Obama: No Need for New Iran Sanctions

Local Editor

US President Barack Obama said Friday that he understood why some US lawmakers wanted to "look tough" on Iran but insisted now was not the time to impose new sanctions on Tehran while it was set to negotiate over a long-term nuclear deal with world powers.

"There is no need for new sanctions legislation, not yet," Obama told a White House news conference a day after a group of US senators introduced a bill to impose new punitive measures on Iran if it breaks an interim nuclear deal reached last month in Geneva.

Obama, who has warned that new sanctions could scuttle the negotiations, said that "if we are serious" about seeking a final nuclear agreement the United States had to act in ways that did not increase Iranian suspicions.

The US president shrugged off his deep dip in polling among the American people, telling a year-end news conference, "we screwed it up" in launching his health care overhaul but saying the country was poised in the coming year "to do very good things."
With his standing in the polls at or near record lows, Obama acknowledged frustration that his legislative goals had been largely crushed by Republicans in Congress. But he said he took satisfaction that "we've got several million people who are going to have health insurance."

He acknowledged that revelations by former contractor Edward Snowden about National Security Agency collection of data about Americans' communications had shaken the "confidence and trust" of some Americans, causing them to worry that their privacy was no longer secure.
He insisted that the NSA was not doing anything contrary to US law but that he felt NSA programs might need to be changed to restore the trust citizens have in their government's security operations.

One reform could be to stop the practice of government storing phone records for five years and shift that storage to phone companies.

"I have confidence that the NSA is not engaged in domestic surveillance or snooping around," Obama said, but added, "we may have to refine this further to give people more confidence."
Despite his fall in the polls, Obama appeared confident and relaxed.
Obama championed the improving economy and said next year "can be a breakthrough year for America" after a long recession and slow recovery.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website