The US has been conducting extensive negotiations with Iran. Iran has never had any intention to to stop its enrichment program. It has used these negotiations to push ahead with the program to enrich as much as possible before the UN is forced to place sanctions on Iran.
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Disappointed powers give Iran two weeks to reply on enrichment
DEBKAfile Special Report
July 19, 2008, 6:20 AM (GMT+02:00)
EU's Javier Solana with Iran's Saeed Jalili
The presence of America’s third-ranking diplomat William Burns elevated the talks between the five permanent UN Security Council members and Germany and Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili begun in Geneva Saturday, July 19 to a more serious level. Ahead of the meeting, a senior official in Tehran restated that suspension was “out of the question.” After the meeting, the US envoy indicated that if Iran wants “full negotiations,” it must stop uranium enrichment.
While Washington has stressed Burns was there to listen, not negotiate. DEBKAfile’s sources reported it was made clear to Iran that it has a chance to end its international isolation by accepting the incentives on offer to freeze enrichment in exchange for a freeze on sanctions.
This outcome would leave Israel out on a limb with the menaces posed directly by Iran and its allies, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas.
European Union executive Javier Solana, who staged the encounter, positioned the American official opposite the Iranian side to avoid a joint photograph.
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High US official attends nuclear talks with Iran, capping secret US-Tehran diplomacy
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report
July 8, 2008, 6:18 PM (GMT+02:00)
By sending US Under Secretary of State William Burns to European-Iranian talks in Geneva Saturday, July 19, the Bush administration makes official the secret diplomatic track afoot between Washington and Tehran, first disclosed by DEBKA-Net-Weekly on June 27. He joins European Union’s Javier Solana meting with officials of the six powers with Iran's nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili.
Our US sources confirm that this step distances the Bush administration still further from Israel’s policy position, which calls for the curtailment of Iran’s drive for a nuclear bomb by all means, including military action. It leaves Jerusalem alone in the arena against Iran on the nuclear and other security issues, such as Hizballah, Syria and the radicalized Lebanese government.
The Washington announcement came a day after Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama reiterated he was willing to engage Iran’s leaders in direct talks.
In its June 27 issue, DEBKA-Net-Weekly 354 reported (Secret US-Iran Talks: Bush Pulls Iran Diplomacy Carpet from under Obama) that President George W. Bush had hijacked Obama’s opening to Iran to fashion a diplomatic legacy for his successor and help John McCain get elected.
This secret dialogue had yielded deals on pricing oil up to a $150 ceiling and a helping hand from Tehran in Iraq.
Revolutionary Guards intelligence officers serving under cover in Iraq were instructed to hold back radical Shiite militias from attacking US forces and to share intelligence with the American military.
This did not stop Hizballah cells in Iraq from going for American targets. One of their operatives, trained in Iran as an explosives expert was captured in Iraq, according to a disclosure on Tuesday, July 15.
The understandings US and Iranian diplomats achieved in their undisclosed talks over several weeks were far-ranging. Our Middle East sources reveal they included Lebanese political stability under a new national government in which Iran’s surrogate, Hizballah won veto power and Syria’s violent proxy a ministerial seat; and Syrian ruler Bashar Assad’s restoration to center position on the Middle East stage.
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