UPDATED Iran-US-Russia Deal on Enrichment, The Sequel

UPDATED Iran: The Washington-Tehran Deal on Enriched Uranium?

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UPDATE 15 October 0835 GMT: Finally! An unnamed journalist picks up on the third-party enrichment story at yesterday's State Department briefing by Philip Crowley:

QUESTION: The meeting coming up, the technical talks in Vienna about the low-enriched uranium – who is the U.S. sending, and how far do you expect to get in those meetings? What’s the sort of agenda and hopes for an outcome?

MR. CROWLEY: Well, it’s – we haven’t decided. Those arrangements are still being worked as to what the representation will be....These are technical talks, really, to work through the practical issues of how to ship the fuel out of Iran, and then provide the fuel that – for this research reactor....

QUESTION: But your understanding is that the Iranians are going forward with this, you know, a hundred percent. [Are the talks] actually just about implementing it right now, or is [the meeting] about in theory how it would work?

MR. CROWLEY: ...This is a confidence-building measure. There is the research reactor. It’s running out of fuel. And we think there’s a mechanism that can be put in place so that we can see that the shipment out of some of the existing Iranian stocks and then fuel for this particular reactor provided. I mean, it really is about working through the technical aspects of this. And...we believe that the meeting will go forward on October 19, and we’re working through the appropriate representation.


UPDATE 15 October 0730 GMT: The Hole in the Middle. Michael Slackman of The New York Times has a good but ultimately curious article this morning. In "Some See Iran as Ready for Nuclear Deal", he quotes analysts such as Trita Parsi, Flynt Leverett, and Juan Cole, as well as past statements from top Iran officials, to build his case.

The curiosity? Slackman never mentions the "third-party enrichment" proposal that proves his point.


UPDATE 1855 GMT: If you're clued up on the real story, then this statement by Vladimir Putin, former President and now Prime Minister of Russia, makes sense: "There is no need to frighten the Iranians. There is a need to reach agreements; there is a need to search for compromises." Stay the course on the ongoing, quieter discussions on third-party enrichment and Iran's second enrichment facility near Qom.

If you're not clued, then you're the ideal receptive audience for Press TV's spin on Putin's statement --- The Russians Are With Us Against the "West" --- "Putin Warns against Intimidation".

The story so far: last weekend we picked up on a scoop by Glenn Kessler of The Washington Post that, for four months, the US had been developing a plan for "third-party enrichment" by Russia of 80 percent of Iran's stock of low-enriched uranium. The processed uranium, now at 20% enrichment, would be used in Iran's medical research facilities. The proposal was presented to Iran before the Geneva talks at the start of October, and Tehran has accepted it as a basis for discussions.

We noted that, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was in Moscow this week, the proposal was likely to be at the forefront of US-Russian talks on Iran. After all, the technical talks on enrichment between Iran and the 5+1 powers (US, UK, France, Russia, China, Germany) are next Monday. At the same time we wondered if the media, dazzled by the surface issue of sanctions, would take any notice.

Well, Clinton has had her meetings with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and no one --- as far as we know --- figured out the real diplomatic game, as opposed to the diversionary one.

During the midst of Clinton's talks yesterday, news services were so at sea that they were blaring, almost at the same time,"Yes, the Russians Will Support Sanctions; No, the Russians Won't Support Sanctions", without giving a passing thought to enrichment.

Today is no better. The New York Times, still stuck on Lavrov's public posture that sanctions would be "counterproductive", headlines, "Russia Resists U.S. Position on Sanctions for Iran". The Guardian of London swallows the opposite PR line, "Clinton hails US-Russian co-operation on Iran", and the BBC, thrilled to get an interview with Clinton, nods its head as she declares, "Clinton: Russia Sees Iran Threat".

But the top prize for media dizziness goes to Mary Beth Sheridan of The Washington Post, who clearly doesn't read the stories published in her story (or at least those by Glenn Kessler). She expends more than 500 words shouting, "Russia Not Budging On Iran Sanctions". Buried well within them is the single line, "Under heavy international pressure, the Islamic republic agreed to admit inspectors and send much of its uranium to Russia for enrichment," which --- to say the least --- is a hydrogen bomb's distance from the account Kessler gave of the US-Iran talks.

And it is not as if Clinton didn't offer a clue to the real story to anyone sharp enough to listen: "Iran has several obligations that it said it would fulfill. We believe it is important to pursue the diplomatic track and to do everything we can to make it successful."

What are those obligations? "[Iran will] fulfill its obligation on inspections, in fact, open up its entire system so that there can be no doubt about what they're doing, and comply with the agreement in principle to transfer out the low-enriched uranium."

At which point a journalist on his/her game would have said, "Secretary Clinton, can you confirm that the agreement in principle concerns the plan developed since June for Iran to transfer uranium to Russia, enriching it from 3.5 to 20 percent?"

Unfortunately, the journalist who was called on to ask the final question ignored that possibility in favour of the "Oh Yes, The Russians Will. Oh No, The Russians Won't" script:"It sounds like you did not get the commitment from the Russian side in terms of sanctions or other forms of pressure that could be brought to bear on Iran. Could you comment on that?"

