Video: Could text messages clear Greg Kelly?

>>> more questions have been raised about a woman's rape claims against new york city news anchor greg kel where who also happens to be the son of the city's police commissioner. investigators continue do police interviews and so far there's state little everyday to support criminal charges against greg kelly . wnbc's chief investigative reporter jonathan dietz has the latest.

>> reporter: the police commissioner made his first public appearance since the rape allegations first surfaced against his son, local tv anchor man greg kelly . he declined to discuss any aspect of the investigation.

>> all those question s aren't going to happen.

>> reporter: the nypd stepped aside to avoid a conflict where they investigate the police commissioner's son. his office, no stranger to high-profile cases. they brought and dropped sex charged against dominic strauss-kahn just last year. new york city mayor michael bloomberg said the d.a. will follow it.

>> there's always going to be high-profile complicated cases. there's always going to be second-guessing. he's tough enough to focus on the job.

>> reporter: sources close to the investigation say there are questions. even some confusion about the woman's accounts, that after a night out drinking with kelly, they went back to a law office where she works and was then raped. she then waited three months before reporting the incident to police . kelly denies any wrong-doing saying what happened was consensual, and sources familiar with the case say the two exchanged friendly text messages after their night out in october.

>> apparently they've been described as leavi flirtatious messages. if there's no evidence and you have text messages on top of this, it's very unlikely they'll bring charges against greg kelly .

>> he's taken time off from work. his dad the police commissioner was asked how he was holding up with his son the subject of an investigation.

>> i respect that question but i'm not going to answer it.

>> reporter: for today, jonathan deetsz, dietz, nbc news new york.

>> joining us sunny hostin and p.r. representative. good morning to both of you. it's interesting because these text messages exist between greg kelly and his accuser. what are investigators are going to be looking for in those messages specifically?

>> i mean they're going to be looking for basically an cofegs because that's what they would need in a case like this. this is an alleged acquaintance rape . in a case like that it's he said/she said. you've got a late report , no rape kit , no corroborating evidence , no photos of injuries. so all you have is her word. you need more as a prosecutor. so they're looking for more. and my understanding is at this point they just don't have it.

>> and, sunny, speaking to the late report , three, four months from when the alleged rape took place to when she reports it. it's a big red flag.

>> it is. i tried sex rape. that was my specialty. there are reasons why women don't come forward. sometimes they're afraid. sometimes they've been threatened by their rapist. so you can try these cases but given all the circumstances of this particular case, it is just doesn't sound right.

>> and marvet, this is an interesting case for a couple of reasons. greg kelly is a well known television anchor here in new york city and he also happens to be the son of a very famous police commissioner here in new york. how could that affect the investigation? could it affect the investigation?

>> it will always affect the investigation because there are high-profile figures involved, so they definitely have to be sensitive and be very careful not to rush to judgment. so i would imagine that the sensitivity involved will definitely, you know, ensure that everyone is meticulously handling this case. but i would imagine that, you know, we just went through this with esk. they're going to be very careful to make sure all the facts line up before they rush to any sort of judgment.

>> sunny, let's talk about dominic strauss-kahn. the d.a.'s office was involved in the case. it was very embarrassing. they had to retract and take away some of those charging, a very milk cause because of the credit sh credibility of the alleged victims. will they act differently because of actions learned from that case?

>> you learn from every case as a prosecutor. let me say this. we're talking about the manhattan d.a. sex crimes division. they're probably the best prosecutors in type of case. in that case, they had special circumstances but i can't imagine that they aren't smarting a bit from it and that they haven't lender from that because when you drop charges in a case like that, it has a chilling effect . it's very difficult for women who have been raped to come forward. and so, you know, thing that case in particular did have a chilling effect because i've spoken to many of my prosecutor friends and less women are coming forward in part because of situations like that. so i think there's no question that they are investigating this with every sex crime , of course. every sexual allegation needs to be invest gated. people need to have the right to have this sort of thing invest gated.

>> absolutely. on the other hand, someone like greg kelly , if he is exonerated. if charges are never filed, do public figures ever really go back to the way things were? i mean how does it affect their image?

