The United States reports progress in persuading Russia
to halt its transfer of missile and weapons of mass technology to Iran.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the progress was the result of
the summit between President George Bush and his Russian counterpart,
Vladimir Putin, in May. Powell, who said further progress was detected
during the meeting by industrial nations in Canada last month, said Putin
recognizes the danger of exporting WMD components and technology to Iran and
the need to halt such transfers.
"There are some issues that we are still in disagreement over with the
Russians, but we have made progress since the Moscow summit, made progress
since the G-8 meeting in Kananakis a couple of weeks ago," Powell told the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday. "And we think that we are on
the right path to making sure that the Russians don't continue to engage in
this kind of activity. We haven't solved the problem yet, but I do believe
we have made some progress."
Powell did not elaborate, but cited statements by Putin that
acknowledged the dangers of Iranian WMD. The secretary said Russia and the
United States have established a panel to discuss strategic issues. He said
the first full meeting of the panel will take place in September and include
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
"You can be sure that on that agenda for the meeting in September will
be proliferation, and, to be very frank, proliferation focused on the Iran
question," Powell said. "That will be an item on the agenda. And it's good
to have the four of us in the room, both the foreign policy part of it and
the defense
part of it."
Earlier, U.S. officials and congressional leaders reported that
Washington has failed to halt or significantly slow down the transfer of
Russian missile and WMD components and technology to Iran. The officials
said the Russian help has bolstered such Iranian intermediate-range missile
programs as the Shihab-3 and Shihab-4.
But at Tuesday's hearing, Powell said Russia recognizes the U.S.
priority to stop Iran from obtaining WMD. He indicated that the Bush
administration would link U.S. support for economic aid to Moscow to the end
of its WMD transfers to Iran.
Officials said the U.S. priority is to stop Russia from continuing its
Bushehr nuclear reactor project in Iran without guarantees from Teheran to
accept an aggressive inspection regime by the International Atomic Energy
Agency. Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty but has rejected a
proposal of more intrusive IAEA inspections established after the 1991 Gulf
war.
