J O S H U A P U N D I T

Vlad and Mo..Brokeback buddies...


Our good pals Putin and the Russians once again went public, warning that Russia would oppose any effort to use the UN Security Council to punish Iran with sanctions or to promote `regime change'.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview published today, "We cannot support and will actively oppose any attempt to use the Security Council to punish Iran or to use Iran's nuclear program in order to promote the idea of regime change."

The interview with Lavrov was done yesterday and the transcript was released by the foreign ministry (surprise!) just as he was sitting down for talks in Moscow with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who arrived in the Russian capital today.

How `bout that?

"We believe that the Iranian side must finally bow to the constructive proposals that have been made and fully co-operate with the IAEA to answer all currently outstanding questions'' about its nuclear ambitions, Lavrov said.

In another knee slapper, Lavrov said without breaking into wild laughter, that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog agency, has no way of telling whether or not there was a military component to Iran's nuclear program.

Like the Russians weren't aware of the Iranian clandestine nukes program even before it was outed by Iranian dissidents? Like Russia didn't facilitate missile and weapons technology shipments from North Korea..for a fee?

Like Lavrov and the Russians aren't aware that any nuclear technology is like any other energy - the same technology can be used for lighting a city or fashioning nukes to destroy it?

To wrap up his stand up routine, Lavrov reiterated Russia's position that only IAEA nuclear inspectors had the expertise and the access to determine whether or not Iran's nuclear program did indeed pose a threat, and insisted this idea was at the core of the UN resolution on Iran adopted in July.

Not Iran's blatant disregard of the NPT they signed, not the lying and the stonewalling, not the threats to wip out another sovereign nation..just more scrutiny from Inspector Clouseau Mohammed El Baradi and the rest of the clowns at the IAEA who weren't able to find their behind with both hands in Iran for almost a decade! Or who, as some have suggested, just quietly looked the other way.

Is President Bush paying attention to this? I hope so...