Abu dhabi, January 10: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Sunday urged Arab states in the Gulf to stay focused on sanctions against Iran over its controversial nuclear program, at the start of a regional tour.
“We don’t want anyone to be misled by anyone’s intelligence” reports, Clinton told reporters on her plane before landing in Abu Dhabi. “We expect all of our partners who share that concern (over Iran)… to stay as focused as they can and to do everything within reason that will help to implement these sanctions,” she said. Clinton had been asked whether Gulf Arab states would be tempted to relax the pressure on Iran now that new Israeli estimates suggest Iran would take longer to acquire the capacity to build a nuclear bomb than previously feared.
On Dec. 29, Israel’s strategic affairs minister Moshe Yaalon said Tehran’s nuclear program has been beset by difficulties, leaving Tehran still about three years away from being able to build nuclear weapons.
“The timeline is not so important as the international effort to try to ensure that whatever the timeline Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapons,” Clinton said.
“I don’t know that it gives much comfort to somebody who is in the Gulf… or is in a country that Iran has vowed to destroy that it’s a one-year timeline or a three-year timeline,” she said.
Clinton arrived in Abu Dhabi at the start of a five-day tour that will also take her to Dubai, Muscat and Doha.
– Agencies