Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Sergey Lavrov looks over papers during a Security Council meeting to discuss Peace and Security in the Middle East during the 67th United Nations General Assembly at the U.N. Headquarters in New York, September 26, 2012. (Photo: Reuters)
Russia's top diplomat was to address the UN General Assembly Friday after mounting calls for international action on Iran and Syria, regional pariahs long shielded by veto-wielding Moscow.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is expected to give the Kremlin's reaction to Israel's "red line" on Iran's nuclear program and Western calls for action to halt Syria's increasingly bloody crackdown on an 18-month-old rebellion.
The "Friends of Syria" group of nations will meanwhile meet on the sidelines to discuss ways of easing President Bashar al-Assad from power, with Russia and China having repeatedly blocked action at the Security Council.
Lavrov's address comes a day after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew the world a stark red line, warning that Iran could have a nuclear bomb in less than a year and demanding international action.
Wielding a red marker and a cartoonish diagram of a round bomb with a fuse, Netanyahu said the international community must put a limit on Iran's uranium enrichment, which Tehran insists is for peaceful purposes.
He did not threaten a unilateral attack, but said Iran's uranium enrichment plants would only remain a credible "target" until the middle of next year, when he fears weapons grade fuel will be transferred to smaller bomb labs.
Iran sent an envoy to the assembly to warn that it would "retaliate with full force" against any attack and to demand that the international community "exert pressure on this regime to end all this irresponsible behavior."
The United States has resisted demands to set a precise deadline for action, but foreign ministers from the major powers met after Netanyahu's speech and called for Iran to act "urgently" to answer their nuclear concerns.
"At this late hour, there is only one way to peacefully prevent Iran from getting atomic bombs -- and that's by placing a clear red line on Iran's nuclear weapons program," Netanyahu told the 193-member UN assembly.
"The red line must be drawn on Iran's nuclear enrichment program because these enrichment facilities are the only nuclear installations that we can definitely see and credibly target."
Netanyahu claimed Iran is 70 percent of the way toward enriching enough uranium to put itself within reach of a weapon, and used his red marker to indicate the 90 percent line he said was the limit of tolerance.
Iran says it is enriching uranium to 20 percent purity -- a short technical step from the 90 percent needed for a bomb -- for a medical research reactor. But the West believes the effort hides a military goal.
Netanyahu warned that Iran would reach the "final stage" of enrichment by next spring or at most by next summer.
"From there, it's only a few months, possibly a few weeks, before they get enough enriched uranium for the first bomb."
Iran's deputy UN ambassador, Eshagh al-Habib, exercised his nation's right of reply and returned to the podium to accuse Netanyahu of making "baseless allegations" against Iran's "exclusively peaceful" nuclear program.
Netanyahu's denunciation of Iran was one of the fiercest he has made so far, and came after US President Barack Obama said Tuesday that the United States would "do what we must" to head off an Iranian bomb.
The UN Security Council has passed four rounds of sanctions against Iran while the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France, Germany and the European Union have sought to negotiate with the Islamic republic.
Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told the assembly that the nuclear standoff had reached a "crucial stage" and said the parties should begin a new round of negotiations as soon as possible to seek a diplomatic solution.
Foreign ministers from the six-nation contact group met after the speeches to discuss the crisis and called on Iran to back down and enter talks.
Netanyahu and Obama, who have testy relations, are to speak by telephone on Friday. In his address, Netanyahu took care to praise Obama, saying: "I very much appreciate the president's position, as does everyone in my country."
Eytan Gilboa, an expert on US-Israeli relations at Bar Ilan University in Israel, said Netanyahu had taken "a bit of a gamble," because Israel will have to attack if Iran's enrichment does not change.
However, he added that the harsh speech could "spur the US and Europeans to impose tighter sanctions and enter nuclear negotiations with Tehran with tougher stances."
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