Nuke Conference Pissing Match

Obama has a nuclear conference; A-jad has a nuclear conference. What can it mean? It means we're eyeball to eyeball with the other guy, and he ain't never going to blink. How can we tell? It's painfully evident from this interview with Iran's Nuke Czar (or, at least, the Nuke Czar's--i.e. the Ayatollah's--mouthpiece):

Press TV: Many thanks for being here with us on Press TV. Day one [or Iran's nuke conference] has now wrapped up. We've had lots of statements and speeches. ( This conference has been) downplayed somewhat in the Western media, what have you made of this conference so far? Has it been successful? Does it make a difference?

Salehi: You see, we are looking after the success of this conference but this is not the essential purpose behind this conference. This conference is being held in a very particular time which is very important; particularly in the sense that we have an upcoming review conferences in New York in about two weeks time which will review the NPT as a whole. This conference gives us the opportunity to the like-minded countries Iran and other countries, specifically the Non-Aligned Movement countries, to come up with some sort of common positions regarding the principles, the norms, the regulations and the procedures that constitute the body of the (nuclear) non-proliferation regime. We think after 40 years that has passed ever since NPT was born and came into force unfortunately there has been an imbalance between the essential pillars of NPT. You know we have three pillars: Disarmament that relates to those countries that have nuclear weapons; the peaceful use of nuclear energy this is another pillar and the third pillar is the non-proliferation.

Unfortunately, what we have noticed in the past 40 years is that most of the principles, most of the rules and regulations, most of the procedures or the procedural activities have been focusing on the non-proliferation and then on the peaceful use of nuclear energy and not on the disarmament. So, we have not seen any positive or hopeful steps in the disarmament issue.

Press TV: If I can just come in here to put in the other argument which is of course countries like the United States, in the last 48 hours we had the European Union's Catherine Ashton come out and say that Iran is the biggest threat to the world. I mean the US argument and many of these nuclear powers is that nuclear weapons are deterrent. In fact, they say that countries like Iran are the threat and they can't get rid of their nuclear stockpiles because of such threats in the world.

Salehi: You see this is the controversy. They have the nuclear bombs in their hands and they have used these nuclear bombs against their adversaries. And here comes a country which is a member of the NPT and a member of the IAEA that is committed to its entire commitments. That is seen in the safeguards agreements and all the agreements that Iran has signed. The only thing that Iran is looking for is to really look for its rights in accordance with the NPT and therefore what have we done wrong that the lady you mentioned her name comes up and says Iran is a threat if she has said so. I'm taking your words. I've not heard that but if that is the case what have we done wrong? We are a member of the NPT. Inspectors are inspecting our nuclear sites 24 hours per day either through camera or through real inspections. We have good relationships with the IAEA. We are committed to our commitments. We look for the integrity of the NPT. We are an active member in the review conferences of the NPT. We have attended the review conference of 2000, 2005 and now 2010. But what else do we have to do in order to prove that we are adherent to our commitments? What else do we have to do? What I have seen from their assessments and remarks is that Iran may have the intention to do something wrong in the future. But this is intention reading. International rules and regulations are not based on intention reading...

He seems eminently reasonable, doesn't he? For a functionary from a nutty theocracy that's vying for global supremacy and is getting set to nuke the Jews to kingdom come, I mean.