MEMRI- Renewed Iran-West Nuclear Talks – Part II:

Tehran Attempts to Deceive U.S. President Obama, Sec'y of State Clinton With Nonexistent Anti-Nuclear Weapons Fatwa By Supreme Leader Khamenei

A. Savyon and Y. Carmon..
MEMRI..
Inquiry & Analysis Series Report No.825..
19 April '12..




Introduction

An important element in the renewal of nuclear negotiations with Iran in the talks in Istanbul April 13-14, 2012 was an alleged fatwa attributed to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, according to which the production, stockpiling, and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that the Islamic Republic of Iran shall never acquire these weapons. Indeed, U.S. leaders – among them Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and even U.S. President Barack Obama – along with 5+1 representatives to the talks,[1] the International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors, and even highly respected research institutes considered the fatwa as an actual fact, and examined its significance and implications for the nuclear negotiations with Iran that were renewed in Istanbul.

However, an investigation by MEMRI reveals that no such fatwa ever existed or was ever published, and that media reports about it are nothing more than a propaganda ruse on the part of the Iranian regime apparatuses – in an attempt to deceive top U.S. administration officials and the others mentioned above.

Iranian regime officials' presentation of statements on nuclear weapons attributed to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as a fatwa, or religious edict, when no such fatwa existed or was issued by him, is a propaganda effort to propose to the West a religiously valid substitute for concrete guarantees of inspectors' access to Iran's nuclear facilities. Since the West does not consider mere statements, by Khamenei or by other regime officials, to be credible, the Iranian regime has put forth a fraudulent fatwa that the West would be more inclined to trust.

This paper will review Iran's attempt at deception with regard to the existence of such a fatwa.

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