Fourth Curse of Lev. The Lead up to War

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Headline News
Sunday, July 15, 2007 by Staff Writer


Iran locked on to 600 targets in Israel

Iran has marked 600 targets for its long-range missiles inside Israel, the Qatari newspaper Al Watan reported on Sunday.

According to the report, Iran is threatening to hit the Jewish state with a massive missile strike if either Israel or the US attack the Islamic Republic or its allies in Syria.

Recent political talk in Jerusalem and Washington indicate the time is rapidly approaching that Israel and the US will have no choice but to intervene militarily to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Likewise, Israeli military experts are predicting a full-scale war with Syria sometime in the coming six months, possibly set off by a renewal of low-level cross-border Hizballah aggression.

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Headline News
Tuesday, July 17, 2007 by Staff Writer


Israel preparing for war with Syria, confirms general

A senior Israeli general on Monday confirmed that the army is preparing for a full-scale war with Syria in the very near future.

Speaking at Israel's Institute for National Security Studies, Maj.-Gen. Eyal Ben-Reuven, who served as deputy commander of Israel's northern forces during last summer's war in Lebanon, said that the army is “preparing itself for an all-out war, and this is a major change in the military's working premise” following the 34-day conflict with Hizballah that many Israelis feel their nation failed to win.

The general said that when war breaks out, Syria will be prepared to suffer mass military and civilian casualties, while at the same time playing on Israel's sensitivity to civilian losses by striking Israel's home front with as many missiles as possible.

Syria “will try to hit Israel's home front in order to win diplomatic gains in peace talks that will follow, and also cause another split in Israeli society,” Israel National News quoted Ben-Reuven as saying.

In order to deny Syria this victory, Ben-Reuven said the Israeli army is training for a swift and overwhelming invasion of Syria “to knock out the areas from where missiles are launched against Israel as quickly as possible.”

He lamented that if Israel had responded to Hizballah's rocket attacks in such a manner, the Second Lebanon War would have ended much differently.

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Headline News
Tuesday, July 24, 2007 by Staff Writer


Syria to target Israeli civilians in upcoming war

A Syrian official said on Monday that his nation will target Israel's civilian population centers with long-range ballistic missiles in the war his country expects to take place in the coming six months.

In an interview with Defense News Weekly, an unnamed senior official in the Syrian Defense Ministry said his nation is looking to avoid a classic war scenario, recognizing that Israel clearly has the upper-hand on the battlefield.

“This will be a war of attrition, which the Israelis are not good at,“ the official explained, adding that it “will be more like a war between cities than a war on the battlefield.”

Military experts say that Syria learned from Israel's war with Lebanon's Hizballah last summer that it does not need to win pitched tank and infantry battles against the Jewish state in order to emerge victorious. Damascus now realizes that establishing itself as a major threat to Israel's civilian infrastructure is sufficient to extract major concessions during the peace negotiations that will follow the conflict.

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Headline News
Monday, July 30, 2007 by Staff Writer


Report: Russia to sell Iran long-range fighter jets

Israel's defense establishment is urgently investigating reports that Russia plans to sell 250 long-range Sukhoi-30 fighter/bombers to Iran, reported The Jerusalem Post.

The reports also noted that Iran intends to purchase several aerial fuel tankers as part of the $1 billion deal.

The Sukhoi-30 is able to operate at long distances, and the use of aerial fuel tankers would give Iran offensive strike capabilities throughout the entire region.

Israeli officials fear the sale is Moscow's response to America's plans to increase military aid to Israel and provide Saudi Arabia with $20 billion worth of advanced US-made weapons. Experts noted that the two global powers appear poised to engage in another Cold War, this time centered on the Middle East.

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Headline News
Monday, August 06, 2007 by Staff Writer


Russia reestablishes naval bases in Syria
Russia will soon reestablish two Cold War-era permanent naval bases in Syria, according to numerous media reports this week.

The bases will give Russia a permanent naval presence in the Mediterranean Sea.

Damascus agreed to let the Russians move back in as part of a deal to cover $11 billion in debt Syria has accumulated while arming itself with the latest Russian weapons.

