Face-off with Iran takes tougher turn | csmonitor.com

Face-off with Iran takes tougher turn | csmonitor.com: "from the March 26, 2007 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0326/p01s04-wome.html
Face-off with Iran takes tougher turn
Tehran spurned UN Security Council sanctions Sunday as it still held 15 British captives.
By Scott Peterson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

BAGHDAD

From the United Nations in New York to the Shatt al-Arab waterway that splits southern Iran and Iraq, the ongoing row over Iran's nuclear program turned decidedly more confrontational over the weekend.

The UN Security Council Saturday unanimously agreed to widen economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic, taking aim at the country's arms exports, state bank, and its elite Revolutionary Guard Corps.

But new UN demands to suspend uranium enrichment are prompting more belligerence from Iran, as the country appears to be shifting its policy of avoiding confrontation to 'following their traditional aggressive policies [pursued since the] Islamic revolution' of 1979, says Saeed Leylaz, an independent analyst in Tehran.

Signaling that it will not be bullied, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard seized 15 British sailors and marines that Tehran says were engaged in 'blatant aggression' inside its waters on Friday along its disputed riverine border with Iraq. Britain denies that its crews entered Iranian waters.

While the new UN resolution is"