Bush’s willingness to talk a “surrender to Iran’s logic” – Mottaki

DPA: Willingness of US President George W.Bush to talk to Iran represents a ‘surrender to Iran’s logic’, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Saturday.
Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Tehran (dpa) – Willingness of US President George W.Bush to talk to Iran represents a ‘surrender to Iran’s logic’, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Saturday.

‘Bush eventually surrendered to Iran’s clear and transparent logic,’ Mottaki said in an interview with the Iranian TV Channel 2.

The foreign minister was referring to Bush’s remarks last Wednesday that he might hold direct talks with Tehran if it suspended uranium enrichment.

While branding the condition posed by Bush as rhetoric, Mottaki said Bush would lose face if he did not accept Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s requests for a debate.

Ahmadinejad twice – in August 2006 and September 2007 – challenged Bush to a televised debate to ‘hold civilized talks on Iraq – or how we can settle world problems and let the people decide what is right and what is wrong?’

Ahmadinejad had also in May 2006 sent a letter to Bush – but both letter and debate proposal were ignored as propaganda by Washington, which in return demanded suspension of atomic work as the main condition for any diplomatic talks.

Mottaki also once again rejected US military threats against Iran as ‘psychological war’ aimed at making business with regional Arab sheikhdoms.

‘Besides the psychological war, the main aim of the US military threats is causing tension in the (Gulf) region and boosting business by selling arms and other warfare to the regional states,’ Mottaki said in the interview.

Also, Ahmadinejad had said that Iran would not take the US military threats seriously – but at the same time he warned that the country would decisively defend itself in case of any military attack and ‘make the aggressor regret its action.’