United States President Barack Obama said he remains willing to speak with Iran on its nuclear program and international sanctions if the Tehran follows "a clear set of steps," according to comments published Thursday, as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Iran is working on a three-stage rocket.
Obama made the comments to a small group of journalists at the White House after U.S. officials rebuffed a call for a U.S.-Iran summit.
The Washington Post said the president indicated international sanctions should remain in place on Tehran but that the regime should have a pathway for a peaceful settlement of the nuclear issue.
"Clear set of steps"
Changing their calculus is very difficult, even though this is painful for them and we are beginning to see rumblings in Iran that they are surprised by how successful we've been
"It is very important to put before the Iranians a clear set of steps that we would consider sufficient to show that they are not pursuing nuclear weapons," Obama said, according to the Post.
"They should know what they can say 'yes' to."
The report said Obama left open the possibility that the United States would accept a deal that allows Iran to maintain its civilian nuclear program, so long as Tehran provides "confidence-building measures" to verify that it is not building a bomb.
An account of the meeting by The Atlantic magazine said Obama expressed the view that Iran is feeling the pain from sanctions but not yet changing their policies.
"It may be that their ideological commitment to nuclear weapons is such that they're not making a simple cost-benefit analysis on this issue," Obama was quoted as saying.
"Changing their calculus is very difficult, even though this is painful for them and we are beginning to see rumblings in Iran that they are surprised by how successful we've been."
On Tuesday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs rebuffed a proposal from Iran's hardline Ahmadinejad for face-to-face summit talks with Obama.
"We have always said that we'd be willing to sit down and discuss Iran's illicit nuclear program, if Iran is serious about doing that," Gibbs told reporters. "To date, that seriousness has not been there."
NBC talk show moderator David Gregory said the president's session with reporters was a way of expressing to the world that Washington prefers a peaceful resolution of the nuclear issue over use of force.
Three-stage rocket
Last time, we sent a satellite to 250 kilometers... Next year it will be sent to 700 kilometers, and the year after that to 1,000 kilometers
Iranian media reported on Thursday that Ahmadinejad had announced the Islamic republic was working on a three-stage rocket to carry a satellite 1,000 kilometers (more than 600 miles) into space, an announcement that raised fresh concerns among world powers already at odds with Tehran over its nuclear drive.
"The country's scientists are working on a three-stage rocket that will take us to 1,000 kilometers," Fars news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying to a local television in the western city of Hamadan on Wednesday.
"Last time, we sent a satellite to 250 kilometers... Next year it will be sent to 700 kilometers, and the year after that to 1,000 kilometers," he said.
In February 2009, Iran launched its first home-built satellite, named Omid (Hope), into orbit to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution.
The launch raised fresh concerns among world powers already at odds with Tehran over its nuclear drive.
"The rocket that we used for the first satellite had an engine thrust of 32 tons at the time of launch, but the rocket that we are building will have the thrust of 120 or 140 tons," Ahmadinejad said.
Western countries suspect Iran is secretly trying to build a nuclear weapons capability and fear the technology used to launch the space rocket could be diverted into development of long-range ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
Tehran strongly denies the charges, saying its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes and that it has the right to the technology already in the hands of many other nations, including its archfoe the United States.
Ahmadinejad also announced that Iran had plans to put telecommunication satellites in the 35,000-kilometer (about 22,000 miles) orbit -- where geostationary satellites are placed -- within "five or six years," Fars reported.
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