Tuesday, June 10, 2008

EU, U.S. ready for extra Iran sanctions

From Reuters, Mon Jun 9, 2008:

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union and the United States will warn Iran on Tuesday they are ready to go beyond agreed U.N. sanctions if it shuns demands to suspend sensitive nuclear work, according to a draft summit communique.

The draft...raises the possibility of a crackdown on Iranian banks, the area where Washington has long urged the EU's 27 states to apply more pressure on Tehran.

"We are ready to supplement those (U.N. Security Council) sanctions with additional measures...We will continue to work together ... to take steps to ensure Iranian banks cannot abuse the international banking system to support proliferation and terrorism..."

...The U.N. Security Council passed a third sanctions resolution against Iran in April and Washington has pressed the EU to deny targeted Iranian banks access to the international financial system.

EU diplomats had said in recent weeks the bloc was ready to go beyond the sanctions, pointing to rigorous applications in the past of travel bans and asset freezes on Iranian officials as proof that the bloc can take a tough line.

They say the EU is preparing an asset and funds freeze on Iran's biggest bank, state-owned Bank Melli, but that it first wants to see how Tehran responds to a new offer of incentives by major powers for it to suspend uranium enrichment.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana is due to take that offer to Tehran before the end of the month as part of carrot-and-stick diplomacy known as the "dual-track" strategy....

...U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said last month the United States would "aggressively" impose more sanctions on Iran as long as it refused to give up nuclear work.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Iranians had suffered devastations in the hands of hordes of Mongols, crazy Alexander of Macedonia, fanatic Arabs and others over their history.

Do we want our name to be on the same list as Genghis Khan for our brutality by attacking Iran? Have we not inflicted enough damage on Iranian people since 1940? Iraq should be our last war of aggression.

It does not make any difference who starts the attack on Iran, USA or Israel. We are just proxy for Israel.

Steve Lieblich said...

"Saint Michael Traveler" - I think you got your definitions arse-about.

It's modern Iran (since 1979) that looks more like "Mongols... fanatic Arabs ...and Genghis Khan". Iran is the totalitarian, repressive regime that places no value on human life, nor the rule of law, NOT USA and EU.