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QUESTION: On Iran, has the United States received this new proposal from Motaki via the Swiss Ambassador?

MR. KELLY: Yeah. This is the question I tried to answer earlier. I was - I have to admit I was all locked and loaded for it.

Well, first of all, let me say that the Administration has made it clear to Iran and the whole international community that we have a new approach to Iran. And we've made it clear to Iran that the choice really is theirs to make. They have a stark choice: They can continue down this path of isolation from the international community, or they can choose to reintegrate with the international community. And that choice is out there for them, and we look forward to learning their choice.

We have received a proposal. We are literally in the last few minutes. We're now reviewing it seriously and carefully. We plan to confer with our partners in the P-5+1 group. And I expect that we'll have more to say about it in the coming days.

I think what we'll be looking for in these proposals, or in this proposal, is, first of all, if they've responded to our longstanding offer to engage with us in the P-5+1 process. And second of all, we'll look to see how in this proposal they address these longstanding concerns of the international community about Iran's failure to comply with its nonproliferation treaty, IAEA, and Security Council obligations. So those are a few of the things that we'll be looking for.

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QUESTION: Ian, did you - you said that you expected to confer in the coming days and then have more to say about this. Is that going to be a conference call among the political directors or is that going to be some other vehicle?

MR. KELLY: I expect, because we want to do this in a very serious and - in a serious fashion, and we want to do it with dispatch, I assume it will be by conference call.

QUESTION: And among the political directors, not the foreign ministers?

MR. KELLY: Among the political directors, yeah.

QUESTION: Okay, thank you.

QUESTION: Ian, if it doesn't contain what you're looking for, these two items that you mentioned, are you going to go ahead and try to engage or are you going to move on to the next set of sanctions?

MR. KELLY: Again, we have to look at it carefully. We have to see how serious it is. And just as importantly, we want to make sure that we confer with our partners.

Jill, you've had your hand up for a while.

QUESTION: Yeah, Ian, it's Iran, but kind of a different aspect of it.

QUESTION: Can I follow up on this first?

QUESTION: Sure.

QUESTION: Specifically on this, just - is not the fact that they gave this proposal enough for you to say, yes, they are taking your engagement offer seriously and that they're trying to engage because they're offering this?

MR. KELLY: Well, I think it has been concerning to us that we've been waiting since April - we, not just the U.S. but the other members of the P-5+1 and then Javier Solana and his office - we've been waiting all this time for a response that - what we thought was a very serious offer to sit down and engage. So, in the sense that we have finally some kind of official response, I mean, that, at least, is something that we can respond to ourselves. So, in that sense, I mean, this is something that we will take very seriously and look at very carefully.

Yeah. Jill.

QUESTION: Iran.

MR. KELLY: Yeah.

QUESTION: Venezuela.

MR. KELLY: Iran/Venezuela. Okay.

QUESTION: Yes. Morgenthau yesterday had this speech at Brookings in which he goes into great detail talking about efforts by Iran to use U.S. banks to subvert or go around UN sanctions, talking about pervasive system of deceitful and fraudulent practices --

MR. KELLY: Yeah.

QUESTION: -- employed by Iran to move money all over the world. And then there are other aspects to that. What does the State Department know, what does the U.S. know, about these efforts by Iran through Venezuela to undermine those sanctions?

MR. KELLY: Yeah. Well, first of all, we take any allegation of proliferation very seriously, particularly if it involves proliferation within this hemisphere. We are following the situation very closely. We are following any kind of links between Venezuela and Iran very seriously. And we would expect Venezuela, as any other UN member, to fulfill their obligations under the decisions of the UN Security Council to call upon Iran to meet its obligations under various Security Council resolutions relating to Iran.

QUESTION: Do you have doubts at this point that they are doing that?

MR. KELLY: I don't have any specific information. As I say, Mr. Morgenthau raised some serious allegations, and we'll look into them.

QUESTION: Are you talking to the Venezuelans or any --

MR. KELLY: I'm sure we are. We have - I mean, we have an embassy in Caracas. I'm sure we are talking to them about it.

QUESTION: If I can just go back to Iran's nuclear issue, can I just ask about to what extent will the U.S. be coordinating a response with Iran's neighbors in the region, both Arab nations as well as Israel?

MR. KELLY: Regarding the nuclear issue, you mean?

QUESTION: Yes.

MR. KELLY: We engage with Iran's neighbors on a regular basis. I think, first and foremost, when we have concerns about proliferation, we're concerned about the region and our friends and partners in that region. And so we consult with them often. They - of course, they have insights into Iran that we find - that we appreciate very much. And we listen to their concerns.

QUESTION: Defense Secretary Gates has even expressed those concerns, even urging Arab countries in the region to buy weapons to counter the Iranian threat. Are you concerned that more weapons in the region will lead to more instability?

MR. KELLY: I think that one of our main - we have a number of reasons why we're concerned about the possibility of Iran developing ballistic missile technology and developing nuclear weapons, but one of the main reasons is that we're concerned about destabilizing the region around Iran. We're particularly concerned about the possibility of an arms race in the region, and this is why we're - one of the reasons we're encouraging Iran to take the route of integration, cooperation, and don't take this route of going down the path of isolation.

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