Israel urges US to act alone, as anti-Iran bids fail

Source: PressTV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=119930&sectionid=351020104


As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tours Latin America to recruit support for new international sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, Tel Aviv urges Washington to adopt Cuba-like embargos against Tehran.

Israel and the US accuse Iran of seeking nuclear arms, as Tel Aviv threatens to attack Iranian nuclear installations and Washington warns of keeping 'all options on the table,' including economic sanctions and military measures.

Iran, however, says its program, which is extensively monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), is directed at the civilian applications of the technology. The country has also called on all nuclear powers to abandon atomic weaponry and eliminate all such arsenal.

Clinton, meanwhile, is on a five-day tour of Latin America. She was quoted by the Associated Press as saying that Washington is working "expeditiously and thoroughly" to rally support for new Iran sanctions.

She has arrived in Brazil, a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council (UNSC), to win support for the sanctions. Brazil has repeatedly said that Iran is entitled to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes.

Although the IAEA says it continues to verify the non-diversion of Iran's nuclear material, the UNSC has already imposed three rounds of sanctions on the country.

Amid the intensified efforts by the US to impose fresh sanctions, China has appeared to reject the calls to support such a measure. Beijing argues that more negotiations are required to resolve the nuclear issue.

Israel, meanwhile, said Tuesday that the US should impose unilateral sanctions on Iran to isolate the country the same way it acted alone on Cuba 50 years ago, Reuters reported.

"We are a little worried by the pace of developments in the international arena," Lieberman told reporters. "I think that from now on Israel should perhaps change its Iran policy a little, and we should ask the United States to adopt the Cuban model ... Here the United States alone can do everything in order to stop this (Iranian) program."

Iranian officials have argued that favorite US pressure tactics such as sanctions are outdated and no longer relevant in the global economy as they have been proven futile in the last three attempts against the Islamic Republic. They insist that imposing new sanctions on Iran will further expose the irrelevancy of the UN as a viable international body.