A panel of former top international officials voiced hope on Tuesday for progress in settling the Iranian nuclear standoff after president-elect Barack Obama takes office.
Hans Blix, the former head of the UN nuclear watchdog, said he expects the new US administration to take a fresh approach to the deadlocked international talks on Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
“I hope that the Obama administration in the United States will be more imaginative” on the issue than its predecessors, Blix said after a session of the Luxembourg Forum on Preventing Nuclear Catastrophe. The forum focuses on challenges to the global security.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has sent congratulations to Obama, the first time an Iranian leader has offered good wishes to a US president-elect since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Igor Ivanov, a former Russian foreign minister who served as secretary of the presidential Security Council, also said he expects the change of administration in Washington to play a positive role in the Iranian nuclear dispute.
“The new administration coming to power in the United States could breathe a new life into the negotiation process,” Ivanov told reporters.
The US, Britain and many other Western countries accuse Iran of using its nuclear program as a cover for weapons development. Iran has denied the claim, saying its uranium enrichment program is aimed at generating electricity.
Nauru has started selling passports to fund climate action, but is so far struggling to attract new citizens to the low-lying, largely barren island in the Pacific Ocean. Nauru, one of the world’s smallest nations, has a novel plan to fund its fight against climate change by selling so-called “Golden Passports.” Selling for US$105,000 each, Nauru plans to drum up more than US$5 million in the first year of the “climate resilience citizenship” program. Almost six months after the scheme opened in February, Nauru has so far approved just six applications — covering two families and four individuals. Despite the slow start —
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