US "MESSENGER BOY" WALKED SAFELY THROUGH THE TEHRAN MINEFIELD
TEHRAN 25 Sept. (IPS) Visiting British Foreign Minister Jack Straw was told Tuesday in Tehran that Iran would be willing to help fighting international terrorism provided the struggle is led by the United Nations and that it would not include a military invasion of Afghanistan by American forces.
Mr. Straw entered today the Iranian political minefield when he briefed Iranian officials on American expectations from Iran in their efforts to mount an international coalition aimed to "eradicate" all major sources of terrorism.
As Iran has several definitions for the word terrorism, Mr. Straw said in this particular case with Iran, there would be explanation "about the fact that there has been only one definition of terrorism not two or three", referring to the 11 September attacks on the Trade Word Center towers in New York and the Pentagon in Washington D.C.
Contrary to American and European expectations, Iran became one of the first countries in the world to strongly condemn the terrorist actions against the United States, attributed to Mr. Osama Ben Laden.
Not only Iran has no relations with the Afghan ruling Taleban, but it also is one of the main supporters of the anti-Taleban Northern Alliance.
Iran said it want to see proofs of American allegations that Mr. Ben Laden is behind the attacks, translating a prevailing belief that the devastating operations might be the work of Israel, the British or the American themselves.
Though Iran’s boss, Ayatollah Ali Khameneh’i, has also condemned the attacks, but at the same time he has ruled out any participation of Iran in any anti-Afghan invasion force.
In his wide-ranging talks with Egyptian, Syrian, Saudi, Russian and European leaders, Mr. Khatami has systematically insisted that no hasty decision should be taken against Afghan people, creating another humanitarian catastrophe.
Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman, the Iraqi-born Hamid Reza Asefi expressed grave doubts about the impending US-led attacks on Afghanistan and said this was the reason why Tehran would not let America and its allies to use the country's airspace.
He also said that he hoped the British Foreign Secretary brings firm evidence that implicates Washington's prime suspect Osama Ben Laden as being responsible for the attacks on the US on 11 September that is being used to substantiate attacking Afghanistan.
On his landing on at Tehran international airport of Mehrabad early this morning coming from Amman, Mr. Straw, the first British Foreign Minister to visit officially Iran since the Islamic revolution of 1979, told reporters that he was not carrying any message from the United States for the Iranian leaders.
"I'm carrying no message from Washington to Tehran and I made that clear to my Iranian interlocutors", Mr. Straw stated on his departure from Tehran for Tel Aviv, obviously no at ease to be told that the Iranian press has already nicknamed him as Washington’s "Messenger Boy".
Nor did he convinced any journalists, as most newspapers in Tehran, London and elsewhere reported that he was carrying with him a message from his American counterpart Collin Powel for the Iranian leaders.
"I’m here as her majesty's Secretary of State for the Commonwealth Affairs and on behalf of the United Kingdom and no other country", Mr. Straw added, pointing out that the trip has been arranged "bilaterally" between Iran and the United Kingdom.
However, the British Foreign Minister confirmed that he had decided to bring forward his planned trip to Iran after Prime Minister Tony Blair spoke on the phone with Iranian President Mohammad Khatami and his own conversations with Iranian counterpart Kamal Kharrazi.
As Police arrested some 50 people protesting Straw's visit outside the British embassy on Monday and shouting "Death to America, death to Britain", anti-riot police were deployed in front of the Embassy’s gates in Tehran’s Ferdowsi Avenue as well in adjacent streets to prevent any demonstrations during the length of the visit, eyewitnesses reported.
Like all key institutions in Iran, the Law Enforcement Forces are under the direct control of the regime’s leader, Ayatollah Khameneh’i.
"The Iranians have more reason than almost any other nation in the world to know about the dreadful consequences of the extremism of the Taleban because Iran has over two million refugees on its borders", Straw said in an interview with BBC radio.
Talks are said to focus on bilateral ties, but also ways to help fight terrorism following the September 11 terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside Washington, informed sources told Iran Press Service in Tehran.