Israeli defense officials told Ynet they fear the new Russian bases will be used to spy on the Jewish state, which is involved in several missile shield projects with the United States.

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Headline News
Monday, August 13, 2007 by Staff Writer


Israel worried about Syrian air defenses

Syria is today in possession of a massive number of the most sophisticated anti-aircraft batteries in the world, according to a senior Israeli military source cited by the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot on Monday.

The source said that Syria's airspace is possibly more heavily covered by ground-to-air anti-aircraft missiles than any other nation on earth.

The buildup of such weapons is a response to Israel's traditional air superiority over its Arab neighbors.

Nor is Syria content with quantity, but it also making sure its defenses are of the highest quality.

The Israeli source told Yediot that a large number of the batteries deployed by Syria are cutting edge Russian systems, some of which are so new the Russian military has yet to put them into active service.

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Russia sends long bombers back on patrol
By IVAN SEKRETAREV, Associated Press Writer
Fri Aug 17, 5:46 PM ET



President Vladimir Putin placed strategic bombers back on long-range patrol for the first time since the Soviet breakup, sending a tough message to the United States on Friday hours after a major Russian military exercise with China.

Putin reviewed the first Russian-Chinese joint exercise on Russian soil before announcing that 20 strategic bombers had been sent far over the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic oceans — showing off Moscow's muscular new posture and its growing military ties with Beijing.

"Starting today, such tours of duty will be conducted regularly and on the strategic scale," Putin said. "Our pilots have been grounded for too long. They are happy to start a new life."

Putin said halting long-range bombers after the Soviet collapse had hurt Russia's security because other nations — an oblique reference to the United States — had continued such missions.

"I have made a decision to resume regular flights of Russian strategic aviation," Putin said in nationally televised remarks. "We proceed from the assumption that our partners will view the resumption of flights of Russia's strategic aviation with understanding."

U.S.-Russian relations have been strained over Washington's criticism of Russia's democracy record, Moscow's objections to U.S. missile defense plans and differences over crises such as the Iraq war. But the Bush administration downplayed the significance of the renewed patrols.

"We certainly are not in the kind of posture we were with what used to be the Soviet Union. It's a different era," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. "If Russia feels as though they want to take some of these old aircraft out of mothballs and get them flying again, that's their decision."

Soviet bombers routinely flew missions to areas where nuclear-tipped cruise missiles could be launched at the United States. They stopped in the post-Soviet economic meltdown. Booming oil prices have allowed Russia to sharply increase its military spending.

Russian Air Force spokesman Col. Alexander Drobyshevsky said that Friday's exercise involved Tu-160, Tu-95 and Tu-22M bombers, tanker aircraft and air radars. NATO jets were scrambled to escort the Russian aircraft over the oceans, he said, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency.

Eleven Russian military planes — including strategic bombers and fighter jets — carried out maneuvers west of NATO member Norway on Friday, a military official said.

Norway sent F-16 fighter jets to observe and photograph the Russian planes, which rounded the northern tip of Norway and flew south over the Norwegian Sea toward the Faeroe Islands before turning back, said Brig. Gen. Ole Asak, chief of the Norwegian Joint Air Operations Center.

A pair of Russian Tu-95 strategic bombers approached the Pacific Island of Guam — home to a major U.S. military base — this month for the first time since the Cold War.

Last month, two similar bombers briefly entered British air space but turned back after British fighter jets intercepted them. Norwegian F-16s were also scrambled when the Tu-95s headed south along the Norwegian coast in international air space.

"This is a significant change of posture of Russian strategic forces," Alexander Pikayev, a senior military analyst with the Moscow-based Institute for World Economy and International Relations, told The Associated Press. "It's a response to the relocation of NATO forces closer to Russia's western border."

NATO has expanded in recent years to include the former Soviet republics of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia as well as the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland.

As of the beginning of the year, Russia had 79 strategic bombers, according to data exchanged with the United States under the START I arms control treaty. At the peak of the Cold War, the Soviet long-range bomber fleet numbered several hundred.

Friday's war games with China near the Urals Mountain city of Chelyabinsk involved some 6,000 troops from both countries, along with soldiers from four ex-Soviet Central Asian nations that are part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a regional group dominated by Moscow and Beijing.

