Dear JPANet Member,

On Nov. 14th, Iran signed an agreement with Britain, France and Germany
that it would stop developing uranium enrichment facilities.  Just days
after this agreement, and one day after International Atomic Energy
Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei reported that "all the declared nuclear
material in Iran has been accounted for," U.S. Secretary of State Colin
Powell released information to the media alleging Iran of secret weapons
facilities.

(UCCtruths: ElBaradei's quote is completely out of context -  in the Associated Press story where this quote is drawn from, the article states "IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei was 'not yet in the position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials' that could have been used for a weapons program, the report said" - a significant statement that puts the JPAnet quote in a completely different context)

At the same time Secretary Powell was meeting with the
media, half-way across the globe, another press conference by the National
Council for Resistance in Iran corroborated his claim.  NCRI is an
exiled group that not only shows up on the official list of terrorist
organizations at the U.S. State Department, but has repeatedly made false
assertions about the Iranian nuclear weapons program. 

(UCCtruths: According to the Washington Post, "the administration told diplomats from those countries that Powell misspoke in releasing information that had not yet been verified" - a significant piece of information that discredits the purpose of this alert)

Sound familiar?  The lead-up to the war in Iraq followed a surprisingly
similar contour.  With Iraq, the United States also claimed to have
secret information not available to U.N. weapons inspectors on weapons of
mass destruction and was subsequently proven wrong. 

The nuclear threat posed by Iran may well be serious.  In the new
post-Iraq war world where possession of a nuclear weapon is the best
deterrent to a pre-emptive strike by the United States, Iran's ongoing uranium
enrichment program, ostensibly for power plants, is a tremendous
concern.  The government of Iran has already submitted to the International
Atomic Energy Agency protocol and has opened up its facilities to
international inspectors. 

(UCCtruths: This is misleading on a number of levels. According to BBC News today, November 22, "It was asked to suspend its programme as a sign of good faith while more rigorous inspection methods, known as an Additional Protocol, are implemented. Iran has yet to ratify its acceptance of this protocol, which it has accepted in principle. The IAEA lost confidence in Iran because of its secret activities in the past".

The question remains whether the United States
will choose to act pre-emptively and unilaterally again through war or
follow diplomatic channels.  Send a letter to your member of Congress
asking for careful consideration and a fair hearing of the facts of the
Iranian nuclear program.  To send a fax or e-mail message click
http://www.ucctakeaction.org/ctt.asp?u=1128&l=68254.