>> they can go back to the way things were, but unfortunately this always be part of his dna. he'll always be someone they question. it makes front page news when it's the news story, but when it goes away, if it goes away, no one will really think about it, read about it, or really care.

>> just remember he was accused.

Source: http://video.today.msnbc.msn.com/today/46173904/

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US Embassy: US citizen kidnapped in Nigeria freed (AP)

LAGOS, Nigeria ? A U.S. citizen kidnapped by gunmen in Nigeria's oil-rich southern delta has been freed after a week in captivity, the U.S. Embassy said.

U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Deb MacLean told The Associated Press on Friday that the man had been released after being kidnapped in Warri in Delta state on Jan. 20. MacLean declined to offer any other details, citing privacy rules. Delta state police spokesman Charles Muka said he had not been informed about the man's release, as his company refused to cooperate with local authorities.

The freed hostage was identified as William Gregory Ock, 50, of Bowdon, Georgia, by his sister, Dee Dee Patterson.

Patterson told the AP on Friday that the family had no details of his release.

"The only thing we know is that he is safe and he is in a secure location," Patterson said by telephone.

She had no information on when Ock would return home to Georgia.

It was not immediately clear whether a ransom had been paid to secure his release, though many companies working in the region carry kidnap insurance and simply pay a negotiated price to see their employees freed. Kidnappers had made contact with authorities previously and demanded a $333,000 ransom.

The attack Jan. 20 occurred outside a bank branch in Warri, one of the main cities in nation's Niger Delta, a region of mangroves and swamps where foreign oil companies pump 2.4 million barrels of crude oil a day. The gunmen attacked Ock as he came outside, shooting his police escort to death before abducting him, Muka said.

Investigators believe the gunmen trailed him for some time before the attack, Muka said.

Foreign firms have pumped oil out of the delta for more than 50 years. Despite the billions flowing into Nigeria's government, many in the delta remain desperately poor, living in polluted waters without access to proper medical care, education or work.

In 2006, militants started a wave of attacks targeting foreign oil companies, including bombing their pipelines, kidnapping their workers and fighting with security forces. That violence waned in 2009 with a government-sponsored amnesty program promising ex-fighters monthly payments and job training. However, few in the delta have seen the promised benefits and criminal gangs still roam the region, increasingly targeting middle-class Nigerians.

In 2011, there were five reported kidnappings of U.S. citizens in Nigeria, according to a recent U.S. State Department travel warning about the country. The most recent occurred in November when two U.S. citizens and a Mexican were kidnapped from a Chevron Corp. offshore oil field and held for about two weeks, the State Department said.

A German working in the city of Kano in north Nigeria was abducted Thursday by unknown gunmen, authorities have said.

___

Associated Press writer Russ Bynum in Savannah, Georgia, contributed to this report.

___

Jon Gambrell can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120128/ap_on_bi_ge/af_nigeria_oil_unrest

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Despair, crackdowns breed more violence in Tibet (AP)

BEIJING ? A young man posts his photo with a leaflet demanding freedom for Tibet and telling Chinese police, come and get me. Protesters rise up to defend him, and demonstrations break out in two other Tibetan areas of western China to support the same cause.

Each time, police respond with bullets.

The three clashes, all in the past week, killed several Tibetans and injured dozens. They mark an escalation of a protest movement that for months expressed itself mainly through scattered individual self-immolations.

It's the result of growing desperation among Tibetans and a harsh crackdown by security forces that scholars and pro-Tibet activists contend only breeds more rage and despair.

That leaves authorities with the stark choice of either cracking down even harder or meeting Tibetan demands for greater freedom and a return of their Buddhist spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama ? something Beijing has shown zero willingness to do.

"By not responding constructively when it was faced with peaceful one-person protests, the (Communist) party has created the conditions for violent, large-scale protests," said Robbie Barnett, head of modern Tibetan studies at New York's Columbia University.

This is the region's most violent period since 2008, when deadly rioting in Tibet's capital Lhasa spread to Tibetan areas in adjoining provinces. China responded by flooding the area with troops and closing Tibetan regions entirely to foreigners for about a year. Special permission is still required for non-Chinese visitors to Tibet, and the Himalayan region remains closed off entirely for the weeks surrounding the March 14 anniversary of the riots that left 22 people dead.

