PRESS RELEASE
Anti-Iran Sanctions
Escalate Dynamic for War
Jan. 26, 2012 (EIRNS)—The decision by the European Union on Jan. 23, to go ahead with an embargo of Iranian oil by July of this year, has been presented as an alternative to war, but it is anything but. Iran is already reeling under the impact of economic sanctions, and the implementation of this decision would be devastating for both it, and nations such as Greece and Italy that rely heavily on Iranian oil imports.
Sanctions against Tehran are not helping to solve the Iranian nuclear problem, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Jan. 23 in reaction to the European move, adding that Moscow will seek resumption of international talks on the issue. "We will keep everyone from making radical moves and we will work to ensure a resumption of the talks," Lavrov told the press.
Indeed, Russia has been in an intense dialogue with numerous partners in the potential talks, including the Turks and the Iranians themselves. Over Jan. 19-21, an Iranian diplomatic delegation, led by Ali Baqeri, deputy secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, carried out high-level diplomacy in Moscow and Beijing, centered on restarting the P5+1 talks on the nuclear issue.
On Jan. 23, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt weighed in on some of the thinking in Europe. "No one has an interest in war," and "sanctions are not the answer," Bildt told the press. He added that
We seek sustained diplomatic engagement with Iran to, step by step, manage this particular crisis. No one has an interest in a slide towards confrontation and war; it is a sufficiently complicated region anyhow. So, sanctions in themselves is not the answer. It is one of the instruments, but the most important one that EU has is the diplomatic one."
Primary promoters of the sanctions-toward-war drive continue to be the British government and the Obama Administration, despite widespread acknowledgement among the military-intelligence community that there is no new (or old) evidence that Iran is working on building a nuclear bomb.
