Japan tries to separate Iran oil talks from nuclear issue

Japan tries to separate Iran oil talks from nuclear issue

Natalie Obiko Pearson, Associated Press, Tokyo

Bucking pressure from Washington, Japan intends to pursue a deal to develop a major Iranian oil field and does not want to link the issue to concerns over Tehran's suspected development of nuclear weapons.

A government-backed consortium had been expected to sign last week a deal for the development the Azadegan oil field, believed to be Iran's largest with estimated reserves of 26 billion barrels of oil.

The deal, if successful, could secure a vital source of long- term energy supplies for resource-poor Japan, which has become increasingly anxious amid the growing political uncertainties in the Middle East.

But Washington has expressed its displeasure with Tokyo for courting Tehran, afraid that the deal, estimated to be worth at least US$2 billion, could end up helping to fund nuclear weapons development and terrorist activities.

A senior Japanese official said Tuesday that Tokyo has not given up on the project, and does not want to tie the deal to assurances that Iran will answer to such concerns.

"We do not really want to directly link the two issues," Foreign Ministry spokesman Jiro Okuyama said.

Still, Tokyo does not appear to be ready to completely ignore U.S. pressure.

Japan's director general for arms control and scientific affairs, Yukiya Amano, is to travel later this week to Iran, where he will urge officials to sign a protocol giving international inspectors the right for more intrusive checks into its nuclear program.

Two years ago, Japan landed priority rights to bid on the oil development project.

But Japan's preferential bidding status expired at the end of June, and Iranian officials are now warning that Tehran is ready to court other parties if Japan backs off.

Officials from the consortium - made up of Tomen Corp., Inpex Corp. and the state-run Japan Petroleum Exploration Co. - refused to comment on the status of the negotiations, or when a decision on the project might be made.

The pressure from Washington - Tokyo's closest ally - has put Japanese officials on the spot.

The Asahi, a major newspaper, reported Tuesday that officials are planning to ask the United States for more leeway, pointing out that similar European interests have escaped Washington's wrath up until now.

But some welcomed the scrutiny that the deal is receiving.

"Preventing nuclear proliferation is an issue of national security that Japan should give a higher priority to than immediate economic interest, especially at a time when North Korea's suspected nuclear weapons development poses the biggest threat to the country," said an editorial Tuesday in the Yomiuri, Japan's largest daily.

Japan has almost no oil of its own. Iran is Japan's third- largest supplier, after Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, providing about 14 percent of its oil imports.