Eugene David<br>...The One-Minute Pundit

Posted 11:38 AM by Gene

Ahmadinejad at Columbia provided the entertainment, but Sarkozy at the United Nations provided the substance. On the largest possible stage -- the U.N. General Assembly -- President Nicolas Sarkozy put Iran on notice. His predecessor, Jacques Chirac, had said that France could live with an Iranian nuclear bomb. Sarkozy said that France cannot. He declared Iran's nuclear ambitions "an unacceptable risk to stability in the region and in the world."

His foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, had said earlier that the world faces two choices -- successful diplomacy to stop Iran's nuclear program or war. And Sarkozy himself has no great hopes for the Security Council, where China and Russia are blocking any effective action against Iran. He does hope to get the European Union to join the United States in imposing serious sanctions.

"Weakness and renunciation do not lead to peace," he warned. "They lead to war."

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Six key nations agreed Friday to delay until November a new U.N. resolution that would toughen sanctions against Iran over its disputed nuclear program.

A joint statement from the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany said they would finalize the new resolution and bring it to a vote unless reports in November from the chief U.N. nuclear official and the European Union's foreign policy chief "show a positive outcome of their efforts."

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told reporters after a meeting by foreign ministers of the six countries that "we have to wait to take into account the two reports."

COURAGE!