After Stalin in 1943 World War 2, Now Putin in Tehran 2007.......!

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, left, received nearly unconditional support for a peaceful civilian nuclear program from Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday.BEHROUZ MEHRI: AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Oct. 17, 2007, 12:19AM
Putin supports Iran on nuclear program
Russian warns area nations to not aid military action
By BORZOU DARAGAHILos Angeles Times

TEHRAN, IRAN — Russian President Vladimir Putin, appearing side by side with his Iranian counterpart at a five-nation summit here Tuesday, made a powerful show of support for America's regional archenemy, drawing the line against any attack on Iran and reaffirming Iran's right to civilian nuclear use.
At the same time, Putin stopped short of unconditional support of the Iranian regime, although the tenor of his remarks appeared at odds with earlier suggestions from the Bush administration that Putin might take a more pro-Western stance.
Days after publicly dismissing U.S. plans for a missile defense system, Putin arrived in the Iranian capital in a painstakingly scrutinized visit that was the first here by a Kremlin leader since Josef Stalin mapped out World War II strategy with Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill in 1943.
Despite continuing threats from the West against Iran's nuclear ambitions, Putin told reporters that Tehran had the right to continued civilian nuclear enrichment.
"Russia is the only country that has assisted Iran in implementing its peaceful nuclear program," he said. "We believe all countries have the right to a peaceful nuclear energy program."
The Russian president also warned the other Caspian Sea nations present not to allow their countries to be used for military assaults against Iran, a clear message to the U.S., which has refused to rule out an attack to halt or slow the Iranian nuclear program it believes is ultimately aimed at building nuclear weapons.
The U.S. maintains strong military ties with the Caspian Sea nation of Azerbaijan, and has been wooing Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan for flyover privileges and intelligence sharing.
The three nations, all formerly part of the Soviet Union, retain authoritarian leadership and have become political battlegrounds between the U.S. and Russia.
Bush administration officials disclaimed any disappointment in Putin's visit to Tehran or his comments, but face a growing challenge in dealing with Putin's maverick, frequently anti-U.S. public statements.
Tom Casey, a State Department spokesman, said the U.S. did not object to Putin's appearance with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and said the administration still believes Moscow agrees with U.S. and European aims on Iran's nuclear program.
While Putin condemned any possible U.S. attack, he did not vow to stand up for Iran in case of one.

In Iran, Putin Warns Against Military Action
Pool photo from KremlinPresidents Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran in Tehran on Tuesday. They and leaders of other Caspian Sea nations condemned any use of force in the area.
By NAZILA FATHI and C. J. CHIVERS- NYT Published: October 17, 2007

