'US steps up spying on Turkey, Brazil'

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/159041.html


The US spy agencies have cranked up their intelligence operations against Turkey and Brazil after the two countries adopted independent policies towards Iran's nuclear standoff with the West.

According to a report by the US-based prominent investigative journalist Wayne Madsen, which dates back to May 2010, the US intelligence agencies have set in motion new intelligence operations against Turkey and Brazil after the two countries frowned upon Washington's policies concerning the Islamic Republic's peaceful nuclear program, a PressTV correspondent reported.

Madsen pointed to widespread assumptions by Washington that Brazil and Turkey had clandestinely held talks with China and Russia in an effort to form an alliance to veto the latest UN Security Council sanctions resolution against Iran.

Although the US-engineered anti-Iran sanctions resolution passed the UN Security Council (UNSC), Brazil and Turkey took the rare move to vote against it, with Lebanon abstaining from the vote.

Washington has never shied away from making it known that it would expect no less than a unanimous vote on UNSC resolution that it sponsors. That is why it was widely considered unprecedented, and rather brave, for Turkey and Brazil to vote independently on the measure.

According to remarks by senior Iranian officials, including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, there were other members of the UNSC that privately expressed reservations about voting for the Western-backed anti-Iran measure and that the pressure of adverse action against their country was too costly for them to ignore.

The fourth round of sanctions was adopted against Tehran over its uranium enrichment program -- which has been misleadingly portrayed as a threat in the West despite repeated confirmations by the International Atomic Energy Agency about the non-diversion of nuclear material in the country.

The reminder on the report comes as Iran has recently invited representatives and ambassadors from different countries to inspect its nuclear facilities in yet another effort to demonstrate its goodwill and transparency of its nuclear program.

Iran, Brazil and Turkey issued a joint nuclear swap declaration on May 17, based on which Tehran agrees to exchange 1,200 kilograms of its low-enriched uranium with higher-enriched fuel on Turkish soil for its Tehran research reactor.

Under the declaration, Turkey, as the custodian of Iran's uranium, makes the commitment to return Iran's uranium in case potential suppliers refuse to provide Iran with the fuel it requires within a reasonable time period.

Ex-CIA agent detained over 'Iran leak'

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/159056.html


A former CIA intelligence officer has been arrested by US authorities for leaking classified information exposing Washington's schemes to sabotage Iran's nuclear program.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested Jeffrey Alexander Sterling in the city of St. Louis on Thursday for disclosing national defense information to a New York Times reporter.

Details in Sterling's indictment suggest that the case is connected to a 2006 book written by the daily's reporter James Risen. The book, Sate of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration, contains details about the spy agency's plans to sabotage Iran's nuclear research program.

According to Risen, in an operation codenamed “Merlin” the United States attempted to provide Iran with flawed blueprints for key nuclear components through a Russian nuclear scientist.

However, the scientist allegedly double-crossed, cooperating with the Iranian side in revealing the flaws in the designs. The Iranians were able to “extract valuable information from the blueprints while ignoring the flaws,” the book adds.

Iranian observers, however, scoff at the report, emphasizing that the Iranian scientist do not need others to point out design flaws and that they are competent enough to detect potential flaws on their own.

Sterling, who worked at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1993 until he was fired in 2002, had served as the chief operations officer handling a “human asset” in a program related to the nuclear capabilities of a foreign country, said the indictment charges.

The United States, as the only country to have used a nuclear weapon on another state, adamantly opposes Iran's nuclear program, claiming without any evidence that it harbors a secret military aspect.

Tehran has refuted the accusations, arguing that as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it has the right to benefit from the peaceful applications of the nuclear technology.

As a member of the NPT, Iran has long pushed efforts to establish a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East, insisting on a global elimination of nuclear weapons.