Residents fume as smoking banned in parks, near kids
ROME (Reuters) - Naples brought in tough anti- smoking measures Monday, but not everyone was convinced Italians in a city famed for flouting the law would stop lighting up in parks or near pregnant women.
"However they try and enforce this, they will meet with laughter," local councilor Gennaro Capodanno commented on the ban on smoking at demonstrations, in parks, and near pregnant women or children under 12 in public.
Traditionally rebellious Neapolitans now risk a fine of up to 250 euros ($366). The city council tightened legislation after health reports found the risk of lung cancer to be "significantly" higher there than elsewhere in Italy.
Across the country smoking is forbidden in indoor public places such as offices, factories, bars and restaurants.
The southern city has the highest murder rate in Italy and its people routinely flout regulations accepted elsewhere, such as wearing a crash helmet when driving a moped.
One politician has proposed hiring special inspectors to enforce the new smoking ban but Capodanno was skeptical.
"How can they assess who's smoking too close? Do you need to use a tape measure? And how do we know if a kid is more than 12? Does he have to carry documents on him?" he said to La Stampa newspaper.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Friday, November 16, 2007
U.S. to Seek New Sanctions Against Iran
U.S. to Seek New Sanctions Against Iran
U.N. Report Faults Tehran's Input on Nuclear Program
By Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 16, 2007; Page A22
The Bush administration plans to push for new sanctions against Iran after the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency reported yesterday that Tehran is providing "diminishing" information about its controversial nuclear program, U.S. officials said.
In a critically timed assessment, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran provided "timely" and helpful new information on a secret program that became public in 2002, but that it did not fully answer questions or allow full access to Iranian personnel. Iran is even less cooperative on its current program, the IAEA reported.
"Since early 2006, the agency has not received the type of information that Iran had previously been providing," the IAEA concluded. "The agency's knowledge about Iran's current nuclear program is diminishing."
The IAEA's report also confirmed that Iran has 3,000 centrifuges in operation, which is the minimum needed to enrich a significant amount of uranium and represents a tenfold increase over last year. Having 3,000 functioning centrifuges is a major technical milestone for Iran. Uranium enrichment can be used to develop peaceful nuclear energy as well as nuclear weapons.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly stated in recent months that Tehran has reached that strategic threshold. If all 3,000 centrifuges are working efficiently, Iran could produce a weapon in a year. But the report indicated that the IAEA has no evidence Iran could produce bomb-grade fuel, and most experts think it still faces significant technical problems.
"They have centrifuges, but it's unclear how well they work and how long they would work," said George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. At his confirmation hearings to be director of national intelligence in February, Mike McConnell estimated that Iran would not have a nuclear weapon until 2015.
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Iran's new chief negotiator, Saeed Jalili, heralded the IAEA's report for proving that "most ambiguities" about Tehran's program have been removed. At a news conference, he said the U.N. agency showed that allegations about Iran trying to subvert a peaceful energy program to develop the world's deadliest weapon are "baseless."
Ahmadinejad said the report by IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei shows the world that Iran has been "right and the resistance of our nation has been correct."
U.S. arms experts took a middle ground. "ElBaradei wants to focus on the positive in terms of the accounting for the past," Perkovich said. "But in the big strategic picture, the report is wholly negative because Iran is not suspending uranium enrichment. Iran is not only not suspending, but it is spitting in our face by saying they're going to ramp up with the next generation of centrifuges beyond what they had already."
The United States warned yesterday that Iran's failure to fully comply with U.N. mandates -- to suspend enrichment and detail its nuclear program -- is grounds for the United Nations to proceed on a long-delayed resolution imposing new sanctions on the Islamic republic.
"The key thing from the director general's report is that Iran's cooperation remains selective and incomplete," said Gregory L. Schulte, the U.S. envoy to the IAEA in Austria. "So Iran has not met the world's expectation that it would disclose information on both its current and past programs."
In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that "partial credit doesn't cut it when you're talking about issues of whether or not Iran is developing a nuclear weapon." White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said the report "makes clear that Iran seems uninterested in working with the rest of the world."
