December 04, 2007

Iran Welcomes NIE News

After yesterday's announcement that a new National Intelligence Estimate shows Iran's nuclear program was frozen in 2003, Iran today heralded the revised assessment. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki praised the U.S. decision to "correct" its 2005 claim that his country was still actively engaged in developing its nuclear program.

Israel, on the other hand, is sounding the alarm, arguing that the NIE sharply diverges from Israeli intelligence reports, and even if the program had been halted in 2003, it has now been restarted.

The new NIE "complicates eventually launching a military operation against Iranian nuclear installations and makes it more difficult to justify an Israeli attack," Iran specialist Efraim Kam told Agence France-Presse.

President Bush is set to give an address from the White House at 10 a.m. to criticize Congress for failing to pass legislation to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but Iran and the NIE report are likely to take center stage. Stay tuned.

Posted at 7:26 AM
Posted to: Iran, Middle East
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