BERLIN, 12 March 2006 — German Chancellor Angela Merkel yesterday urged a diplomatic solution to the standoff over Iran’s nuclear plans, saying the international community had to avoid the divisions seen in the run up to the 2003 Iraq war. “I am doing everything I can as chancellor to ensure the international community follows a common path to make clear to Iran what is possible and what is not possible and where the red line is,” she told reporters after a meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Berlin.
“I find it very hopeful that the IAEA has succeeded in getting a resolution that brings in the UN Security Council,” she said, referring to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Security Council has begun examining how to persuade Iran to suspend uranium enrichment-related activities after the UN nuclear watchdog sent the 15 members a report on Wednesday saying it could not verify that Iran’s work was peaceful.
Merkel said splits within the European Union and among other western countries over US plans to invade Iraq in 2003 had cost the west an opportunity to exert pressure that might have helped avoid war. “I think that this split in the European Union and the Western community meant that pressure which could have been exerted on Saddam Hussein was not,” she said.
Merkel’s comments followed a guest article in a German newspaper by Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier who warned against getting dragged into “saber rattling” by antagonistic comments from Iranian officials. “This is the hour of diplomacy,” he said in an article for the Bild am Sonntag weekly.
Merkel met for the first time with Mubarak yesterday, emphasizing the European Union push for a new Hamas-led Palestinian government to seek peace and its concerns over Iran’s nuclear program.
The Islamic group Hamas swept Palestinian parliamentary elections Jan. 25, and Mubarak said the international community “must work with them” as the democratically elected government.
But Hamas also has an obligation, he said, to abide by agreements signed by previous Palestinian leaders with Israel and others. “All of the agreements that have been signed must be recognized,” Mubarak said through a translator. At a meeting in Cairo last week, Egypt and the rest of the Arab League countries urged the Hamas leadership to adhere to a 2002 Arab initiative that suggested a trade of peace for land with the Jewish state.
The EU on Friday threatened to cut off aid to a Hamas-led Palestinian government “unless it seeks peace by peaceful means,” and Merkel said Germany stood by its demands that Hamas recognize Israel and renounce violence.
“I made it clear for us that we have put to Hamas particular conditions and that these conditions must be fulfilled in order for there to be a cooperation between the EU, between Germany, and the Palestinian territories,” she said.
Both leaders also said that they agreed that world powers must work together using diplomatic means to pressure Iran to resolve questions about its nuclear program.
“Diplomacy must triumph,” said Merkel, who marked her 100th day as chancellor on March 1. The Egyptian leader arrived Friday in Berlin from talks with Italian leaders in Rome. He is to meet today with Steinmeier before heading to Austria, which holds the rotating presidency of the European Union.
Mubarak and Merkel also stressed the need to promote a cultural dialogue between the West and the Islamic world, following the severe unrest in Muslim countries over the publication of blasphemous cartoons in Western media.
Mubarak called on states in the region to support the Middle East peace process and urged Hamas to accept the progress reached so far. “After that there can be negotiations with Israel,” he said.
The chancellor drew a parallel to the situation before the Iraq war when she said Western nations were unable to present a united front to exert maximum pressure on Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. “For this reason I am doing everything in my power to ensure that the international community adopts a common approach in order to make clear to Iran what is possible and what is not and where the red line is.” “The diplomatic process has by no means been exhausted,” Merkel said.
Mubarak called for a nuclear-free zone in the region, encompassing Israel as well as other countries. “We need to take steps to prevent the spread of atomic weapons,” the president said. The two leaders also touched on Sudan, where moves are afoot to send a UN peacekeeping mission to the Darfur region, and discussed the situation in Iraq, which Merkel said “gave rise for concern.”
The Egyptian leader met German President Horst Koehler and former Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher shortly after arriving from Rome on Friday.