TEHRAN, Oct. 16 — President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said at a summit meeting of five Caspian Sea nations in Iran on Tuesday that any use of military force in the region was unacceptable. In a declaration, the countries agreed that none would allow their territories to be used as a base for military strikes against any of the others.
Presidents Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran followed in the footsteps of Persian soldiers Tuesday. “We should not even think of making use of force in this region,” Mr. Putin said.
Mr. Putin’s comments and the declaration come at a time when the United States has refused to rule out military action to halt Iran’s nuclear energy program, which it believes masks a desire to develop nuclear weapons. Iran says its program, including the enrichment of uranium, is solely for peaceful purposes.
Asked this morning about Mr. Putin’s remarks, Tony Fratto, the deputy White House press secretary, played them down, saying simply, “That sounds like a good policy.”
And later, Tom Casey, the deputy State Department spokesman, said, “I think the president’s made clear, and U.S. policy’s been consistent, that we’re pursuing a diplomatic path with respect to Iran.” He noted that Russia had joined in several unanimous votes at the United Nations Security Council demanding that Tehran end any uranium-enriching activities.
Mr. Putin arrived in Tehran on Tuesday for meetings with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran and leaders from three other Caspian Sea nations that have rich oil and gas resources, promising to use diplomacy to try to resolve the international debate over Iran’s nuclear program.
Later he had a meeting with Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in which he said he had expressed a desire for “deeper” relations between the countries, Reuters reported.
Mr. Putin was the first Kremlin leader to travel to Iran since 1943, when Stalin attended a wartime summit meeting with Churchill and Roosevelt. His statements, which were consistent with his past positions cautioning against military action against Iran, were nonetheless stark in their setting and firmly emphasized his differences with the United States over the extent of Iran’s threat and the means to counter it.
“Not only should we reject the use of force, but also the mention of force as a possibility,” Mr. Putin said.
Russia has blocked a third set of sanctions against Iran at the United Nations that were intended to persuade Tehran to stop enrichment activities, which Western nations fear could lead to the development of nuclear weapons. Mr. Putin has emphasized the need for further dialogue and working through the International Atomic Energy Agency to ensure that Iran’s nuclear programs were for peaceful purposes.
He has further called into question the concerns of the United States, France and other European countries about Iran, saying that while he sought transparency in its nuclear program he had not seen clear evidence of any Iranian intention to make nuclear weapons.
In spite of Mr. Putin’s strong statements and the evident show of solidarity among the five countries bordering the Caspian Sea — Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, as well as Russia and Iran — significant regional tensions remain, particularly about the division of the sea’s main resource, oil.
Iran and the Soviet Union once had agreements for sharing its resources, including a water boundary. Before 1991, each country took 50 percent of the oil and gas from the sea.
But since the Soviet Union collapsed, the successor governments in the newly independent Caspian nations have quarreled over where their sea borders should be drawn.
Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have expressed interest in building pipelines under the sea, which would allow Central Asian governments to bypass Russian pipelines as they ship their resources to the West. Russia opposes the idea, which would break its monopoly, citing environmental concerns.
In the absence of a multilateral agreement and mutually accepted borders, the Caspian nations are developing the oil resources as they see fit, although analysts have said that the absence of clear borders has limited the sector’s development.
“The division of the sea is not less important than the nuclear program,” said Ahmad Nateq Nouri, a former speaker of the Iranian Parliament, in a report carried by the Fars news agency.
But the issue of Iran’s nuclear program overshadowed the others. Mr. Putin’s remarks also underscored a longstanding unease in the Kremlin with what it has regarded as a creeping American military presence in Central Asia, a region once solely under Moscow’s control.
Since the terrorist attacks in the United States in 2001, the Pentagon has built a military base in Kyrgyzstan to support operations in Afghanistan, and has expanded its collaboration with Azerbaijan, including underwriting improvements to a former Soviet airfield there. It also has an agreement allowing military transport planes en route to Afghanistan to refuel in Turkmenistan, a country that has made neutrality a cornerstone of its foreign policy.
The American presence and collaboration in the region have alarmed Moscow, while Washington’s potential access to improved airfields in two countries bordering Iran — Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan — has fueled speculation that the airfields could support actions against Tehran.
Mr. Ahmadinejad intimated as much in his statements on Tuesday. “On many issues we have reached final agreement, but we also need collective cooperation,” he said. “The goal is to keep the sea clear of military competitions and keep foreigners out of the region.”
Although Mr. Putin and Mr. Ahmadinejad were resolute, their statements appeared to have more political than military significance, and were not a departure from the status quo. The United States does not have existing agreements with any Caspian nation to launch attacks on another. Rather, the Pentagon has negotiated limited bilateral agreements in the region that allow for flights to Afghanistan through local airspace, refueling, emergency landings and the like.
Moreover, with American military assets assembled in Iraq and other Persian Gulf nations, and aircraft carriers and submarines in the region as well, it was not clear that any of the Caspian countries would be essential for a raid on Iran.
The Caspian meeting also concluded without a clear agreement on territorial demarcation. The leaders said in the declaration that the sea would be used for peaceful purposes and its issues would be resolved by the coastal nations.
Mr. Putin and Mr. Ahmadinejad discussed the completion of a nuclear power plant that Russia has been building in the southern Iranian city of Bushehr. Russia has given various reasons for delays in completing the plant and delivering fuel for the start-up. Brushing that aside, Mr. Ahmadinejad told Mr. Putin that Iran was willing to have Moscow build two more plants in Bushehr, the ISNA news agency reported.
Mr. Putin was received by the Iranian foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, at the Tehran airport, according to state-run television. Mr. Putin, who had flown from Germany, where he met Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday, went ahead with the trip despite a report of a possible assassination plot against him in Iran.
Iran is counting on Russia and China, which have important trade ties with Iran, to use their veto power to oppose another round of sanctions in the Security Council. Russia has voted for two sets of sanctions, but has said that it will not support a third set without convincing evidence that Iran had a program to build nuclear weapons.
In addition to the nuclear power plants and business ties, Moscow has a long record of military collaboration with Iran, which relies on Soviet-era and Russian weapons and supplies for its armed forces. The Russian president’s visit appeared to underscore the many levels of bilateral ties.
Mr. Putin said the two countries planned to cooperate on space, aviation and energy issues, and suggested that the tensions with the West over Iran’s nuclear program had provided Russia a unique role. “Russia is the only country that is helping Iran to realize its nuclear program in a peaceful way,” he said.
Nazila Fathi reported from Tehran, and C. J. Chivers from Moscow. Brian Knowlton contributed reporting from Washington.