The Bush administration has been counting on two reports this month -- the IAEA's assessment and a report by European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who negotiates with Iran -- to end five months of squabbling among the five veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council about further steps against Tehran. U.N. resolutions imposing sanctions on Iran, passed in December and March, have been unsuccessful in getting Tehran to comply.
Undersecretary of State R. Nicholas Burns expects to meet with his counterparts from Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany the week after Thanksgiving to work on a third round of Security Council sanctions, he said yesterday.
Russia and China have resisted U.S. pressure, mainly to give more time for the IAEA's "work plan" to learn more about Iran's activities through 2002. They also are concerned about their own economic interests and the risk of fomenting wider tension between Iran and the West, according to U.S. and European diplomats.
"We need China to join the effort and agree to have the next meeting," Burns said in an interview. "We're concerned that China's trade has increased significantly with Iran. It's incongruous for China to continue to sell arms to Iran and become Iran's top trade partner. We've advised the Chinese to take a much more resolute role."
U.N. Report Faults Tehran's Input on Nuclear Program
By Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 16, 2007; Page A22
The Bush administration plans to push for new sanctions against Iran after the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency reported yesterday that Tehran is providing "diminishing" information about its controversial nuclear program, U.S. officials said.
In a critically timed assessment, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran provided "timely" and helpful new information on a secret program that became public in 2002, but that it did not fully answer questions or allow full access to Iranian personnel. Iran is even less cooperative on its current program, the IAEA reported.
"Since early 2006, the agency has not received the type of information that Iran had previously been providing," the IAEA concluded. "The agency's knowledge about Iran's current nuclear program is diminishing."
The IAEA's report also confirmed that Iran has 3,000 centrifuges in operation, which is the minimum needed to enrich a significant amount of uranium and represents a tenfold increase over last year. Having 3,000 functioning centrifuges is a major technical milestone for Iran. Uranium enrichment can be used to develop peaceful nuclear energy as well as nuclear weapons.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly stated in recent months that Tehran has reached that strategic threshold. If all 3,000 centrifuges are working efficiently, Iran could produce a weapon in a year. But the report indicated that the IAEA has no evidence Iran could produce bomb-grade fuel, and most experts think it still faces significant technical problems.
"They have centrifuges, but it's unclear how well they work and how long they would work," said George Perkovich of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. At his confirmation hearings to be director of national intelligence in February, Mike McConnell estimated that Iran would not have a nuclear weapon until 2015.
ad_icon
Iran's new chief negotiator, Saeed Jalili, heralded the IAEA's report for proving that "most ambiguities" about Tehran's program have been removed. At a news conference, he said the U.N. agency showed that allegations about Iran trying to subvert a peaceful energy program to develop the world's deadliest weapon are "baseless."
Ahmadinejad said the report by IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei shows the world that Iran has been "right and the resistance of our nation has been correct."
U.S. arms experts took a middle ground. "ElBaradei wants to focus on the positive in terms of the accounting for the past," Perkovich said. "But in the big strategic picture, the report is wholly negative because Iran is not suspending uranium enrichment. Iran is not only not suspending, but it is spitting in our face by saying they're going to ramp up with the next generation of centrifuges beyond what they had already."
The United States warned yesterday that Iran's failure to fully comply with U.N. mandates -- to suspend enrichment and detail its nuclear program -- is grounds for the United Nations to proceed on a long-delayed resolution imposing new sanctions on the Islamic republic.
"The key thing from the director general's report is that Iran's cooperation remains selective and incomplete," said Gregory L. Schulte, the U.S. envoy to the IAEA in Austria. "So Iran has not met the world's expectation that it would disclose information on both its current and past programs."
In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that "partial credit doesn't cut it when you're talking about issues of whether or not Iran is developing a nuclear weapon." White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said the report "makes clear that Iran seems uninterested in working with the rest of the world."
The Bush administration has been counting on two reports this month -- the IAEA's assessment and a report by European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who negotiates with Iran -- to end five months of squabbling among the five veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council about further steps against Tehran. U.N. resolutions imposing sanctions on Iran, passed in December and March, have been unsuccessful in getting Tehran to comply.
Undersecretary of State R. Nicholas Burns expects to meet with his counterparts from Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany the week after Thanksgiving to work on a third round of Security Council sanctions, he said yesterday.