The former Cold War rivals share a heightening distrust of what they see as the United States' outsized role in global politics, and they have forged a "strategic partnership" aimed at counterbalancing Washington's policies.

The United States, Russia and China are locked in a tense rivalry for influence in Central Asia, the site of vast hydrocarbon resources. Washington supports plans for pipelines that would carry oil and gas to the West and bypass Russia, while Moscow has maneuvered to control exports. China also has shown a growing appetite for energy to power its booming economy.

Putin, Chinese leader Hu Jintao and other leaders of the SCO nations attended the joint exercise, which followed their summit Thursday in Kyrgyzstan's capital Bishkek.

The summit concluded with a communique that sounded like a thinly veiled warning to the United States to stay away from the region: "Stability and security in Central Asia are best ensured primarily through efforts taken by the nations of the region on the basis of the existing regional associations."

Putin hailed the exercise — which involved dozens of aircraft and hundreds of armored vehicles countering a mock attack by terrorists and insurgents striving to take control of energy resources — "as another step to strengthen relations between our countries." Hu said the maneuvers "underlined the SCO's readiness to confront terror."

The exercises underlined that "the SCO wants to show that Central Asia is its exclusive sphere of responsibility," said Ivan Safranchuk, an analyst at World Security Institute

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov said the exercise was not aimed at the United States.

"I don't see anything anti-American in the SCO exercise," he was quoted as saying by the ITAR-Tass news agency.

The SCO was created 11 years ago to address religious extremism and border security issues in Central Asia. In recent years, the group has grown into a bloc aimed at defying U.S. interests in the region.

In 2005, the SCO called for a timetable to be set for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from two member countries, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Uzbekistan evicted U.S. forces later that year, but Kyrgyzstan still has a U.S. base, which supports operations in nearby Afghanistan. Russia also maintains a military base in Kyrgyzstan.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose country has SCO observer status, attended the summit for the second consecutive year. On Thursday, he echoed Russia's criticism of U.S. plans to deploy missile interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic, saying they were a threat to the entire region.

___

Associated Press Writer Vladimir Isachenkov contributed to this report from Moscow.

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U.S. actions against Iran raise war risk, many fear
By Warren P. Strobel and Nancy A. Youssef, McClatchy Newspapers
Fri Aug 17, 4:45 PM ET



WASHINGTON — As President Bush escalates the United States' confrontation with Iran across a broad front, U.S. allies in Europe and the Middle East are growing worried that the steps will achieve little, but will undercut diplomacy and increase the chances of war.

In the latest step, Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice are considering designating Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps , the elite military force that serves as the guardian of Iran's Islamic state, as a foreign terrorist organization.

News of the decision was leaked to newspapers in what a senior State Department official and Washington -based diplomats said was a sign of an intensifying internal struggle within the U.S. government between proponents of military action and opponents, led by Rice.

State Department officials and foreign diplomats see Rice's push for the declaration against the Revolutionary Guards as an effort to blunt arguments by Vice President Dick Cheney and his allies for air strikes on Iran . By making the declaration, they feel, Rice can strike out at a key Iranian institution without resorting to military action while still pushing for sanctions in the United Nations .

Partisans of military force argue that Rice's strategy has failed to change Tehran's behavior.

"It really does seem this is more tied to the internal debate that is going on in the administration on Iran , rather than a serious attempt to influence Iranian behavior," said an Arab diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity.

"How that debate will play out is what's concerning" Arab and European countries, he said.

Designating the Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist group "is the State Department trying to do something short of war," said former U.S. diplomat Charles Dunbar , a professor of international relations at Boston University .

"What else can we do?" said Dunbar, who worked for the State Department in Tehran from 1963 to 1967.

The Revolutionary Guard would be the first military unit of a sovereign government ever placed on the department's list of terrorist organizations. The move would allow the Treasury Department to go after the group's finances and those of its reputed business network inside and outside Iran .

The Bush administration has been engaging Iran in a increasingly strident war of words since the spring, when the Bush administration demanded tougher U.N. sanctions over Iran's nuclear energy program. The White House says that Bush remains committed to diplomatic and financial actions to persuade Iran to stop enriching nuclear fuel, which the U.S. says can be made into a bomb but that Iran insists is intended only for electricity generation.

