Remarks by Assistant Secretary Philip Crowley on Iranian Enrichment (Excerpts)

February 22, 2010

Weapon Program: 

  • Nuclear

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QUESTION: On Iran, so the rhetoric got ratcheted up quite a bit last week on the Secretary's trip, among others, not just the U.S. Today, the Iranians say that they're going to build two of these 10 new reactors inside mountaintops to protect them from attack. I'm just wondering (a) what your reaction to that is and (b) what's happening on the sanctions front right now.

MR. CROWLEY: Well, as to any further enrichment activity, as we've made clear, Iran has more practical and sensible alternatives. We have the Tehran research reactor proposal still on the table. In a correspondence through the IAEA, the United States, France, and Russia have made clear that there are other ways in which Iran could purchase isotopes on the open international market to meet the humanitarian needs of its people.

So it is unfortunate that this is further evidence that Iran refuses to engage cooperatively and constructively with the IAEA. So in essence, adding more potential enrichment sites adds to the questions rather than resolves the questions that the international community has.

We continue to work closely with our partners in the P-5+1 process to identify potential targets for sanctions. And we will, I think, be advancing specific proposals to the UN in the coming weeks.

QUESTION: A follow-up on that?

MR. CROWLEY: Sure.

QUESTION: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said that he thinks what's needed here are direct and biting sanctions against the energy - Iran's energy sector and that the UN Security Council should be bypassed. I guess individual countries should try and impose on their own if the UN doesn't get its act together.

MR. CROWLEY: Well, those are not mutually exclusive alternatives. There are sanctions in place nationally. We think we're - as the Secretary has said, we're continuing to look at other steps that we can take both multilaterally and prospectively on a national basis. You had recently an announcement by the Department of Treasury regarding specific entities that we are continuing to focus on with respect to current sanctions.

But we obviously are looking at the full range of possibilities. We want to see effective sanctions that have the impact that we want to put pressure on Iran. And as the Secretary has said, we will be paying specific attention to the Revolutionary Guard Corps that is playing a more - a growing role in Iranian society and in the Iranian economy.

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