Secret Britain-Iran Talks in 2005 on Iraq, Tehran Nuclear Programme?

The BBC is claiming that secret discussions between Britain and Iran took place in 2005 on Tehran's role in Iraq and Iran's nuclear programme.

A BBC documentary tonight will claim that Iran made an "extraordinary offer" to stop attacking British troops in Iraq if Western countries accepted Iran's uranium enrichment programme.

The claim is made by Sir John Sawers (pictured), who was Britain's top political representative in Iraq and is now currently Britain's ambassador to the United Nations. He claims, "The Iranians wanted to strike a deal whereby they stopped killing our forces in iraq in return for them being allowed to carry on with their nuclear programme."

The British government rejected the offer.

Guantanamo Update: Binyam Mohamed Home Next Week

Details emerged this afternoon that suggest Ethiopian-born UK resident Binyam Mohamed will be freed from Guantánamo Bay- where he has been held since 2004- next week. The Washington Post, citing an anonymous British source, believes that Mohamed may be released as early as Monday.

The UK government will not, however, be pressing for the release of the remaining UK resident held at Guantánamo, Shaker Aamer- the BBC has been told by the Foreign Office that the UK is "no longer in active discussions" with the US over Aamer's release.

See also:

• British Officials Devised Torture Policy For Detainees


• Binyam Mohamed Coming Home, No Need To Talk About Torture


• Binyam Mohamed And The Hiding Of Torture Evidence

Mr Obama's World: Updates on US Foreign Policy (20 February)

Evening Update (8.30 p.m. GMT / 1.30 p.m. Washington): Amnesty International and a Tibetan rights group are reported to be "shocked" by Hillary Clinton's decision not to press China on human rights today. Clinton believes that "We pretty much known what they are going to say."

Perhaps proving Clinton right, China today deployed thousands more troops to Tibet to stave off unrest.

In Poland today Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told NATO allies that the Obama administration was expecting significant contributions towards troop levels in Afghanistan, however some are calling Gates' appeal for a contribution towards non-combatant, civilian roles a tacit admission that troops are unlikely to be forthcoming.

Back in Washington the White House has announced that it will today "refine" its legal position on detainees held at Bagram air base. Over 600 people  are detained at the base outside Kabul, and under the Bush administration they were deemed not to be entitled to US legal rights. At present it is not known whether Obama's break with Bush on the rights of 'enemy combatants' at Guantánamo Bay will extend to Bagram.

Afternoon Update (2.30 p.m. GMT / 7.30 a.m. Washington): Clinton has arrived in China on the final leg of her Far East tour. The economy, human rights, the environment and North Korea could all be on the agenda.

Speaking to CNN Clinton said that North Korea was "miscalculating" if it thought it could "drive a wedge" between the US and South Korea. Clinton suggested that North Korea deploys two different approaches to its neighbours, alternating between sabre-rattling and appeasement in order to gain diplomatic leverage.

Clinton has also appointed former ambassador to South Korea Stephen W Bosworth as a special envoy to Pyongyang, with the aim of getting the North back to the negotiating table.

Elsewhere, the Kyrgyzstan Government has signed the bill closing the US Manas airbase.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has said that the US will consider Russian concerns over missile defence.

Morning Update (5:30 a.m. GMT; 12:30 a.m. Washington): A relatively quiet start to the foreign-policy day, but we're keeping a close eye on the reaction to the International Atomic Energy Agency report on Iranian nuclear production, released on Thursday. We've got the text of the report and an immediate analysis.

As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (pictured) visits South Korea, the headlines are on North Korea's latest belligerent posturing, threatening an "all-out confrontation" with the South, and the possibility that Pyongyang will test a long-range missile.

This is more sound than fury. North Korea is now pulling back a bit, saying it will be testing a satellite, and it is unlikely that Clinton will go beyond general references to the need for regional security and alliance with South Korea. Seoul doesn't want a showdown with the North, China --- where Clinton heads next --- will emphasise the need for engagement, and Washington is still signalling that it prefers diplomacy to the image of confrontation.

On his first visit as President to a foreign country, Barack Obama has denied asking Canada for any additional troops in Afghanistan: ""I certainly did not press the prime minister on any additional commitments beyond the ones that have already been made."