Recently, the administration has stepped up the rhetoric, accusing Iran of providing Shiite Muslim militias in Iraq with particularly deadly roadside bombs that have killed dozens of U.S. service members.

"We are confronting Iranian behavior across a variety of different fronts on a number of different, quote- unquote, battlefields, if you will," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Wednesday.

Earlier this year, the Pentagon temporarily moved an additional aircraft carrier into the Persian Gulf as a warning to Iran . U.S. commanders in Iraq have also highlighted intelligence they say shows that the Revolutionary Guard's Qods force is shipping sophisticated road-side bombs, known as explosively formed penetrators, into Iraq .

Bush and his aides also have accused Iran of playing an unhelpful role in Afghanistan — although some State Department officials say the reality is much more complicated.

Finally, Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates traveled to the Middle East in late July and early August, bearing promises of billions in weapons sales to friendly Arab states and a $30 billlion, 10-year military aid package to Israel . The rationale: Iran .

What remains unclear is what the administration will do if none of those steps has an impact on Iran , whose leaders seem confident as they see Bush unpopular at home and bogged down in Iraq .

"The coercion ... undermines diplomacy. And once diplomacy is undermined, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy," said Ray Takeyh , an Iran expert at the Council on Foreign Relations .

By early 2008, "You're in a position where you have a series of escalatory measures ... And then the military option becomes something you can consider," Takeyh said.

On the nuclear front, since taking office in 2005, Rice has backed a European-led effort to persuade Iran to stop enriching uranium in exchange for economic, political and security benefits.

The U.N. Security Council has passed two resolutions imposing sanctions on Iran for its nuclear work. But negotiations on a third have stalled and a September deadline for enacting new sanctions will likely be missed, say State Department officials and diplomats.

Critics say that designating the Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist group could further undermine the effort, and also scuttle U.S.-Iranian talks in Baghdad on Iraq's security. Those talks have achieved little.

On Iran's role in Iraq , U.S. ground commanders in Iraq oppose proposals from Cheney and his allies to counter-attack inside Iran itself, saying they believe they can contain Iran's growing influence without acting outside Iraq .

Privately, some are hostile to suggestions that the military strike another country, saying they are mired in Iraq .

"Let them put on the uniform and go there then," said one military official in Baghdad who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the topic.

Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno , the No. 2 commander in Iraq , said Friday that Shi'ite factions, backed by Iranian groups, are now responsible for nearly half the attacks in Iraq , compared to 30 percent in January.

Odierno said he could deal with the problem inside Iraq , without going over the border into Iran . But he conceded that the military still is learning about how Iranian networks run through Iraq .

"We're just in the beginning stages" of denting Iranian influence, he said. Iran's abilities are "still significant. So we still have an awful lot of work to do."

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Headline News
Sunday, September 16, 2007 by Staff Writer


Israeli air raid raises fears of nuclear-armed Syria

A number of media reports citing unnamed Israeli and American officials and experts indicate that an alleged Israeli air force raid deep inside Syria 10 days ago targeted nuclear technology transferred from North Korea to Israel's northern neighbor.

Israel's Yediot Ahronot and Britain's The Observer both reported on Sunday that as many as eight Israeli fighter jets took part in the raid, penetrating all the way to Syria's eastern border before attacking what officials fear is a facility to extract uranium. In addition to the attacking aircraft, both newspapers reported that an electronic intelligence gathering plane flew thousands of feet above the fighters collecting additional data on the target.

The Washington Post reported that the strike came just three days after a North Korean ship purportedly carrying cement docked in Syria. An expert cited in the report said that both Israel and the US were convinced the shipment contained sensitive nuclear equipment that would have enabled Syria to launch a nuclear arms program.

Syrian officials meanwhile vehemently denied that there are any nuclear facilities anywhere in their country.

But former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton told The Jerusalem Post that “simple logic” would draw the conclusion that both Iran and North Korea would look to an ally not under suspicion of nuclear activity in order to outsource the more conspicuous elements of their own nuclear arms programs.

