Top Stories
AP: "The dinner coincided with Thursday's launch of a
billboard campaign by an advocacy group, United Against Nuclear Iran, which put
up images in Times Square and Grand Central Station arguing no venue in New
York should host the Iranians. The group is led by a former U.S. representative
for U.N. management and reform in the previous Bush administration." http://bit.ly/dxzWuD
Reuters: "Iran has entered the world's 'nuclear club' and
major powers should accept it, an influential cleric told worshippers on
Friday, underlining Tehran's defiance in a dispute with the West over its
atomic activities." http://bit.ly/ch83w7
NYT: "The new chief of the International Atomic Energy
Agency on Thursday rejected Iran's claim that international inspectors have no
right to ask questions about research Tehran has conducted into missile
technology and warheads." http://nyti.ms/99ovJ5
Nuclear Program
Reuters: "The Obama administration accused Iran on
Wednesday of trying to buy time by accepting Brazil's offer to mediate in its
nuclear standoff and said the United States would be undeterred in its push for
new U.N. sanctions." http://bit.ly/aaxLVC
AFP: "US Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday warned that
Iran's nuclear drive threatens a Middle East arms race as he sought to reassure
Europe of its importance as a US ally.
With increasing Western pressure for new sanctions
against Iran, Biden warned Iran to scrap its nuclear programme or face 'further
consequences'" http://bit.ly/bJzLJj
AP: "The state Senate is advancing a bill to require
Pennsylvania's two largest pension funds and the state Treasury Department to
divest investments in companies that do significant business in Iran or Sudan. Senators approved the bill 42-7 on Wednesday,
five months after the House unanimously approved a similar bill." http://bit.ly/bRAqiN
Human Rights
ABC News: "The mothers of the three American hikers who
have been held in Iran since July today made a public plea to Iranian officials
to set politics aside and release their children. 'The two countries are at odds with each
other and we don't want this mixed in with that,' Cindy Hickey, mother of Shane
Bauer, said on 'Good Morning America.'" http://bit.ly/bHRow4
Opinion
James Woolsey in IHT: "The first Iranian bomb doesn't
have to be that sophisticated. Something that goes boom and sends a mushroom
cloud up in the northern Iranian desert - even if it would not fit into the
nose cone of a Scud - would still make Iran a nuclear power. That would change the world. Like Iran, other countries - including
Venezuela and Saudi Arabia - say they want 'peaceful' nuclear power for
electricity. Given their vast oil resources, that is patent nonsense. They want
a reactor in order to get on the road to highly enriched uranium and bomb
material." http://nyti.ms/9Lf2mI
William Harris in The Weekly Standard: "When Iran gets
the bomb, the nuclear club will have a crucial new feature. Without an Iranian
bomb and barring regime change in Pakistan, we know that no nuclear power will
transfer a device to a private army of the religious elect like Hezbollah in
Lebanon. With an Iranian bomb, such assurance instantly ends. This is a looming,
tangible state of affairs--in contrast to the hype about loose nuclear
materials at the April 2010 Washington nuclear security summit." http://bit.ly/bhP6Z7
Stephen Kurczy in CS Monitor: "Iran's president knows how
to deliver a headline-grabber. But like
a lot of politicians, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also tends to contradict himself
(sometimes within the same speech), often leaving the audience to decide for
themselves where he stands on an issue. Addressing
the Nuclear Non-Proliferation meeting at the UN headquarters in New York City
this week, President Ahmadinejad said nuclear weapons are 'a fire against
humanity.'" http://bit.ly/9lvhSc
Howard LaFranchi in CS Monitor: "But others say the
current international standoff with Iran over its nuclear ambitions clouds the
conference's prospects, not only because Iran alone could foil 'consensus' if
it chose to, but because many nonaligned countries, including major US partners
like Brazil and Turkey, are sympathetic to Iran's case against what it calls
the powers of a dead 'world order.'" http://bit.ly/bFBUKF
Jackson Diehl in WP: "Has Brazilian President Luiz
Ignacio 'Lula' da Silva become Iran's useful idiot? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad clearly thinks so. On
Wednesday his website posted a statement saying he had accepted 'in principle'
a supposed Brazilian proposal to defuse Iran's standoff with the U.N. Security
Council -- and prevent the adoption of new sanctions pressed by the United
States, Britain and France." http://bit.ly/acLcFD
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