It is a shrewd political move, as any proposed increase would prompt a Canadian political crisis and possibly doom the government, but it raises the question of whether the US can get any significant military backing for its "surge" this year. Canada has 2700 troops in Afghanistan and is committed to withdrawing them by 2011.

Meanwhile, another sign of the US escalation in Afghanistan: plans are underway to double the size of the detention facility at Camp Bagram. The facility currents hold more than 600 detainees in conditions which have been criticised as a deprivation of basic human rights.

Richard Holbrooke, the US envoy on Afghanistan and Pakistan, has criticised the Pakistan Government's allowance of local autonomy, including sharia law, in the northwest of the country: "I am concerned, and I know Secretary (of State Hillary) Clinton is, and the president is, that this deal, which is portrayed in the press as a truce, does not turn into a surrender." Holbrooke added that Pakistani President Asif Zardari had assured him the arrangement was temporary.

In northwest Pakistan, at least 18 people have been killed and many others wounded after a sucide bomber exploded at a funeral procession for a Shia Muslim.


The Obama Administration continues its slowdown of the Bush Administration's Missile Defence scheme. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said Thursday that "the U.S. would consider whether the system was affordable and technologically feasible" and would try to reopen talks with Russia over the project.

The Latest on Israel-Gaza-Palestine (20 February)

Evening Update: The wrangling over the formation of a new government in Israel continues. Meanwhile in the UK it has emerged that 400 BBC staff have signed a petition in protest at BBC Director General Mark Thompson's decision not to air the DEC's Gaza appeal.

3.30 p.m. GMT / 5.30 p.m. Israel/Palestine: A spokesman for Hamas has denied that it gave a letter for President Obama to Senator John Kerry yesterday, but at the same time stressed that Hamas is "open to hold dialogue with any country and our only enemy is the Zionist occupation."

Afternoon Update : The BBC reports that Likud's Benjamin Netanyahu will form the new Israeli cabinet. CNN also carries the story, and suggests that the support of other right-wing parties such as Yisrael Beytenu and the Orthodox Shas movement will allow Netanyahu to build a coalition.

Netanyahu has told reporters he wants to form a unity coalition with Kadima and Labour: "I call on Kadima chairwoman Tzipi Livni and Labour Party chairman Ehud Barak and I say to them -- let's unite to secure the future of the State of Israel. I ask to meet with you first to discuss with you a broad national unity government for the good of the people and the state."

Morning Update (8 a.m. GMT; 10 a.m. Israel/Palestine): No progress in Israel-Gaza talks with the continuing stalemate over the precondition of a prisoner swap including Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit (pictured). Senior Hamas official Mahmoud az-Zahar has tried to press Tel Aviv and secure Hamas' relations with Egypt, claiming that Cairo and the Gazan leadership are in agreement over the prisoner issue.

Two rockets landed near Sderot in southern Israel on Thursday night.

In an interesting intervention over recent Israeli-Turkish tensions, Congressman Robert Wexler visited Turkish officials and, on CNN-Turk, underlined the importance of Turkish-American relations. He warned Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to leave behind his criticism of Israel's Gaza policy at the Davos Summit. Wexler said, “The close relationship with Israel is not going to change after taking over of the administration by President Obama. In the Middle East, whether in humanitarian or in security areas, Washington is going to continue standing by Israel.”

We remember Mr. Wexler in 2006 when Erdogan met with Hamas officials in Ankara. He urgently came to Turkey and warned Ankara in order to stop that unilateral political initiative that was not approved by American, European and Israeli leaders. This time, his warning is perceived as a much significant one, especially by the bureaucratic circles whilst anti-Israeli discourses backed up by the walkout in Davos may lead to a crisis among Israel, American, Turkey, and American Jewish lobbies in prior to the coming of a proposal concerning 'the approval of Armenian genocide' to the House of Representatives.

From the Archives: Academic Freedom, "Terrorism", and the University of Nottingham

I received the news just after landing in Dublin that Hicham Yezza, who has been a student and administrator at the University of Nottingham for more than 13 years, is to be deported from the United Kingdom. The original charge was that Yezza was aiding and abetting terrorism through the possession on his computer of an Al Qa'eda Training Manual --- he was keeping this as a favour for postgraduate student Rizwaan Sabir, who was working on a thesis on the group. When this couldn't be sustained, the British Home Office decided to press a technicality over Yezza's long-term status as a student and employee of the university.