Video smuggled out by activists shows paramilitary troops equipped with assault rifles and armored cars making pre-dawn arrests. Huge convoys of heavily armored troops are seen driving along mountain roads and monks accused of sedition being frog-marched to waiting trucks.

For the past year, self-immolations have become a striking form of protest in the region. At least 16 monks, nuns and former clergy set themselves on fire after chanting for Tibetan freedom and the return of the Dalai Lama, who fled to India amid an abortive uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.

China, fiercely critical of the Dalai Lama, says Tibet has been under its rule for centuries, but many Tibetans say the region was functionally independent for most of that time.

In a change from the individual protests, several thousand Tibetans marched to government offices Monday in Ganzi prefecture in Sichuan province. Police opened fire into the crowd, killing up to three people, witnesses and activist groups said.

On Tuesday, security forces opened fire on a crowd of protesters in another area of Ganzi, killing two Tibetans and wounding several more, according to the group Free Tibet.

On Thursday in southwestern Sichuan province's Aba prefecture, a youth named Tarpa posted a leaflet saying that self-immolations wouldn't stop until Tibet is free, the London-based International Campaign for Tibet said. He wrote his name on the leaflet and included a photo of himself, saying that Chinese authorities could come and arrest him if they wished, group spokeswoman Kate Saunders said in an email.

Security forces did so about two hours later. Area residents blocked their way, shouting slogans and warning of bigger protests if Tarpa wasn't released, Saunders said. Police then fired into the crowd, killing a a 20-year-old friend of Tarpa's, a student named Urgen, and wounding several others.

The incident, as with most reported clashes in Tibetan areas, could not be independently verified and exact numbers of casualties were unclear because of the heavy security presence and lack of access. The topic is so sensitive that even government-backed scholars claim ignorance of it and refuse to comment.

The government, however, acknowledged Tuesday's unrest, saying that a "mob" charged a police station and injured 14 officers, forcing police to open fire on them. The official Xinhua News Agency said police killed one rioter and injured another.

"The Chinese government will, as always, fight all crimes and be resolute in maintaining social order," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said in comments on the incident.

The harsh response points to a deep anxiety about the self-immolations, said Youdon Aukatsang, a New Delhi-based member of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile.

"They're worried that there is an underground movement in Tibet that is coming to the surface," she said.

Tibetan desperation has been fed both by the harsh crackdown ? security agents reportedly outnumber monks in some monasteries ? along with a deep fear that the Dalai Lama, probably the most potent symbol of Tibet's separate identity, will never return.

The 76-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate handed his political powers to an elected assembly last year. That was intended to ensure the Tibetan cause would live on after him, but was met with considerable anxiety among many Tibetans who saw it as a sign he was giving up his role as leader of their struggle.

Dibyesh Anand, a Tibet expert at London's University of Westminster, said resistance to Chinese rule is likely to grow more fierce.

"Protests will get more radicalized since the Tibetans in the region see no concession, no offer of compromise, no flexibility coming from the government," he said.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/china/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120128/ap_on_re_as/as_china_tibet_spiral_of_violence

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Outside Syria's capital, suburbs look like war zone

DAMASCUS?? When Arab League observers headed to the suburbs of Damascus on Thursday, Syrian security refused to accompany them to most areas, because they are no longer in control there.

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In some towns no more than a 15-minute drive from the capital, the governor of rural Damascus warned that gunmen were walking the streets.

But the monitors went, accompanied by journalists, to the outskirts of Irbin and Harasta, which have become hotbeds for protests and armed revolt since the 10-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began.

At a checkpoint on an intersection heading into the town of Irbin, dozens of soldiers with assault rifles were deployed in full gear and on alert. On the sidewalk near them lay the bodies of two men shot dead, one of them a soldier.

But the soldiers were fixated nervously on the anti-Assad protest just hundreds of meters away, with protesters chanting "Allahu Akbar". Most shops were closed and people gave the Arab League monitors suspicious looks.

