Iran and Syria understand full well that the world expects them to help Iraq. We’ve made that very clear to them, Bush told reporters in Washington, DC.
We’ve got a lot of issues with Iran. First is whether or not they will help this young democracy succeed. The second issue, of course, is whether or not they will help the Lebanese democracy succeed — the Siniora government, which is — a priority of this government is to help that Siniora government. The big issue right now is whether or not Iran will end up with a nuclear weapon, Bush said.
Our position is very clear to the Iranians: There is a better way forward for the government and the people than to be isolated.
And we will continue to work to make it clear to the Iranian government that all three accounts and the sponsor of terrorists will cause more isolation, he added.
Bush said that the U.S. had a very active diplomatic effort taking place to deal with the Iranian issue. The Iranians know our position on Iraq, and they know it clearly. More importantly, they know the Iraqis’ position relative to Iran. We’re helping a sovereign government succeed. And the Iraqis have sent messages to the Iranians: To help us succeed, don’t interfere in the internal affairs, he said.
Asked whether Washington would be willing to hold direct talks with Tehran, Bush said that Iran had a chance to come to the table with the United States to discuss a variety of issues. The way forward is if they would verifiably stop their [uranium”> enrichment, the United States will be at the table with them. In the meantime, they understand our position, and they understand, more importantly, the Iraqi position about their interference inside their country, he said.
Bush described the U.S.s broader war on terror as an ideological conflict.
I know it’s incumbent upon our government and others who enjoy the blessings of liberty to help those moderates succeed because, otherwise, we’re looking at the potential of this kind of world: a world in which radical forms of Islam compete for power; a world in which moderate governments get toppled by people willing to murder the innocent; a world in which oil reserves are controlled by radicals in order to extract blackmail from the West; a world in which Iran has a nuclear weapon. And if that were to occur, people would look back at this day and age and say, what happened to those people in 2006? How come they couldn’t see the threat to a future generation of people? he said.
