Condoleezza Rice talks with her Spanish counterpart Miguel Angel Moratinos at the NATO meeting in Brussels on Friday. (AP)
Livni, at NATO: There is no doubt Iran is seeking nuclear arms  
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent and The Associated Press  
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said at a conference of NATO ministries in Brussels on Friday that she had no doubt that Iran continues to pursue its attainment of nuclear weapons.
"There are the old-fashioned threats coming from states like Iran - a dangerous regime based on an extreme religious ideology and speaks clearly about its vision of wiping a state off the map, denies the Holocaust, works with radical elements in order to undermine other regimes in the region and financing terrorist organizations - while simultaneously tries to achieve nuclear weapons" Livni said.
"Have no mistakes - This is the Iranian goal - this is the purpose of the continuous enrichment program - in clear violation of the NPT [Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty] and Security Council resolutions. There is not, and there should not be any dispute on this," the foreign minister continued.
Livni was speaking several days after the release of the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate, which found Iran halted its nuclear program in 2003.
Israel and the United States are concerned the report's findings could thwart recent international momentum to impose tougher sanctions on Iran in order to force it to retreat from its nuclear program, which it claims is for peaceful civilian purposes only.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met privately on Friday at the NATO conference with her Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, but could not persuade him of the urgency of new sanctions.
Lavrov said he hopes for more talks with Iran. Regarding the U.S. intelligence report, he said that "it fully confirms the information that we have - that there is no military element in their nuclear program. We hope very much that these negotiations with Iran will continue"
Rice saw Lavrov after having won NATO backing to stay the course on a two-pronged approach that offers Iran civilian nuclear cooperation in return for a shutdown of uranium enrichment and reprocessing.

"There was unanimity around the table that there is a clear choice for Iran," British Foreign Secretary David Miliband told reporters, noting offers of nuclear cooperation with Iran if it stops enriching and reprocessing uranium.
"Iran can see the outstretched hand from the international community if they are willing to join the drive against proliferation," he said. "But if Iran persists on defying the will of the United Nations Security Council, then there must be further sanctions."
But Lavrov said Wednesday that Moscow had never seen evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, not even one that it had given up on four years ago.
Before embarking on her trip, Rice maintained that Iran stopped developing its program due to international pressure, and therefore the international community must maintain its pressure on Tehran. Earlier Friday, France announced it would push for continued negotiations to tighten international sanctions against Iran, saying its concerns over Tehran's nuclear program were not allayed by the new U.S. intelligence. "Negotiations should continue so that we can reach possibly a worsening of the sanctions regime," said French presidential spokesman David Martinon.
"We need to increase pressure on Iran and the only way to do that is sanctions," he added. "For us, the sooner the better."
Martinon said the report did not allay France's concerns.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy and U.S. President George W. Bush discussed the report earlier this week.
At a press conference on Thursday, Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged a two-pronged approach of pressure and negotiations with Iran.
Defense official: Won't rule out strike on Iran
A senior defense official suggested Friday that Israel would still consider a military strike against Iran to stop what it believes is a
nuclear arms program.
"For now, Israel believes diplomatic pressure on its top enemy must be exhausted," Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai told Army Radio. But when asked if he believed an Israeli strike was possible, Vilnai said, "no option needs to be off the table."
Vilnai did not say if Israel should act alone in any military action. Defense officials have said such a strike would be complicated for a variety of reasons, including the fact that Iran's nuclear development sites are located in several areas around the country.
In response to the new U.S. assessment, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said that Israel's own intelligence analysis indicates Iran has not stopped the program. "We cannot allow ourselves to rest just because of an intelligence report from the other side of the Earth, even if it is from our greatest friend," Barak said. President Shimon Peres told former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in a meeting this week that many intelligence assessments around the world later turned out to have been inaccurate.
Israel considers Iran its greatest threat, pointing to calls by the Islamic regime's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for Israel's destruction. Iran said last month that it had produced a new missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers, capable of reaching Israel.
In 1981 Israeli warplanes penetrated deep into Iraq to destroy an unfinished nuclear reactor near Baghdad to prevent its use in a weapons program.
Israel has since taken delivery of about 80 aircraft fitted with long-range fuel tanks that would allow them to reach Iran, and it has acquired three German-built submarines reportedly capable of firing nuclear-armed missiles, with two more under construction.
Israel has never confirmed or denied possessing nuclear weapons, but it is widely believed to have a formidable atomic stockpile. 
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