WASHINGTON: Despite Western nations tightening the screws on Iran, a top aide to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says increasingly tough sanctions have failed.
On the eve of fresh negotiations with Western powers tentatively set for December 5, Ahmadinejad confidant Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi said it was time for them to “stop fooling themselves” over the effectiveness of measures designed to pressure Iran into abandoning its uranium enrichment me. Banning Iranian ships from European ports, a fuel blockade against Iran Air, growing financial restrictions and other punitive measures have had no noticeable effect, he said in an interview with The Washington Post conducted Monday and published Wednesday.
“The delay in the negotiations has been a good opportunity for the other side to realise the effects of its political decisions.” He also claimed the failure of sanctions had prompted the West to relaunch the long-stalled talks, a direct contradiction of the US position.
Iran is under four sets of UN Security Council sanctions over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, which is at the center of fears about Tehran’s atomic ambitions. It has also faced military threats and alleged technological attacks on its controversial nuclear me.
Tehran and the so-called P5+1 that groups the US, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany have agreed to return to the negotiating table for the first time since October 2009 for a meeting tentatively scheduled to take place next month in Geneva.
Samareh Hashemi’s comments came as the UN atomic watchdog found Tuesday that Iran was still uncooperative after nearly eight years of attempting to determine if its nuclear me is military or, as Tehran insists, peaceful in its objectives.
