Walid Ghazal’s Weblog

TEHRAN — Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, a relative moderate who struggled against the uncompromising agenda of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has resigned his high-profile post, government officials announced Saturday.

The resignation of Ali Larijani dealt a major setback to Iranian moderates trying to forge a compromise over Iran’s pursuit of nuclear technology, which is strongly opposed by the West.

Iran is capable of firing 11,000 rockets into enemy bases within the first minute after any possible attack, state-run television quoted a top Revolutionary Guards Corps commander as saying Saturday.Gen. Mahmoud Chaharbaghi, the missile commander of the Guards, said Iran has identified all enemy positions and was prepared to respond in less than a minute to any possible attack.

“Enemy bases and positions have been identified. … The Guards ground force will fire 11,000 rockets into identified enemy positions within the first minute of any aggression against the Iranian territory,” the television quoted Chaharbaghi as saying.

Chaharbaghi did not specifically identify the bases or the enemy and did not refer to arch foes Israel or the United States by name. But the U.S. has 40,000 troops on various U.S. bases in other Persian Gulf countries and 20,000 in Mideast waters. Another 160,000 U.S. troops are in neighboring Iraq and about 25,000 are in another one of Iran’s neighbors, Afghanistan.

Iran’s semiofficial Fars news agency also quoted Chaharbaghi as saying that Iran’s radar-avoiding rockets cover the entire Persian Gulf and the entire Iran-Iraq border. Both on state-run TV and in Fars, he only used the word rocket, not missile. A rocket is normally an unguided weapon whereas missiles usually have guidance systems. ord = Math.random() * 10000000000000000; document.write(”);

Chaharbagi was quoted by Fars as saying that rockets with a range of 250 kilometers (155 miles) will be delivered to the Guards ground force soon. He didn’t elaborate.

Iran has periodically raised alarms over the possibility of war, particularly when the West brings up talk of sanctions over Tehran’s rejection of a U.N. Security Council demand that it halt uranium enrichment.

Tensions are high between Washington and Tehran over U.S. accusations that Iran is secretly trying to develop nuclear weapons and helping Shiite militias in Iraq that target U.S. troops. Iran denies the claims.

Washington has said it is addressing the Iran situation diplomatically, rather than militarily, but U.S. officials also say that all options are open.

Last month, a top Iranian air force general said Iran has drawn up contingency plans to bomb Israel should the Jewish state attack Iran. He made the comments days after French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said that the international community should prepare for the possibility of war in the event Iran obtains atomic weapons, although he later stressed the focus is still on diplomatic pressures.

Iran on Thursday denounced a warning by U.S. President George W. Bush that the Iran’s nuclear activities could lead to World War III, saying the statement was warlike rhetoric geared at diverting U.S. attention from White House failures in Iraq.

The White House said Bush was simply making “a rhetorical point” when he suggested that if Iran could make nuclear weapons, it could lead to World War III.

Another top Iranian Revolutionary Guards commander warned last month that U.S. bases around Iran would be legitimate targets.

“Today, the United States is within Iran’s sight and all around our country, but it doesn’t mean we have been encircled. They are encircled themselves and are within our range,” Gen. Mohammed Hasan Kousehchi told IRNA in September.

Last month, Iran showed off its military might during a parade that included torpedoes, surveillance drones and what Iran called its new domestically manufactured warplanes.

Iran also has upgraded its Shahab-3 missile to range of about 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles), capable of reaching Israel and carrying a nuclear warhead.

But last month, Adm. William Fallon, the top U.S. military commander in the Middle East, said he believes Iran is not as strong as it portrays itself. “Not militarily, economically or politically,” he said.

All Waiting For Saad Al Hariri!!

Pressure had been building on Mr Sarkozy to make a statement about his marriage amid fears that the issue could overshadow the EU summit in Lisbon, where European leaders are due to agree a text for a simplified European treaty.

Mr Sarkozy, 52, and Cécilia, a 49-year old former model, have been married for 11 years and have five children: two each from their first marriages and their own son, Louis.

The television news channel LCI and the Liberation newspaper quoted judicial sources yesterday as saying that Cécilia had applied to a judge for a divorce on Monday and that a judge visited the Elysée Palace later that evening to see Mr Sarkozy to validate the procedure.

The news came as Paris Match, the weekly magazine, was due to print a million copies with exclusive pictures of Mrs Sarkozy, alone in a Parisian hotel, entitled: “Cécilia into the daylight — she comes out of the shadows, pictures of a serene woman.”

Rumours of their impending separation intensified in recent weeks amid reports that Mrs Sarkozy has been staying in Geneva and London. She was not with her husband on a recent trip to Bulgaria, where she was due to receive an award. She will not accompany him on his first official state visit to Morocco next week.

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Constitutionalists are divided over how to proceed with a divorce — a first for a serving French president. Some say Mrs Sarkozy does not have the right to ask for a divorce, which can come only by mutual consent. Others say that Mr Sarkozy’s divorce affects him as a private citizen, and thus presidential rules need not apply.

Christophe Barbier, the editor of l’Express magazine and a friend of the Sarkozys, said that France was entering a “new phase” without Cécilia, who would be missed.

“The French love Cécilia Sarkozy not only for her elegance and modernity but also because she has developed a rebellious spirit, a spirit of a free woman and freedom is French,” he said.

Security official tells AFP prisoner exchange deal involving the release of two Hizbullah militants in return for body of Israeli soldier may take place Monday afternoon on Israeli-Lebanese border

A breakthrough may be underway in an Israel-Lebanon prisoner exchange deal, AFP reported Monday. As part of the exchange, Israel will release a Lebanese prisoner and the bodies of two Hizbullah militants in return for the body of an Israeli soldier, a security official told the French news agency.”The body and prisoner exchange could take place between Lebanon and Israel this afternoon at the Naquora crossing on the Israeli-Lebanese border,” the source said. The source did not specify if the Israeli’s body belongs to one of the two missing soldiers kidnapped by Hizbullah in July is last year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was informed Sunday of reports of a possible attempt on his life in Tehran during a visit to Iran scheduled to begin on Tuesday, the Kremlin told AFP.

“We cannot comment on this information but we confirm that the president has been informed,” a Kremlin spokesman said when contacted by telephone.

The Interfax news agency reported Sunday, citing a source in the special services, that a group of suicide bombers were preparing to attempt to kill the Russian leader during his visit to Tehran on Tuesday.

Spanish, French and Italian foreign ministers will visit Lebanon next week in an effort to diffuse the current political deadlock, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos announced Saturday.

The visit takes place “at an important time in the internal debate in Lebanon,” Moratinos told Spain’s Cadena Ser radio station.

“There are presidential elections and we want to meet all the political forces to obtain national reconciliation and look for a solution to the crisis that continues to affect the country’s stability.”

Moratinos, along with his counterparts — France’s Bernard Kouchner and Italy’s Massimo D’Alema — will visit Lebanon on Friday and Saturday, a Spanish diplomatic source told AFP.

The Middle Eastern country is mired in a political standoff, with bickering parties unable to agree on a successor to Syrian-backed President Emile Lahoud, whose term expires in November.

The Lebanese parliament has been adjourned until October 23 to give majority and opposition lawmakers more time in finding a consensus candidate to replace Lahoud. The parliament has not been in session since last November.