Video: Inside Syria: the untold story (on this page)

"Some people are angry with us because of the report," one observer said.

The observer team sent a report last week on their mission to check implementation of an Arab peace plan that aims to halt bloodshed from Assad's military crackdown on the unrest that the United Nations says has killed more than 5,000 people.

Syria says the revolt is run by foreign-backed militants that have killed over 2,000 of its forces.

While the Arab League came out with a strong statement calling for Assad to step down, many in the Syrian opposition were angry at the monitors' report, which highlighted violence by Assad's adversaries as much as by the government itself.

They said monitors neglected the balance of power in the struggle between protesters and rebels against the army.

ICRC: Red Crescent official shot dead in Syria

Reuters, which joined the monitors on their first observation trip since the report, is in Syria on a state-sponsored trip and is usually accompanied by a government minder.

The Arab observers watched the anti-Assad demonstration from afar, and minutes later they drove away towards a police hospital in Harasta, another flashpoint in the revolt.

The team head, Jaafar al-Kubaida, said the monitors did not enter Irbin because they were worried the "angry crowd" might harass them. "Teams are harassed sometimes, we feared they might attack the cars or throw stones at us. It has happened before."

Cars with 'Israeli bombs'
At the police hospital in Harasta, the staff said most of rural Damascus was not controlled by the government forces and gunmen were kidnapping and killing those affiliated with the government in those areas.

"Any car plate that belongs to the government cannot drive inside Harasta, we as doctors cannot go, they hijacked one of our cars a week ago," said a doctor in the hospital.

A soldier pointed at a mosque facing the checkpoint and said, "You see that mosque? Their snipers sometimes fire at us from there."

A senior officer said that security forces were in talks with the armed men through dignitaries in the towns, hoping to convince them to hand over their weapons. He said the government had not completely lost control of the Damascus countryside.

"No, you cannot say that they are in control of rural Damascus, they control areas and the army control areas," he told Reuters.

Elderly Syrian man dares to speak out to journalists then says 'I will disappear'

When Arab observers pressed a senior officer to allow them entry into the troubled town, he said it was too dangerous.

"The coordination (team) did not get back to us, we told them you wanted to go but still no reply from them, We want you to go to them under their protection," a senior officer told the monitors.

The monitors were frustrated they could not enter, but also said they were unsure if their presence was wanted after their first report. "We would love to go, but I'm not sure we are welcomed there," one observer told Reuters.

Security officials showed monitors three cars which they said were towed from inside Harasta and Douma. They said the vehicles were confiscated from "terrorists" and loaded with Israeli bombs.

Inside Harasta, the army was heavily deployed. Dozens of soldiers in full gear were deployed in a 1,650-foot-long street, their guns pointed up as they nervously watched the nearby houses. People peeked from their windows but few went out. The trash-littered streets was almost deserted.

"Free Syria" was written on a wall.

"Yes, it is not safe," said a veiled woman who was walking a man down the street. She looked worried and scared. "There are gunmen but we do not have the Free Syria Army here."

More of msnbc.com's Syria coverage

Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46150156/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/

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Killings shock Homs, United Nations to discuss Syria (Reuters)

AMMAN (Reuters) ? Fighting erupted in Homs on Friday, a day after townspeople said Alawite militiamen killed 14 members of a Sunni Muslim family in one of Syria's worst sectarian attacks since a revolt against President Bashar al-Assad flared in March.

The U.N. Security Council was to meet later in the day to discuss Syria before a possible vote next week on a new Western-Arab draft resolution aimed at halting months of bloodshed.

Russia, which joined China in vetoing a previous Western draft resolution in October and which has since promoted its own draft, said the Western-Arab version was unacceptable.

The draft contains "no fundamental consideration for our position" and is missing "key aspects that are fundamental to us," Itar-Tass news agency quoted Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov as saying.

The text, obtained by Reuters, calls for a "political transition," but not for U.N. sanctions against Assad's government, which Moscow, an old ally of Syria and an important arms supplier to Damascus, opposes.

Arab monitors headed for the Damascus suburb of Douma, where government troops battled rebel fighters the previous day as the struggle to topple Assad edged close to the Syrian capital.