Russia and China have resisted U.S. pressure, mainly to give more time for the IAEA's "work plan" to learn more about Iran's activities through 2002. They also are concerned about their own economic interests and the risk of fomenting wider tension between Iran and the West, according to U.S. and European diplomats.
"We need China to join the effort and agree to have the next meeting," Burns said in an interview. "We're concerned that China's trade has increased significantly with Iran. It's incongruous for China to continue to sell arms to Iran and become Iran's top trade partner. We've advised the Chinese to take a much more resolute role."
Saturday, March 24, 2007
Security Council tightens sanctions against Iran over uranium enrichment
Security Council tightens sanctions against Iran over uranium enrichment
Security Council
24 March 2007 – The United Nations Security Council acted unanimously today to tighten sanctions on Iran, imposing a ban on arms sales and expanding the freeze on assets, in response to the country’s uranium-enrichment activities, which Tehran says are for peaceful purposes but which other countries contend are driven by military ambitions.
Following the adoption of resolution 1747, Iran’s Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, immediately rejected it as illegitimate, maintaining Teheran’s longstanding claim that the country’s nuclear programme is entirely peaceful and therefore outside of the Council’s brief.
He also charged that the sanctions were not being imposed in response to the nuclear programme but were rather “schemes of the co-sponsors” carried out “for narrow national considerations aimed at depriving the Iranian people of their inalienable rights.”
The resolution reaffirms that Iran must take the steps required by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors, which has called for a full and sustained suspension of all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities; and ratification and implementation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty’s (NPT) Additional Protocol granting the IAEA expanded rights of access to information and sites, as well as additional authority to use the most advanced technologies during the verification process.
States are called on “to exercise vigilance and restraint regarding the entry into or transit through their territories of individuals who are engaged in, directly associated with or providing support for Iran’s proliferation sensitive nuclear activities or for the development of nuclear weapon delivery systems.”
Any such persons should be reported to the Council’s Iran sanctions committee. A designated list of individuals banned from travel is annexed to the resolution, but its provisions apply to others not listed who are involved in Iran’s nuclear weapons programme.
The resolution imposes a strict import/export ban on Iranian weapons, deciding that “Iran shall not supply, sell or transfer directly or indirectly from its territory or by its nationals or using its flag vessels or aircraft any arms or related materiel, and that all States shall prohibit the procurement of such items from Iran by their nationals, or using their flag vessels or aircraft, and whether or not originating in the territory of Iran.”
States must also “exercise vigilance and restraint” with regard to any battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles or missile systems destined for Iran.
Except for humanitarian or development aid, States and international financial institutions should not provide funds to Iran, according to the resolution. All countries have 60 days to report to the Iran sanctions committee on steps they have taken to give effect to the resolution.
The resolution also aims for a diplomatic breakthrough, expressing the Council’s conviction that if the IAEA can verify that Iran has suspended its uranium enrichment and reprocessing, this would lead to a negotiated solution that guarantees Iran’s nuclear programme is for exclusively peaceful purposes.
Underlining a willingness to work positively for a diplomatic solution, the Council encourages Iran, “to re-engage with the international community and with the IAEA.”
Under other provisions of the resolution, the Director-General of the IAEA is to report back to the Council within 60 days on Iran’s nuclear programme.
The Council will review Iran’s actions in light of that report and will suspend the sanctions “if and for so long as Iran suspends all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities, including research and development, as verified by the IAEA, to allow for negotiations in good faith in order to reach an early and mutually acceptable outcome.”
The measures will be terminated once Iran has complied with all Council demands.
However, if Iran does not comply, the Council will “adopt further appropriate measures” aimed at persuading Teheran to comply with its resolutions and the requirements of the IAEA, the resolution warns.
Today’s text also recalls an IAEA Board of Governors resolution adopted last year which states that “a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue would contribute to global non-proliferation efforts and to realizing the objective of a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction, including their means of delivery.”
Annexed to the resolution is a proposal put forward last June by six countries – China, France, Germany, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States – aimed at achieving an end to the standoff by providing elements of a long-term agreement.
Three months ago, the Council imposed a more limited set of sanctions on Iran over the nuclear issue. That resolution, also adopted unanimously following weeks of intensive diplomacy, contains a list of persons and entities involved with Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programmes that are subject to a freeze on their financial assets. Today’s resolution expands that list with an Annex containing additional persons and entities also subject to the measures.