Bolton said he believes that Syria is providing facilities for uranium enrichment to both Iran and North Korea, both of which are under intense UN scrutiny. He also pointed out that for some reason North Korea was among the nations that most vigorously condemned Israel's alleged air raid in Syria.

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Headline News
Wednesday, January 02, 2008 by Staff Writer


Egypt threatens to attack Israel diplomatically

An Egyptian official cited by Israel's Ynet news portal on Monday warned that if Jerusalem does not mind its own business regarding the smuggling of terrorist arms into the Gaza Strip via the Egyptian Sinai, then Cairo will use its diplomatic clout in Africa to damage Israeli interests.

The official spoke to Ynet less than a day after Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Gheit threatened to retaliate diplomatically following Israel's public complaints that Egypt was harming peace efforts with the Palestinians by failing to curb the flow of arms, cash and terrorist know-how to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Egypt is well aware of Israel's vital interests in Africa, and will use its immense influence in the continent to harm Israel's diplomatic relations with any number of nations.

The Egyptians singled out Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, threatening to have her declared persona non grata across Africa for her public criticism of Egypt's Gaza border failures. Livni was accused of being part of a wider Jewish conspiracy to bolster efforts by some US congressmen to cut American military aid to Egypt.

On Tuesday, Israeli government officials told The Jerusalem Post that while the Egyptian threats are being taken seriously, Jerusalem is not overly concerned by them since Egypt has for years been working to thwart Israeli diplomatic gains.

As an example, one official revealed that Egypt had led an effort at the UN last month to have the first-ever Israeli-authored General Assembly resolution blocked. The official said such moves are all aimed at showing Israel that Egypt is the dominant power in the region.

Many Israeli politicians have warned for years that despite the peace treaty between them, Egypt is no friend of Israel. One politician in particular, Likud Party lawmaker Yuval Steinitz, has repeatedly pointed out that the US-funded Egyptian military continues to conduct all of its war exercises against an Israeli enemy.

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'Oil, Israel and Iran' Among Factors that Led to Georgia War
by Gl Ronen

Analysis of the war in Georgia points to a fight over a major oil route as
the main reason for hostilities, but also to an Israeli connection.

Channel 2's expert on the Muslim world, Ehud Ya'ari, told viewers of the
central evening newscast that Russia and neighboring countries were vying for
control of a strategic oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean.
This relatively new pipeline passes through Azerbaijan and Georgia to Turkey
and is the only pipeline between Asia and Europe that does not pass through
Russia or Iran. Israel is expecting to receive oil and gas through the pipeline.

By using the ethnic Russian population in South Ossetia to destabilize
Georgia, Russia was making a play for the pipeline, he said.

The Israeli Connection
The Georgian move against South Ossetia was motivated by political
considerations having to do with Israel and Iran, according to Nfc. Georgian
President
Mikheil Saakashvili decided to assert control over the breakaway region in
order to force Israel to reconsider its decision to cut back its support for
Georgia's military.

Russian and Georgian media reported several days ago that Israel decided to
stop its support for Georgia after Moscow made it clear to Jerusalem and
Washington that Russia would respond to continued aid for Georgia by selling
advanced anti-aircraft systems to Syria and Iran.

Hundreds of Israeli defense experts are reportedly in Georgia and Israel's
military industries have been upgrading Georgia's air force, training its
infantry and selling the country unmanned aerial vehicles and advanced artillery
systems.

Former minister Ronny Milo was reportedly among the leading Israeli
middlemen in the arms deals with Georgia and Brig.-Gen. Gal Hirsch has been training
army units through a company he owns.

Russia nixes ceasefire
Georgia has ordered its forces to cease fire, and offered to start talks
with Russia over an end to hostilities in South Ossetia, Georgian officials said
Sunday. However, Russia has reportedly rejected the offer. Earlier in the
day, Georgia said its troops had pulled out of the breakaway region and that
Russian forces were in control of its capital, Tskhinvali. Georgian President
Saakashvili said Sunday that his country's sovereignty is in danger.

After conducting consultations regarding events in Georgia, Foreign Minister
Tzipi Livni said Sunday that Israel "recognizes Georgia's territorial
integrity." Israel also called for a peaceful resolution of the conflict between
Russia and Georgia.