Monday, Oct. 15, 2007
The Point of Putin's Tehran Trip
By Tony Karon

That Russian President Vladimir Putin is hopping mad with Washington has been obvious for some time now. In a speech in Munich last July, he lambasted the U.S. for its "unilateral and frequently illegitimate actions," claiming that "the United States has overstepped its national borders in every way" and slamming its "greater and greater disdain" for international law. Enraged by U.S. moves to station a missile defense system on his doorstep, Putin withdrew Russia from a Cold War-era treaty governing the size of conventional military forces in Europe, and ordered its old turbo-prop Bear bombers out of mothballs to fly nuclear patrols along old Cold War frontiers. Last week in Russia, he made the U.S. Secretaries of State and Defense wait 45 minutes for him before delivering them a tongue-lashing over the missile defense plan. Another jab follows on Tuesday, when Putin becomes the first occupant of the Kremlin since Stalin to visit Tehran, a capital Washington would very much prefer to keep isolated. The Russian leader's message is plain: If the U.S. continues, as he sees it, to tread on Russia's toes, Russia has little interest in helping Washington achieve its strategic goals.
Putin arrives in Iran at a moment when the U.S. and its key European allies are pushing for a new round of sanctions aimed at persuading Tehran to suspend uranium enrichment. But the likelihood of the U.N. Security Council approving new sanctions right now appears remote, given the veto power of China and Russia — both of whom differ substantially with the West on the nature of the problem with Iran, and on how to deal with it.
Nor are the differences merely tactical: Russia agrees that Iran has, in some of its activities, failed to meet the transparency requirements of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which is the basis for the Security Council demand that it suspend enrichment until it can clear up questions raised by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and restore confidence in its intentions. But the IAEA and Tehran have agreed to a "work plan" and timetable for Iran to resolve the outstanding questions, which is why further U.N. action has been tabled pending the outcome of that process.
At the same time, Putin insisted after talks last week with French President Nicolas Sarkozy — the most energetic European supporter of the U.S. position — that there is no evidence to suggest Iran is trying to build a nuclear weapon. That assessment may put him at odds with Washington, but it is, in fact, consistent with the findings of the IAEA. The difference hinges over what defines a nuclear weapons program. Last week, French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner wrote to his European colleagues urging support for tougher sanctions. "Time is against us," Kouchner warned, "because each day Iran gets closer to mastering enrichment technology, in other words to having a de facto military nuclear capacity."
What Kouchner makes clear is that the U.S. and its allies have defined mastering the technology of uranium-enrichment as a red line that Iran cannot be allowed to cross. But Kouchner exaggerates when he claims that this technology would give Tehran "de facto military nuclear capacity"; it simply gives Iran an important piece of nuclear infrastructure that is allowed under the NPT but could, if Iran pulled out of the NPT, be used to create weapons-grade materiel. While the demand that Iran suspend enrichment until it has answered the IAEA's questions enjoys broad support, the demand that Iran be denied the right to enrichment because it is a regime not trusted by the West is a much tougher sell. And Russia isn't necessarily buying.
On the contrary, an economically resurgent Russia views the Iran standoff as another opportunity to reclaim some of the strategic ground it lost after the Soviet collapse. It is pushing back against the U.S. because it sees Washington's power as having been used to decimate Moscow's influence in the former Soviet territories it considers its backyard. That strategic orientation has led Russia to make common cause with other regimes at odds with Washington, most important among them China; ironically, perhaps, Moscow and Beijing are more closely aligned now, against U.S. power, than they were during the Cold War, when their respective Communist Parties were at loggerheads.
Although both China and Russia have a stake in Iran — China is heavily invested in its energy sector, while Russia is building the country's nuclear reactor at Bushehr and also selling billions of dollars of weapons to the Islamic Republic — each has more important, and immediate strategic concerns of its own. Both could more easily live with a nuclear-armed Iran than Washington would, and neither sees Iran as a strategic threat. Still, Russia has plainly dragged its feet (by measure of years) over completing the Bushehr reactor, suggesting it may be keeping the Iranian reactor offline as leverage. The friendship between Tehran and Moscow is, at best, an uneasy one.
Russia may hold the key to the Iranian standoff, but it is unlikely to be moved by entreaties by Western leaders for President Putin to "act responsibly" on Iran. Gone are the days when gaining Western approval and gratitude would have been a Kremlin objective. Now, Russia's response will be driven by its own agenda. And in Putin's mind, it's unlikely to be separated from his broader strategic agenda, which most certainly includes a greater leveling of the global balance of power.