More Shifts in U.S. Attitudes Toward Iran

Tweet Portion below; whole thing (via Cursor.org) here:
http://www.canada.com/topics/news/world/story.html?id=a5ac431a-1bbf-48e1-a7bf-fd63f7b97088

WASHINGTON - Iran said Monday it wants to seek "common ground" with the West over its nuclear ambitions as it faces an international deadline to halt uranium enrichment.

In an NBC television interview broadcast Monday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that a new approach by the United States towards his country could yield positive results, as he reiterated that his country is not interested in developing a nuclear weapon.

In a further easing of the angst over whether the U.S. might attack Iran, U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates said in a newly published magazine article that even though he thinks Iran is "hell bent" on building nuclear weapons, a third U.S.-led war in the region would be "disastrous on a number of levels."

Ahmadinejad's remarks come after the United States slightly eased 29 years of political isolation with Iran by sending a senior diplomat to engage directly with Tehran's top nuclear official at an international meeting in Geneva on July 19.

In Geneva, the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council - the U.S., Britain, France, Russia and China - plus Germany offered Iran a package of incentives to suspend its controversial enrichment program. Tehran has until Saturday to respond.

"They submitted a package, and we responded by submitting our own package," Ahmadinejad said when asked what Iran's response would be.

"It's very natural in the first steps we are going to negotiate over the common ground as they exist inside the two packages. If the two parties succeed in agreeing over the common ground, that will help us to work on our differences as well, to reach an agreement."

Ahmadinejad also signalled that if the recent diplomatic overture by the U.S. in Geneva was sincere, it could lead to positive developments.

"For more than 50 years now, the policy of American statesmen has been to confront the Iranian people, and our people to a large sense, have become acclimated with this situation, and we have tried to work around it. Today, we see new behaviour shown by the United States and the officials of the United States. My question is: is such behaviour rooted in a new approach, in other words, mutual respect, cooperation and justice? Or this approach is a continuation in the confrontation with the Iranian people, but in a new guise?" he said.

"But if the approach changes, we will be facing a new situation, and the response by the Iranian people will be a positive one."