Iran using nuclear talks to buy time for bomb: Israel

NUKEWARS

Iran tests new air-to-sea missile: report
Iran said on Sunday it "successfully" tested a new air-to-sea missile with a range of 110 kilometres (68 miles), the Fars new agency reported. It did not say when the test was conducted. "Iranian defence specialists are able to successfully install missiles with a range of 110 kilometres on fighter planes and launch them," the report said, adding that the high-precision weapon weighs about 500 kilos. The report said the latest test showed the Islamic republic's "ability to automatically direct the missile and carry warheads to destroy large targets at sea." The announcement comes just days after a top military commander said Iran has missiles that can reach nuclear facilities in its arch-foe Israel. Mohammed Ali Jafari, the head of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps, said Tehran has missiles with a range of more than 2,000 kilometres, bringing all of Israel within range. But defence analysts question the accuracy of Iran's longer-range missiles. Jafari's comment came amid sustained speculation that Israel could target Iranian nuclear plants. Israel has a major nuclear facility at Dimona in the Negev desert, at which it is widely believed to have developed a nuclear arsenal. Israel maintains a policy of neither confirming nor denying a nuclear capability, but it is suspected to have more than 200 warheads. Iran does not recognise the Jewish state and has repeatedly predicted its demise.

by Staff Writers
Jerusalem (AFP) March 8, 2009
Iran is trying to use the talks with Western powers on its nuclear ambitions to buy time to produce an atomic bomb, Israel's military intelligence chief said on Sunday.

"Iran has crossed the technological threshold. Reaching a military-grade nuclear capability is a question of synchronising its strategy with the production of a nuclear bomb," Major General Amos Yadlin told cabinet ministers.

"Iran continues to stockpile hundreds of kilogrammes of low-level enriched uranium and hopes to use the dialogue with the West to buy the time it requires in order to move towards an ability to manufacture a nuclear bomb," a senior official quoted Yadlin as saying.

US President Barack Obama has signalled his willingness to engage in talks with Iran in a bid to resolve the nuclear standoff.

The five veto-wielding permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany announced last week that they were ready for direct talks with Iran to resolve the long-running crisis.

Israel, widely believed to have the Middle East's sole nuclear arsenal, accuses Iran of seeking to develop a bomb but Iran insists its nuclear programme is for purely peaceful purposes.

Benjamin Netanyahu, the hawk tasked with forming Israel's next government after last month's general election, said Iran was the top challenge facing the Jewish state.

"Iran is seeking to arm itself with nuclear weapons and is the most serious threat to our existence since the war of independence" in 1948, he said.

In an interview with NBC television, on Sunday Defence Secretary Robert Gates said Iran was "not close to a weapon at this point."

But in a separate interview with CNN the same day, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen expressed concern about the quantities of low-enriched uranium that Iran had produced.

Low-enriched uranium is used as fuel in nuclear power plants. Uranium enriched to a far higher level is used to make the fissile core of an atomic bomb.

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NUKEWARS

Iran says missiles can reach Israel nuclear sites

Tehran (AFP) March 4, 2009
A top Iranian military commander said on Wednesday that the country has missiles that can reach the nuclear sites of its arch-foe Israel.

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