Date : 25/04/2006
KUN0153 4 GEN 0365 FRANCE /AFP -RJB3
PPL-US-IRAN-TRAVEL
US concerned about presence of Iranian official in Washington
WASHINGTON, April 24 (KUNA) -- The United States did not foresee the
possibility of an Iranian official who has a green card entering the United
States legally and meeting with people in Washington, said US Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice on Monday.
The presence of the Iranian diplomat who freely entered the United States
came to light when reporters asked the State Department about the issue during
a press briefing.
Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor the State Department was
aware of his presence in the United States before that.
"We were very concerned when we learned about it," Rice told reporters
while en route to Greece.
Rice said that the issue is of concern to the United States and is being
look into by several government agencies because Mohammad Nahavandian, an
economics and technology aide to Iran's top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani,
is here legally on a green card.
"It is not the kind of thing that I think that anybody foresaw," conceded
Rice.
The United States has to be "true to both the requirements of what it means
to be a green card status and to be true to the policy considerations of this
rather anomalous condition in which you have someone with which the United
States does not actually have diplomatic relations but is a very high ranking
diplomat inside the United States," Rice said.
Nahavandian has been a legal permanent resident of the United States since
1993, but because of his status with the Iranian government he may lose his
green card due to US laws that consider the Islamic Republic a sponsor of
terrorism.
The United States, which has not had diplomatic relations with Iran for
over three decades, does not allow Iranian officials to visit the country
unless it is within the perimeters of an official trip to the United Nations
headquarters in New York.
"We are going to try to make certain that we understand the facts,
understand the legal basis and then we will take appropriate action," said
Rice, warning that the sticky situation with Nahavandian will take time to
sort out. (end)
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