(Washington Post) Editorial - In the eight months since Iran last agreed to meet with the international coalition, the offer to Tehran has grown more, rather than less, generous. "It was they who tried to get closer to our point of view," crowed Tehran's chief negotiator, Saeed Jalili. While the previous proposal last May called for Iran to shut down the Fordow underground nuclear plant and to ship its stockpile of medium-enriched uranium out of the country, the latest bid scales back the Fordow shutdown to a suspension of operations and allows Iran to retain some of that 20 percent-enriched uranium. The coalition also appears to have offered a greater easing of sanctions. If Iran altered its own, unacceptable proposals from previous rounds, there was no indication of it. That raises the possibility that the regime will simply pocket the easier terms and return to its stonewalling, with the expectation that another crumbling of the coalition position will ensue. History suggests these are the tactics of a regime convinced that it can outlast and outmaneuver the U.S. and its partners.
2013-03-01 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive