President Barack Obama yesterday said the US had a good fix on the progress of Iran’s nuclear programme and had long prepared a military response in the Gulf should it become necessary.
Mr Obama made his latest attempt to calm speculation about a possible Israeli or US strike on Iran in the short-term in an interview aired on NBC yesterday, but said it was tough to figure out political dynamics inside the Islamic republic.
Later yesterday the US President also imposed new sanctions on Iran’s central bank as he seeks to tighten a choke hold on the Islamic republic’s ailing economy and compel it to reverse course on its nuclear programme.
Mr Obama’s move came as US officials warned foreign, non-American banks doing business with Tehran that they too could soon face sanctions, and amid speculation about a possible Israeli strike on Iran.
The US President tried to still some of the nervousness at the weekend, saying that he did not think Israel had taken a decision to launch a high-risk military assault on underground nuclear plants it sees as an existential threat.
But tightening a sanctions regime, he said, was already making Iran feel “unprecedented” pressure. Officials revealed yesterday that Mr Obama had signed an executive order the day before, implementing some new measures passed by Congress late last year.
The sanctions block all property and interests of the Iranian government, the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) and all Iranian financial institutions that come within US jurisdiction.
Previously, US institutions were required to reject, rather than block, such Iranian transactions.
Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney has accused Mr Obama of not sufficiently laying the groundwork for any military action against Iran’s nuclear programme, but Obama disagreed.
“We have done extensive planning over the last several years about all our various options... we are prepared to exercise these options should the need arise,” he said, but stressed he was seeking a diplomatic solution to the showdown.
On Sunday, Obama also talked about Iran in earlier parts of the interview aired on NBC before annual Super Bowl American football championship game.
He said Washington was working “in lockstep” with Israel to bring Iran to heel despite suggestions the allies had different perceptions of the current threat from Tehran.