French Investment Boycott.

Kouchner on Sept. 16 said: "We have asked a certain number of our big companies not to respond to Iranian tenders [in the petroleum sector]. I think this has been heard and we are not the only ones to have done so". This put pressure on companies such as Total, the oil group deadlocked over investment in one of the world's most promising gas fields, the offshore South Pars project in Iran. Since late 2006, however, Total has been hesitating about a massive integrated gas E&P/LNG venture based on a phase of the South Pars development, not only because of Tehran's nuclear stand-off with the West but also in view of a rapid rise in project costs.

Iran's Acting Oil Minister Gholam-Hossein Nozari later said Tehran will have to "reconsider" its agreement with Total because of differences over the price the French giant would be paid for its gas. He said the rate quoted by Total was high, which would force Tehran to "study the feasibility of this plan once again". Total's CEO Christophe de Margerie said earlier the JV, valued at about $15 billion, had stalled, adding: "The estimated cost has doubled between the time we were negotiating the contract and now. So if we cannot solve this issue, we will be stuck".

Kissinger On Iran's Control Of ME Oil: Former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger was on Sept. 22 quoted as saying in an article: "An Iran that practices subversion and seeks regional hegemony - which appears to be the current trend - must be faced with lines it will not be permitted to cross. The industrial nations cannot accept radical forces dominating a [petroleum-rich] region on which their economies depend".

In his op-ed entitled: "Putting Politics Aside To Save Iraq", Kissinger wrote: "These truisms need to be translated into effective policies, preferably common policies with allies and friends". He said: "Iran has legitimate aspirations that need to be respected". But he said those aspirations should not include control over the oil the US and other powers needed.

Kissinger pointed out that none of these objectives can be realised, however, unless two conditions were met: The US had to maintain a presence in the region on which its supporters can count and which its adversaries have to take seriously. Above all, the US must recognise that bipartisanship has become a necessity, not a tactic.

US Says Iran Arming The Taliban: US Central Command (CentCom) commander Admiral William Fallon on Sept. 21 accused Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) of supplying powerful roadside bombs (EFPs) to Taliban militants in Afghanistan and said the US would "act decisively" if the cross-border flow continued. During a trip to Afghanistan, Fallon said: "The Iranians are clearly supplying some amount of lethal aid". He said there was "no doubt" that "agents from Iran are involved in aiding the insurgency". The New York Times on Sept. 21 quoted his aides later as saying his comments were not meant as a threat of military action against Iran but as a suggestion that border interdiction efforts might need to be increased. Iran has denied it is supplying arms to fighters in Afghanistan.

Fallon said Iran was also providing development assistance in western Afghanistan, which he called helpful, and he said Iranian activities inside Afghanistan were meant to ensure that Tehran had a role in the region's politics, adding: "And I think they put a priority on causing us as much frustration as they can. I think it's all aimed at embarrassing us, and one of their long-standing aims is getting us out of the region".

NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) has said three shipments of weapons from Iran had been intercepted in Afghanistan since April. The latest was found in Farah Province in the west on Sept. 6. NATO's top commander in Afghanistan, General Dan McNeill of the US, told The Washington Post in an interview published on Sept. 21 that the Sept. 6 shipment probably had been sent into the country with IRGC's knowledge and possibly with the knowledge of IRGC's covert Quds Force.

US military leaders have long said Iran is supplying weapons to militants in Iraq, who use them against US forces there (see ood3-IraqGetsCostlierSep24-07).

Afghanistan has seen its heaviest fighting this year since the expulsion of the Taliban regime in late 2001. More than 4,400 people have died in insurgency-related violence around the country. A bomb attack in western Kabul on Sept. 21 was directed against a convoy of French troops travelling in armoured vehicles. It killed one soldier and an Afghan civilian and wounded many other Afghans. French President Sarkozy condemned the attack as "cowardly and odious", adding: "More than ever, I remain determined to pursue the fight against terrorism". Fighting in the south by Sept. 21 had killed about 75 Taliban militants in 48 hours. On Sept. 19, NATO began a new operation in Helmand Province, which has seen the heaviest fighting in Afghanistan this year.