Iran letter does not change US position: US Iran letter does not change US position: US
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
LONDON, May 9 - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's letter to US President George W Bush does not change Washington's position on Tehran's nuclear program, a White House official said, according to AFP.
"Nothing in the letter addresses the issues between Iran and the international community," said Frederick Jones, a spokesman for the National Security Council.
Jones said the letter sent Monday to Bush breaks no new ground on issues of concern to the administration, including Iran's disputed nuclear program and what Washington views as a lamentable human rights record.
"The president was briefed on the letter en route to Florida," Jones said, adding that the White House will not make its contents public.
The letter was portrayed by Tehran officials as an important diplomatic initiative to break the weeks-long impasse on the nuclear issue and defuse tensions after a quarter century of official silence between the top levels of government in Washington and Tehran.
Speaking to reporters Monday en route to Florida where the president has public appearances scheduled, Bush's spokesman Scott McClellan said Washington's position was essentially the same as before the letter arrived.
"These are concerns that the regime has with the world, and the international community wants to see the regime change its behavior and address those concerns," McClellan said.
"The international community is concerned about the regime having a nuclear weapon capability or nuclear weapons and that's why we're working together to find a diplomatic solution," he said.
"This letter really doesn't appear to do anything to address such concerns," McClellan said.
Ahmadinejad's letter had been described as proposing "new ways" to resolve the dispute between Washington and Tehran, but Jones described the letter as presenting a "broad historical and philosophical exposition" of Iran's past statements defending the country's stance on the nuclear issue.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack also dismissed the letter's significance. "Nothing in the letter addresses the issues on the table between Iran and the world, whether that is on the nuclear issue, terrorism, or human rights," he said.
Washington has not had diplomatic relations with Iran since April 1980, following the seizure of the US embassy in Tehran in 1979 in which 52 Americans were held for 444 days.
But diplomats from both sides have held confidential meetings, most recently following the defeat of Afghanistan's Taliban in 2001 and prior to the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
The Iranian message was handed to the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, Philippe Welti, by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki. The Swiss embassy in Tehran, which represents US interests in Tehran, has been a conduit for messages since 1981.
The United States has called for sanctions and refused to rule out using force to stop the hardline Islamic regime's disputed nuclear drive.
Washington and Tehran have been at loggerheads over Iran's nuclear program which Washington suspects is a cover to build atomic weapons.
News of the letter came ahead of a meeting in New York of the foreign ministers of the UN Security Council's five permanent members plus Germany in a bid to map out a common strategy to force Iran to halt sensitive nuclear fuel work.
Security Council members are bargaining over a Franco-British draft resolution that would legally require Iran to freeze all uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities.