Putin warns U.S. against military action on Iran

Dispute over payments
Russia has warned that the Bushehr plant would not go on line this fall as originally planned, saying Iran was slow in making payments. Iranian officials have angrily denied being behind in its payments and accuse the Kremlin of caving in to Western pressure.

Moscow also has ignored Iranian demands to ship nuclear reactor fuel for the plant, saying it would be delivered only six months before the Bushehr plant begins operation. The launch date has been delayed indefinitely amid the payment dispute.

Putin said the two sides were negotiating revisions to the Bushehr contract, and once agreed a decision on fuel can be made.

The Caspian leaders offered a degree of support for the Iranian nuclear program, stressing in their joint statement that any country like Iran which has signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty has the right to “carry out research and can use nuclear energy for peaceful means without discrimination.”

Putin underlined his disagreements with Washington on Iran last week, saying he had seen no “objective data” showing Tehran is trying to construct nuclear weapons. Iran says it need enriched uranium to fuel nuclear reactors that will generate electricity.

The main issue before the summit was the Caspian Sea itself.

Divvying up territory in and around the inland sea — believed to contain the world’s third-largest reserves of oil and natural gas — has been a divisive issue among the five nations, and the leaders showed no signs of progress toward resolving the dispute.

Leaders warn against outside influence
The Caspian’s offshore borders have been in limbo since the 1991 Soviet collapse. The lack of agreement has led to tensions and conflicts over oil deposits, but Putin and Ahmadinejad strongly warned outside powers to stay away from the region.

“All issues related to the Caspian should be settled exclusively by littoral nations,” Ahmadinejad said.

Moscow strongly opposes U.S.- and European-backed efforts to build pipelines to deliver Central Asian and Caspian oil and gas to the West by bypassing Russia, through which all the region’s pipelines now flow. Russia has pushed for new pipelines to cross its territory as well.

Putin argued that all pipeline projects in the region should require the approval by all five Caspian nations to take effect, a view that would give each capital a veto.

“Projects which may inflict a serious damage to the Caspian environment can’t be and mustn’t be implemented without a preliminary discussion by the Caspian five and making a consensus decision in the interests of our common sea,” Putin said.

But the idea was barely mentioned in comments by the leaders of the former Soviet republics of Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, which are striving to balance their relations with Russia, the West and Asia.

In Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital, political analyst Ilgar Mamedov said the veto idea was only “Putin’s opinion.” Caspian nations “are independent and act in accordance with their own interests,” he said.

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