U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned China that it would face economic insecurity and diplomatic isolation if it did not sign on to tough new sanctions against Iran for its nuclear program, seeking to raise the pressure on Beijing to fall in line with an American-led campaign. American officials have been making this argument privately to the Chinese for weeks, as the United States tries to win them over for new sanctions. But this is the first time Mrs. Clinton has publicly made the link between China’s energy security and the alarm over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. In case Beijing missed the urgency of her appeal, Mrs. Clinton remarked that a nuclear-armed Iran would risk setting off an arms race in the Persian Gulf, and that it could provoke a military strike from Israel, which she said would regard a nuclear Iran as an “existential threat.” (The New York Times)
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