Friday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 3.10.2006:

Poll: Iranian Support for nuclear technology weakening.

• Countdown reported on a confidential poll in Iran that claimed, 69% of the Iranians do not recognize the nuclear issue a matter of national aspiration and 86% do not believe that nuclear technology is worth a military conflict.

US Iran Policy

• U.S. Department of State published the congressional testimony of R. Nicholas Burns, Under Secretary for Political Affairs, where he outlined the long overdue US policy toward Iran.
• Reuters reported that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Iran is probably the No. 1 challenge to the United States.
• U.S. Department of State reported that Secretary Condoleezza Rice said: "We do not have a problem with the Iranian people. We want the Iranian people to be free. Our problem is with the Iranian regime and these programs are intended to help us reach out to them."
• The International Herald Tribune reported that the State Department is preparing for a "long struggle" against Iran.
• The New York Sun reported that the State Department stressed the importance of plans to station at least 10 diplomats in Dubai to monitor the Tehran regime and support Iran's pro-democracy movement.

UK: Iran just months from the bomb.

• The Guardian reported that a senior UK Foreign Office official said that Iran might gain the technical knowhow within months to build a serviceable nuclear weapon.

Iran's Supreme Leader: "We will resist!"

• Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported that Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said: "We will resist ..." 'If we give in this time, then the Europeans will come up next with new excuses to deprive us from scientific achievements."
  

UK takes Iran's threat seriously.

• Reuters reported that Britain said it was taking seriously threats from Iran that it could inflict "pain."

Iran may have over played it hand.

• Reuters reported that Iran may have misjudged its recent confrontational tactics in the nuclear standoff.

Iranian Secrets.

• Ha'aretz reported that intelligence services in the West are convinced that Iran is taking covert means to develop nuclear weapons and that there is a secondary, smaller covert channel that is making steady progress.
• The Weekly Standard reported that Iran secretly agreed to assist the Taliban in its war against U.S. forces in October 2001.

The Nuclear Sites Targeted in Iran.

• Mehran Riazaty reported on the nuclear sites that would be targeted in an attack on Iran.

Videos of Iranian Security Attacks on Demonstrators.

• Reuters reported that Iranian police and plainclothes agents yesterday beat hundreds of women and men who had gathered to commemorate International Women's Day. Plus 4 videos.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• Knight Ridder reported why the US shouldn't expect any bold initiatives from Arab rulers in the escalating nuclear standoff with Iran: They're paralyzed by fear of the United States, fear of Iran and fear of their own citizens.
• Deutsche Welle reported that German newspapers are divided on the issue of Iran's nuclear activities now that it has been passed on to the United Nations Security Council.
• Amir Taheri, The New York Post warned of the danger of a Jihad war in Thailand.
• Radio Free Europe reported that Iran arrested more than 50 people involved in recent bombings in the Southwestern province of Khuzestan.
• And finally, Iran Watch Canada is counting down the release of Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji from prison, with just 8 days to go (March 17th).