Russia bombs Israeli-run plant
Also on Sunday, Russia bombed a Georgian military plant in which Israeli
experts are upgrading jet fighters for the Georgian military. According to Nfc,
the bombing was a "sharp message" to Israel.

A Russian fighter jet bombed runways inside the plant, located near Tbilisi,
where Israeli security firm Elbit is in charge of upgrading Georgian SU-25
jets.

Dozens Waiting to Make Aliyah from Georgia
Eight Jews were scheduled to arrive from Georgia to Israel Sunday evening
and dozens more intend to make Aliyah to the Jewish state, once they finish the
required paperwork. Representatives of Russian Aliyah agency Nativ will
provide the Olim with Aliyah permits. The Georgian government claims Tbilisi's
international airport was damaged Sunday after being bombed by Russian jets,
and it is not clear if flights will be able to take off in the coming days.

Russia's foreign minister denied the Georgian claim, Russian news agency
Interfax reported.
Russia is not denying reports that it bombed a military airport in a suburb
of Tbilisi twice.

Russia: Western Media is Pro-Georgian
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gregory Karasin said Sunday that
international and western press coverage of events in Georgia were biased in favor of
the Georgians.

"The West behaved strangely in the first hours of the attack on South
Ossetia," Karasin said, and added that "the U.S.A.'s negative attitude" would be
"taken into consideration in the future in contacts about other global
questions." The US says it will ask the United Nations to condemn Russia's actions in
Georgia.

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Russia "very alarmed" at Iranian nuclear stance
Feb. 20, 2010

By Conor Sweeney


MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Friday it was "very alarmed" by Iran's failure to cooperate with the IAEA, after the U.N. nuclear agency said it feared Tehran might be working to develop a nuclear-armed missile.


Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei repeated Iran's insistence that suspicions about its nuclear program were baseless. But the U.S.-led campaign for more sanctions against Tehran appeared to be gaining ground.


Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov indicated that Moscow's patience was wearing very thin.


"We are very alarmed and we cannot accept this, that Iran is refusing to cooperate with the IAEA," Lavrov told the Ekho Moskvy radio station in an interview.


"For about 20 years, the Iranian leadership carried out its clandestine nuclear program without reporting it to the IAEA," he said. "I do not understand why there was such secrecy."


The IAEA on Thursday made public its concerns over a classified analysis which concludes that Iran already has explosives expertise relevant to a workable nuclear weapon.


"Some questions remain on the table and Iran has so far not reacted to them but they are rather serious and we need to understand how several documents concerning military nuclear technology found their way to Iran," Lavrov said.


"Clear explanations are needed."


Russia -- which wields a veto in the United Nations Security Council -- has in recent weeks raised suspicions publicly about Iran's nuclear activities, after for years saying it had no evidence Tehran was seeking to build a nuclear bomb.


SANCTIONS?


The Kremlin has repeatedly said that further sanctions might have to be imposed if Tehran failed to cooperate with the IAEA.


The Foreign Ministry on Friday hinted that talks on a sanctions resolution could start soon.


"No work is in progress at the U.N. Security Council in New York today to prepare a possible sanctions-based resolution on Iran," Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said.


"However, given the current circumstances, we cannot fully rule out the possibility of starting this work."


[b]Germany, one of the six powers negotiating with Iran on the nuclear issue, added its voice to the pressure.[/b]


"The persistent defiance ... of United Nations resolutions and Tehran's continuation of a dangerous nuclear policy are forcing the international community to pursue further comprehensive sanctions in New York against the regime in Tehran," government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm said.


But he added: "We rule out a military solution." The United States says it wants a diplomatic solution but has not ruled out military action.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said European capitals were coordinating on a joint response following the latest IAEA report.

German exporters called on Friday for tough sanctions, even though Germany is among Iran's biggest trading partners,[b] exporting more than 3.3 billion euros' worth of goods in 2009.[/b]
Khamenei was quoted as saying by Iranian media: "The West's accusations are baseless because our religious beliefs bar us from using such weapons ... We do not believe in atomic weapons and are not seeking that."