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The New York
Times
By MICHAEL R. GORDON
 SINGAPORE,
June 3 — Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld
told a gathering of defense experts here on Saturday that Iran was “one of the leading
terrorist nations in the world.”
Mr. Rumsfeld also questioned why Russia and China
would allow Iran to
participate in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a regional organization
that includes Russia, China and
Central Asian nations.
Iran has observer status in
the group, and the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is expected to attend a summit meeting
that the organization is holding in Shanghai
this month.
“It strikes me as passing strange that one would want to bring into an
organization that says it is against terrorism one of the leading terrorist
nations in the world: Iran,” Mr. Rumsfeld said.
His pointed comments were made at an important moment in American diplomacy.
This week, the Bush administration reversed a refusal to hold direct talks
with Iran
that had lasted decades. The administration said it was willing to join
European allies in negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program if
Teheran first suspended its efforts to enrich uranium.
At the same time, Washington
has been seeking Russian and Chinese cooperation in fashioning a common
negotiating strategy. Both nations are members of the United Nations
Security Council, which the United States
would like to impose punitive measures if Iran does not accept a package
of incentives and suspend its nuclear enrichment activities.
The United States and
its European allies recently agreed on the package of incentives, which are
to be conveyed to Iran
in the coming days. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said that Iran must
respond within weeks. President Ahmadinejad has
rebuffed the offer, but America
officials said this may not be the final word.
In his comments, Mr. Rumsfeld said that President
Bush had presented Iran with the opportunity to defuse the confrontation
over its nuclear program through diplomacy and that more time was needed to
assess the prospects for a diplomatic settlement.
“The information has just been communicated to them, and it seems to me the
appropriate thing now to do is to wait and see which path the Iranian
government will take,” he added.
But he painted a dark picture of Iran, saying that it had a long
history of “being engaged in terrorist activities” and, thus, was not an
appropriate participant in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The
Russian- and Chinese-dominated organization was established in 2001 and one
of its stated goals is to counter separatist and terrorist groups.
Singapore’s prime minister,
Lee Hsien Loong , said Friday that Iran’s
role in the Shanghai organization was a way
for Russia and China to
demonstrate their influence. Iran, he said, had applied to
upgrade its presence to full-fledged member. By agreeing to consider this,
he said, “Russia and China have
reminded the West of their combined influence on world-turning events.”
India, which also has
observer status in the organization, said Iran’s
participation in the upcoming summit as an observer was a matter for Iran to
decide. “Who am I to decide on their behalf?” said the Indian defense
minister, Pranab Mukherjee.
One of the main themes in Mr. Rumsfeld’s address
here was the need for more inclusive institutions. The United States was concerned last year when
an East Asian summit was held that included 10 members of the Association
of South East Asian Nations, as well as China,
Korea, Japan and other countries, but which
excluded the United
States.
Mr. Rumsfeld repeated a theme from last year’s
address — that China
needed to be open about how much it was spending on its military and what
the funds were being used for.
Russia,
he said, had sought “to constrain the independence and freedom of action of
some of their neighboring countries.” Defense officials said this was a
reference to the pressure that Moscow has put on Central Asian nations to
curtail military ties with the United States as well as to Russia’s
difficult relationship with Georgia and Ukraine.
Mr. Rumsfeld’s presentation and that of other
defense officials were made at an annual conference organized by the
International Institute for Strategic Studies. Neither China nor Russia sent high-level
officials to the conference. Iran has made its own forays
into the region. Last month, President Ahmadinejad
visited Indonesia
where, Mr. Lee noted, he received a hero’s welcome from Indonesian
students.
“This showed how successfully Iran has portrayed itself as a
leading Muslim country, its nuclear program as a project in which Muslims
worldwide should take vicarious pride, and the issue as a nationalist
struggle,” Mr. Lee said. “We have to refocus on the core issue, which is
nuclear proliferation and Iran’s
obligations under the Nonproliferation Treaty.”
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