And who was that journalist? Take a bow, Mary Beth Sheridan of The Washington Post.

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1955 GMT: More on The Friday Prayer. State media's rather sanitised version of Ahmad Khatami's remarks is now being supplemented by other accounts summarising his attack on post-election protesters. He claimed that, on Qods Day, the foreign media focused on a "few thousand Republicans", who were enemies of Islam, rather than the millions of supporters of the Government and regime.

1655 GMT: A Friday Prayer Diversion. Ahmad Khatami's turn to give the address, and he (or at least the state media summarising him) continued the Ahmadinejad approach of looking overseas to avoid looking at home. He declared, "The meeting [at Geneva on Iran's nuclear programme] was a great victory for the Islamic Republic of Iran to such an extent that even the Western and Zionist media had to admit defeat."

1445 GMT: Flashback: The "Confession" That Means Death. We're posting the Press TV report from mid-August on Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani, the post-election protester sentenced to death earlier this week.

1230 GMT: Karroubi's Back. The reformist leader has written a sharp letter to the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, refuting claims made by President Ahmadinejad on US television and asking for time to present the evidence of detainee abuses. We've posted the English text.

And, on the day that the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded, we've revived our entry on the drive to name Karroubi as the 2010 recipient.

0915 GMT: Urgent Correction. Readers have let us know (and thanks to all of you!) that the date for the major protest is 4 November, not 3 November as we originally reported, and that the occasion is Iran's Heritage Day as well as the anniversary of the 1979 takeover of the US Embassy.

0825 GMT: A Quick Reply on 4 November Demonstrations. It took only a few minutes for readers to confirm the information on Iran's streets about the forthcoming protest (see 0745 GMT). The poster (on left) has the following caption:

Join, my dear. On 13 Aban [4 November] we will greet the anti-riot police and security forces with flowers. And sitting down on the streets in silence, we will turn night into day and day into night with our unity

Invitation by the Student Society, Office of Strengthening Unity (Daftar-e Tahkim-e Vahdat), University of Tehran, the People & Students’ Green Movement

0745 GMT: 25 Days and Counting? A reader notes our statement "no major gatherings scheduled" (0630 GMT) and replies, "Do you know about the demonstrations being planned by the Sea of Green for 13 Aban (November 3), anniversary of the taking of US hostages in 1979?" [N.B.: Other readers later corrected this --- the date is 4 November, Iran's Heritage day.]

I have noticed references to this but have been awaiting further information on whether intentions have turned into plans. Any assistance from readers most welcome.

0730 GMT: A University Correction? We linked yesterday (1845 GMT) to a Government document which ordered the closure of a University newspaper after it implied that the Holocaust had been a historical event. A sharp-eyed reader has noted that the date on the document is Iranian Year 1387 --- last year --- rather than 1388.

0645 GMT: Credit to Michael Slackman of The New York Times. Yesterday he published a full review not only of the Revolutionary Guard's involvement in a coalition bid for 51% of Iran's state telecommunications company but also background cases such as the Guard's takeover of the management of Imam Khomeini Airport, the current Parliamentary investigation of the telecom deal, and "concerns in Iran over what some call the rise of a pseudogovernment".

Although the story is weeks old, it hasn't been noticed much in the Western media, and the Revolutionary Guard's role in the Iranian economy is one of the most important long-term aspects of this political crisis. The only clanger in Slackman's piece is his necessity to put in an irrelevant comment from Flynt Leverett, a former US National Security Council official: “In a strategic sense, I don’t think Iran is in a fundamentally different place than it was before elections, not in the way it approaches negotiations or the way it looks at its foreign policy."

If Slackman really wanted to establish significant in that quote from Leverett, which belongs in a piece on US-Iranian relations, he would link it to the former NSC official's continuing attempt to establish the legitimacy of the Ahmadinejad Government. For it is that legitimacy that it is at the political heart of possibly illegitimate moves by the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps.

0630 GMT: On Monday it will be four months since votes for President were counted/misaltered/manipulated in Iran, and the anniversary is being welcomed with one of the quietest phases in the post-election conflict. With no major gatherings scheduled, and with politicans and some clerics focused more on private talks than public statements, this is wait-and-see.

The anticipated Parliamentary fireworks have not materialised, and President Ahmadinejad is trying to stay out of trouble by not mentioning alleged abuses, his Ministers' records, or the Iranian economy. One interesting on the last of these: Iran state TV reported yesterday that the quota of subsidised gasoline/petrol for each person will be cut by 45%. Some US-based specialists interpreted this as a reaction to anticipated tighter sanctions from Washington; the simpler explanation is that the Iranian Government needs to cut costs.

Now into the Iranian weekend. No chatter yet about Friday Prayers --- we'll have a look now to see who's leading them. Expect instead more murmurs about detentions and punishment; slowly the death penalty passed on protester Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani, and some activists are also raising cases such as the trial, with possible death sentences, of seven member of the Baha'i faith.