British salesman for US war gets rough greeting in Iran, as regime adapts to oncoming war

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Financial Times (NYT website) dispatch October 12
Tehran greets Straw with anti-US rhetoric
By Christopher Adams and Guy Dinmore in Tehran


Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, on Wednesday walked into a wall of
anti-US rhetoric when he arrived in Tehran for talks with Iranian leaders,
including Mohammad Khatami, the moderate president. Mr Straw was on the last
stage of his four- nation Middle East tour to lobby support for further
action against Iraq.
Mr Straw was lobbying Iran to join an international coalition against Iraq,
warning that military force may have to be used against President Saddam
Hussein if he fails to disarm.
Kamal Kharrazi, Iran's foreign minister, warned of "deep hatred" across the
Islamic world for the US because of its "unilateralist" approach to foreign
policy, and accused the US and UK of neglecting the Israel- Palestine
conflict.
The "clash of civilisations", he said, was being fuelled by people such as
Jerry Falwell, the rightwing US evangelist, who in an interview on CBS
television described the Prophet Mohammad as a "terrorist". Mr Straw
condemned Mr Falwell's remarks as "outrageous and insulting".
Kayhan, an Iranian newspaper with close ties to hardline clerics, said
Muslims had the right to retaliate by attacking US interests, including
embassies in Islamic countries.
Publicly, Iran's leaders are opposed to a war on Iraq. Privately, however,
they accept military action is almost inevitable and are looking to protect
Iran's interests in the formation of a new Iraqi government that would
include strong representation from the Iranian-backed Shia opposition.
Iran is also seeking assurances that any co-operation with a UN-sanctioned
military campaign would be reciprocated by the US, which has included Tehran
in an "axis of evil" with Iraq and North Korea.
The mood within the UN Security Council has shifted sharply in the past
days, making it more likely that the US would gain some UN support for a
tough resolution against Iraq. France and Russia, which until now had openly
opposed many of the key points the US had pressed for, were beginning to
work for a compromise with Washington and London, diplomats said.
The UN ambassadors of France, the US and UK met last weekend, buoyed by a
telephone call between Colin Powell, US secretary of state and his French
counterpart. During the call Mr Powell suggested the US would consider
dropping its insistence of immediate UN authority to bomb Iraq if Baghdad
did not comply, so long as strong language warning of the consequences of
recalcitrance remained.
The new, more constructive atmosphere within the council seemed to have
quieten some of the countries that had been critical of the US approach,
diplomats said.


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