Iran’s nuclear programme has been a matter of international concern ever since the discovery in 2003 that it had concealed its nuclear activities for 18 years in breach of its obligations under the NPT.
Security Council
24 March 2007 – The United Nations Security Council acted unanimously today to tighten sanctions on Iran, imposing a ban on arms sales and expanding the freeze on assets, in response to the country’s uranium-enrichment activities, which Tehran says are for peaceful purposes but which other countries contend are driven by military ambitions.
Following the adoption of resolution 1747, Iran’s Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, immediately rejected it as illegitimate, maintaining Teheran’s longstanding claim that the country’s nuclear programme is entirely peaceful and therefore outside of the Council’s brief.
He also charged that the sanctions were not being imposed in response to the nuclear programme but were rather “schemes of the co-sponsors” carried out “for narrow national considerations aimed at depriving the Iranian people of their inalienable rights.”
The resolution reaffirms that Iran must take the steps required by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors, which has called for a full and sustained suspension of all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities; and ratification and implementation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty’s (NPT) Additional Protocol granting the IAEA expanded rights of access to information and sites, as well as additional authority to use the most advanced technologies during the verification process.
States are called on “to exercise vigilance and restraint regarding the entry into or transit through their territories of individuals who are engaged in, directly associated with or providing support for Iran’s proliferation sensitive nuclear activities or for the development of nuclear weapon delivery systems.”
Any such persons should be reported to the Council’s Iran sanctions committee. A designated list of individuals banned from travel is annexed to the resolution, but its provisions apply to others not listed who are involved in Iran’s nuclear weapons programme.
The resolution imposes a strict import/export ban on Iranian weapons, deciding that “Iran shall not supply, sell or transfer directly or indirectly from its territory or by its nationals or using its flag vessels or aircraft any arms or related materiel, and that all States shall prohibit the procurement of such items from Iran by their nationals, or using their flag vessels or aircraft, and whether or not originating in the territory of Iran.”
States must also “exercise vigilance and restraint” with regard to any battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles or missile systems destined for Iran.
Except for humanitarian or development aid, States and international financial institutions should not provide funds to Iran, according to the resolution. All countries have 60 days to report to the Iran sanctions committee on steps they have taken to give effect to the resolution.
The resolution also aims for a diplomatic breakthrough, expressing the Council’s conviction that if the IAEA can verify that Iran has suspended its uranium enrichment and reprocessing, this would lead to a negotiated solution that guarantees Iran’s nuclear programme is for exclusively peaceful purposes.
Underlining a willingness to work positively for a diplomatic solution, the Council encourages Iran, “to re-engage with the international community and with the IAEA.”
Under other provisions of the resolution, the Director-General of the IAEA is to report back to the Council within 60 days on Iran’s nuclear programme.
The Council will review Iran’s actions in light of that report and will suspend the sanctions “if and for so long as Iran suspends all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities, including research and development, as verified by the IAEA, to allow for negotiations in good faith in order to reach an early and mutually acceptable outcome.”
The measures will be terminated once Iran has complied with all Council demands.
However, if Iran does not comply, the Council will “adopt further appropriate measures” aimed at persuading Teheran to comply with its resolutions and the requirements of the IAEA, the resolution warns.
Today’s text also recalls an IAEA Board of Governors resolution adopted last year which states that “a solution to the Iranian nuclear issue would contribute to global non-proliferation efforts and to realizing the objective of a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction, including their means of delivery.”
Annexed to the resolution is a proposal put forward last June by six countries – China, France, Germany, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States – aimed at achieving an end to the standoff by providing elements of a long-term agreement.
Three months ago, the Council imposed a more limited set of sanctions on Iran over the nuclear issue. That resolution, also adopted unanimously following weeks of intensive diplomacy, contains a list of persons and entities involved with Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programmes that are subject to a freeze on their financial assets. Today’s resolution expands that list with an Annex containing additional persons and entities also subject to the measures.
Iran’s nuclear programme has been a matter of international concern ever since the discovery in 2003 that it had concealed its nuclear activities for 18 years in breach of its obligations under the NPT.
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