Opposition activists said Syrian security forces killed seven people overnight, including four in Homs, a mostly Sunni city with minority Alawite neighborhoods that has become a fiercely contested battleground in the uprising. Two people were killed in Idlib and one in the Damascus suburb of Saqba.

Residents and activists said "shabbiha" militiamen from Assad's Alawite sect had shot or hacked to death 14 members of the Bahader family in Homs's Karm al-Zaitoun district, including

eight children, aged eight months to nine years old.

They said the slayings followed a hail of mortar rounds on the area which killed 16 people. "We also have 70 wounded," said a doctor treating casualties from the bombardment.

YouTube video footage taken by activists, which could not be independently verified, showed the bodies of five children, three women and a man in a house.

There was no comment from Syrian authorities, which enforce tight restrictions on independent media.

The British-based opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said security forces had killed a total of 43 civilians on Thursday, including 33 in Homs, of whom nine were children.

REVENGE KILLINGS

Hamza, an activist in Homs, said the militiamen were taking revenge for deaths inflicted on their ranks by army defectors loosely grouped in the rebel Free Syrian Army.

Tit-for-tat sectarian killings began in Homs four months ago. Assad's Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, has dominated the political and security apparatus in Syria, a mostly Sunni nation of 23 million, for five decades.

At the U.N. Security Council meeting, Morocco was expected to distribute the new draft resolution backing an Arab League call for Assad to step down. An interim unity government would then prepare for elections and enact security reforms.

Syria, which says it is pursuing its own political reforms, has rejected the Arab plan as interference in its affairs.

The 10-month-old revolt against Assad edged closer to Damascus on Thursday as troops battled rebels in a town just north of the capital and a provincial governor spoke of negotiating local ceasefires.

(Additional reporting by Erika Solomon in Beirut and Louis Charbonneau at the United Nations; Writing by Alistair Lyon)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/un/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120127/wl_nm/us_syria

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Shiite leader urges end to Iraqi political crisis (AP)

ANKARA, Turkey ? A top Iraqi Shiite official said Thursday that the political crisis pitting Shiite officials against his country's largest Sunni-backed bloc must end.

But Ammar al-Hakim, a powerful cleric and leader of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, did not offer any change in the legal challenge that started the standoff: An arrest warrant that Iraq's Shiite-led government filed against the Sunni vice president, Tareq al-Hashemi, on terrorism charges, sending him into virtual exile to the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq.

Al-Hashemi's Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc has responded by boycotting Iraq's parliament and Cabinet sessions, bringing government work to a standstill. Al-Hashemi denies charges of running death squads that targeted Shiite officials and refuses to return for trial in Baghdad.

"I want to invite Iraqiya to return to parliament and take its place in parliament," al-Hakim said during his visit to Turkey. "We say that we will examine their just demands and do whatever is necessary."

Al-Hakim said that an administration run by members of only one sect was impossible, but he didn't say what Iraq's government should do to end the crisis.

A month after the U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq, violence has surged during its escalating political crisis, and this has raised concerns in neighboring Turkey, which has been dealing with an insurrection by its Kurdish minority since 1984, with some Kurdish guerrillas based in northern Iraq.

Turkey, whose population is mostly Sunni, has criticized Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, regarding the standoff. He has replied by accusing Turkey of interfering in Iraqi affairs.

"We can't remain silent, if you start a process of sectarian conflict," Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said of al-Maliki on Wednesday.

Al-Hakim also was scheduled to meet Erdogan and Turkish President Abdullah Gul later Thursday.

Sunnis fear that Iraq's Shiite-led government will try to do push aside their leaders one by one, as al-Maliki tries to cement his own grip on power.

Last week, the leader of the Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc, Ayad Allawi, accused al-Maliki, a Shiite, of unfairly targeting Sunni officials and deliberately triggering the political crisis. Allawi, also a Shiite, said Iraq needs a new prime minister or new elections to prevent the country from disintegrating along sectarian lines.

The Iraqi government crisis has intensified sectarian resentments that have remained raw in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion unleashed fierce fighting between Sunni and Shiite militias battling for dominance and killing tens of thousands civilians on both sides of the sectarian divide just a few years ago.

