Iran is launching a broad diplomatic offensive aimed at convincing as many UN Security Council members as possible to oppose harsher sanctions over its nuclear program, the Washington Post quoted politicians and diplomats in Tehran as saying.
The Washington Post's report, published Wednesday, quoted officials as saying that Iranian diplomats travelling around world to discuss the nuclear fuel swap arelobbying some of the Security Council's rotating members to vote against a fourth round of sanctions proposed by the United States.
According to the officials, Iran wants to focus on resuming stalled negotiations about the nuclear fuel swap to build trust on all sides, but leaders of Western nations say that unless the Islamic Republic revises its terms for the deal, they will refuse to discuss it again.
Under the deal, aimed at breaking a deadlock over Iran's uranium-enrichment efforts, Tehran would exchange most of its low-enriched uranium for more highly enriched fuel for a research reactor that produces medical isotopes.
"In the coming 10 days, the Islamic republic's delegations will travel to the capitals of Russia, China, Lebanon and Uganda to pursue talks," The Washington Post quoted Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki as saying. "Other countries will be visited in the near future." According to the Washington Post, he said that "nuclear issues" will be on the agenda.
'Discriminatory elements in NPT'
The report said Iran also plans to try to rally support during an international conference to review the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). In Tehran's view, the gathering, scheduled for May in New York, is shaping up as a confrontation between nuclear powers and developing nations, said the Washington Post.
"The groups we are sending out will be focusing on the correct implementation of the NPT, the disarmament trend and fuel-swap issues," Kazem Jalali, a member of the Iranian parliament's national security and foreign policy committee, was quoted by the Washington Post as saying. "Naturally, our explanations during the trips will have a positive effect against the efforts by the United States in trying to impose new sanctions."
To kick-off its diplomatic offensive, Iran held a nuclear disarmament conference last weekend that several Security Council members attended. The meeting, focused on what Iran and other developing nations call "double standards" and "discriminatory elements" in the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
According to the Washington Post, Iran's diplomatic effort seems especially aimed at developing nations such as Brazil, Nigeria and Turkey, which hold rotating seats on the 15-member Security Council. Iran is also betting that council members Lebanon - which has a government that includes members of Iran-backed Hezbollah - and Uganda might vote against new sanctions or abstain, said the report.
As a part of the campaign, the Washington Post reported, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will begin a two-day state visit Friday to Uganda, where he is expected to promise assistance in the construction of an oil refinery.