In the midst of the initial detention and questioning of Sabir and Yezza, the Vice-Chancellor of Nottingham issued a statement that researchers had no right to study "terrorist" materials, in effect hanging Sabir and Yezza out to dry as well as throwing a fear-laden obstacle in the way of study, analysis, and reflection on one of the critical topics in our world today. This was my response in Times Higher Education:


Let it be noted: the vice-chancellor of a prominent university in Britain has caved in to the culture of fear ("Researchers have no 'right' to study terrorist materials", 17 July).

The University of Nottingham should be celebrating the contributions of its staff and students to knowledge and analysis, which should be at the forefront of free thinking, discussion and debate. Instead, its officials sacrifice their scholars to a craven bending of the knee before government authorities who can no longer distinguish between threat and reflection, before those gatekeepers of "common sense" who show no sensibility to our ability to think without falling prey to extremism, and before those who have carried out acts of violence these past years not only to kill us but also to bully us into giving up those liberties and qualities that should have enabled us to rise above their intimidation.

This is not a question of "access (to) and research (of) terrorist materials". No page or picture frame or moving image is "terrorist" in and of itself. It is how that material is used to fan the flames of division and hostility that can lead to acts of violence. The problem was never the typeset pages of Mein Kampf; rather, it was in the use of those pages to justify bigotry, racism, war, genocide. The problem was never Marx's Das Kapital or Mao's Little Red Book or Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations or the Koran or the Bible. It was, still is and always will be the manipulation of those texts to justify the taking of lives.

Vice-chancellor, do you think that, through your denial of texts to us, you make us safer? Do you think that, by denying us our ability to think, consider, criticise, you shelter us from harm? Do you think that you protect us from ourselves, prevent us from becoming extremists?

I am proud that, before and after 11 September 2001, I have worked in a British system in which my supervisors, my colleagues, my friends and my students have not only read these documents, essays and books but have used them to construct responses, critiques and publications that show that we are not enslaved either to the "terrorist" or to an ill-defined "War on Terror".

"There is no 'prohibition' on accessing terrorist materials for the purpose of research. Those who do so are likely to be able to offer a defence to charges," says the vice-chancellor. Thus we are allowed freedom of thought under the caution that we are guilty before being proven innocent. Perhaps, vice-chancellor, you know of other times and places where scholars, students and citizens have been advised that they may read their books and then, as those books are burnt, explain why they have not committed a crime. Perhaps you know of those not-so-distant times when people have been threatened, arrested, terrorised in the name of protecting them from "terror". Perhaps you know the instances where those scholars, students, citizens fled to countries where they could read, think, speak without fear of detention.

One of those countries was (and still is) Britain. Perhaps you know that some of those individuals who escaped the restrictions on their freedoms came to British universities. The professor who opened the door to my career at Birmingham was a scholar who left Nazi Germany as a teenager to work as a groundsman at the University of Oxford. The British system not only saved his life but allowed him to build that life as one of our finest historians - he took up his first chair at Nottingham at the age of 39. He was proud of that. On the day I was offered my post at Birmingham, he set me two challenges. First, he said with a smile, beat 39. Then, he added, always be inquisitive, always realise what you do not know, always put yourself in the position of another (the President, the General, the infantryman, the groundskeeper and, yes, the "terrorist"). Then, and only then, I would have earned the right to put my thoughts and my work before others.

At the age of 37 I was able to give a professorial lecture at Birmingham. But, pondering your words, I realise that my false pride was in meeting my mentor's first challenge. The real pride should be that, as I quoted both "American fundamentalists" and "Islamic fundamentalists" in that lecture, I was not giving way to either of those groups, laying down my ability to think and judge. I could not be reduced to the "us" following an injunction to avoid scandalous, dangerous texts. And, in reading those texts, I did not become part of "them".

This is why I write. And why I will defend any of my colleagues, including colleagues at Nottingham with whom I have worked for 20 years, who continue to pursue their research at risk of your approbation or the prosecution of any misguided law. And why I hope that, one day, you will not feed the culture of fear with your proclamations, but challenge it (and the terrorists) in your defence of academic freedom.