___

Sinan Salaheddin in Baghdad contributed.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_on_re_eu/eu_turkey_iraq

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Ahmadinejad says Iran ready for nuclear talks

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) ? Iran is ready to revive talks with the world powers, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Thursday, as toughening sanctions aim at forcing Tehran to sharply scale back its nuclear program.

Even so, he insisted that the pressures will not force Iran to give up its demands, including to continue enriching uranium, that led to the collapse of dialogue last year.

The United States and its allies want Iran to halt making nuclear fuel, which they worry could eventually lead to weapons-grade material and the production of nuclear weapons.

Iran says its program is for peaceful purposes ? generating electricity and producing medical radioisotopes to treat cancer patients.

The 27-member European Union imposed an oil embargo against Iran on Monday, part of sanctions to pressure Tehran into resuming talks on the country's nuclear program. It follows U.S. action also aimed at limiting Iran's ability to sell oil, which accounts for 80 percent of its foreign revenue.

No date is set for the possible resumption of talks between Iran and the five permanent U.N. Security Council members plus Germany. Negotiations ended in stalemate in January 2011, and Iran later rejected a plan to send its stockpile of low-enriched uranium abroad in exchange for reactor-ready fuel rods.

Iran had previously indicated that it is ready for a new round of talks. Ahmadinejad is the highest-ranking official to make the offer.

He accused the West of trying to scuttle negotiations as a way to further squeeze Iran.

"It is you who come up with excuses each time and issue resolutions on the verge of talks so that negotiations collapse," Ahmadinejad said in a speech in Kerman in southeastern Iran. "Why should we shun talks? Why and how should a party that has logic and is right shun talks? It is evident that those who resort to coercion are opposed to talks and always bring pretexts and blame us instead."

A senior U.N. nuclear agency team is expected to visit Tehran on Saturday, the first such mission since a report in November that alleged Iran conducted secret weapons-related tests and that Tehran was on the brink of developing a nuclear weapon.

The delegation from the International Atomic Energy Agency will be led by Deputy Director General Herman Nackaerts, who is in charge of the Iran nuclear file, and might include Peri Lynne Johnson, the agency's senior legal official.

Iran begun uranium enrichment at a new underground site built to withstand possible airstrikes earlier this month, in another show of defiance against Western pressure to rein in Tehran's nuclear program.

Centrifuges at the bunker-like Fordo facility near Iran's holy city of Qom are churning out uranium enriched to 20 percent. That level is higher than the 3.5 percent being made at Iran's main enrichment plant at Natanz, central Iran, and can be turned into warhead material faster and with less work.

Iran says it won't give up its right to enrich uranium and produce nuclear fuel, but it has offered to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors to visit its nuclear sites to ensure that its nuclear program won't be weaponized.

Ahmadinejad also said sanctions and oil embargo will backfire because it has minimum trade with EU.

"Americans have not purchased Iranian oil for 30 years. Our central bank has had no dealings with them ... our (total) foreign trade is about $200 billion. Between $23 billion to $24 billion of our trade is with Europeans, making up about 10 percent of our total trade ... Iran won't suffer," Ahmadinejad said. His comments were posted on state TV's website.

Ahmadinejad said sanctions won't harm the government, but only the people.

He said officials will be paid. "They won't be under pressure ... it's clear that you (U.S. and allies) want to pressure the people," Ahmadinejad said. "History has shown that the Iranian nation has overcome obstacles. The bigger the obstacles, the more determined the Iranian nation is."

The EU had been importing about 450,000 barrels of oil a day from Iran, making up 18 percent of Iran's oil exports.

In Beijing, the official Xinhua News Agency quoted the Foreign Ministry as opposing the latest EU measures on Iran.

"To blindly pressure and impose sanctions on Iran are not constructive approaches," the statement said.

China, which is a major buyer of Iranian oil, has urged that the nuclear standoff be resolved through dialogue and consultation.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-26-Iran-Nuclear/id-e8ec6aa85f804b838468c2374f6b4d7c

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