WASHINGTON: The United States dismissed on Monday a suggestion by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to free Iranians in exchange for two detained hikers as Washington kept up pressure on the Islamic republic.
As Ahmadinejad visited New York for the UN General Assembly, the United States has sharpened the tone against his regime with senior officials publicly saying that economic sanctions have weakened the firebrand leader.
Opening his trip, Ahmadinejad called in an interview on Sunday for the United States to release eight Iranians as a "humanitarian gesture" after the Islamic republic freed US hiker Sarah Shourd.
State Department spokesman Mark Toner rejected any link.
"We would just say that there is no equivalent between these individuals who have been either charged or tried and afforded due process in a court and these hikers who crossed an unmarked border and have yet to be charged," Toner told reporters.
Shourd, 32, returned to the United States after more than a year in detention, but two fellow hikers remain in custody.
The hikers say they strayed into Iran in July 2009 from Iraqi Kurdistan. But Iranian authorities have alleged that they were spying.
Toner said he was not aware that Iran presented a list of prisoners.
Iranian media reports have said the United States is holding around a dozen Iranians, with some detained in other countries at Washington’s request.
In the interview with the US network ABC, Ahmadinejad regretted that the Iranians "haven’t even received a note" from the United States after the release of Shourd.
Toner replied that the United States was "very, very pleased and happy to have Sarah Shourd home" and called on Iran to release the other two hikers — Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal.
President Barack Obama, shortly after taking office last year, offered talks with Iran to end three decades of bad blood since the Islamic revolution overthrew the pro-Western shah.
Toner said that the door for engagement remained open. But the administration also appears to have hardened its tone on Iran.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in an interview on Sunday renewed questions about Ahmadinejad’s legitimacy following his June 2009 re-election, which triggered major protests by Iranians alleging major fraud.
"And I can only hope that there will be some effort inside Iran, by responsible civil and religious leaders, to take hold of the apparatus of the state," Clinton told ABC News.
Clinton on Wednesday will join her counterparts from the four other permanent Security Council members — Britain, China, France and Russia — along with Germany to discuss Iran.
The six powers met with Iran in Geneva in October 2009 and agreed on a nuclear fuel swap deal. But the agreement has since stalled and in June the Security Council approved a fourth round of sanctions against Iran.
Stuart Levey, a key architect of the sanctions as US under secretary of the Treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, said that the measures were making Iran "vulnerable."
Listing companies that have renounced business plans in Iran, Levey credited other nations — such as Australia, Japan and South Korea — with raising the pressure on Iran by imposing their own sanctions.
"We are already receiving reports that the regime is quite worried about the impact of these measures, especially on their banking system and on the prospects for economic growth," Levey said at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think-tank.
"As pressure increases, so has internal criticism of Ahmadinejad and others for failing to prepare adequately for international sanctions and for underestimating their effect," he said.
Iran says it is pursuing a civilian energy program, but Western powers widely suspect it is seeking nuclear weapons.