"Mr. Straw is expected to brief the Iranians on what exactly the Americans are expecting from Iran and then inform Washington about the Iranian answers", the source added.
At his arrival, Mr. Straw was greeted by an Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister and the senior staff of the British embassy led by Mr. Nicholas Brown, the British Ambassador to Iran.
Britain cut off relations with Tehran after Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a dead fatwa against the Anglo-Indian writer novelist Salman Rushdie for his book "The Satanic Verses", but relations were normalised ten years latter after Tehran officially distanciated itself from the fatwa and subsequently Mr. Kharrazi visited London in January 2000 after an exchange of ambassadors had took place earlier.
A barrage of harshly anti-British articles and commentaries in the Iranian conservative-controlled press greeted Mr. Straw.
"The British cannot be trusted", said a headline in the hard-line "Jomhoori Eslami" (Islamic Republic", that belongs to Mr. Khameneh’I, but nevertheless translating the way a great majority of Iranians think about London.
"The British can never be in the same united front as us against terrorism", the newspaper said. "We cannot have the least good faith towards the British government's claims", it added
"The (Islamic) revolution could not have happened without British backing", said one. "It served their interest at the time".
"Look under a mullah's cloak and you will see 'made in England", Iranians delight in telling visiting Brits.
And now some even see the deadly suicide attacks on New York and Washington as being crafted by the ever-cunning British.
"The explosions in America cannot be analysed without taking a look at the behind-the-scenes hands of the British", an unnamed analyst was quoted as saying by the Hambastegi newspaper last week.
"The aim of these explosions was to pull America down from its unique superpower position and to rejuvenate Britain's past rule over the world," he said.
Even for reform-minded Iranians backing President Mohammad Khatami's campaign for closer ties with the outside world, the feeling persists that London, not Washington, is the mover in international affairs.
Mr. Straw’s meeting with Mr. Kharrazi was cut in order to allow the Iranian Foreign Minister to attend a session of the Iran’s Supreme Council for National Security, at which also participated President Khatami, Ayatollah Khameneh’i and Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the Chairman of the regime’s Discerning Assembly, one of the few institutions that could give the green light to any normalization with Washington, in case Mr. Khameneh’i agrees.
[The Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) on Tuesday held an emergency meeting, presided over by the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khameneh’I, the official news agency IRNA confirmed.
"The SNSC reviewed the latest developments in the region and the measures taken to safeguard national security and interests", the agency said.
"The Supreme Leader offered guidelines to the council and then the body made necessary decisions", IRNA added, without giving details on the decision].
Meanwhile, Mr. Straw created uproar in Israel where he is due after Tehran for remarks that Israel says is an insult to them.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has reportedly cancelled an scheduled meeting with Straw during the latter's current tour of the Middle East for remarks he made recently in support of the Palestinians.
Straw has been strongly criticised by the Israelis for suggesting that anger over the plight of the Palestinians was a cause of terrorism in the region.
"I understand that one of the factors that helps breed terrorism is the anger which many people in the region feel at events over the years in Palestine", Straw said in an article.
Sharon's spokesman described Straw's remarks as "despicable". He said: "It is simply wrong. I have never seen such a bunch of lies garbled together. I've no doubt it is malicious. I would expect the foreign minister of Libya or Iran to write such an article, but not the foreign minister of Britain", he said angrily.
"Straw's Tehran visit was preparing the ground for Iran and its organisations not to be targets...but partners. His trip to Tehran, coordinated by the Americans, is sticking a knife in Israel's back", said Sneh, himself of Iranian extract.
But a Foreign Office statement here said that Straw stood by his words. "His record of fighting terrorism speaks for itself. Jack Straw believes that there is never any excuse for terrorism. At the same time there's an obvious need to understand the environment in which terrorism breeds. That's why the whole of the international community is so concerned to see a lasting peace in the Middle East". ENDS IRAN BRITAIN US EXPLOSIONS 25901