Iranian crisis worries U.S.

Press, 5 January 1979, Page 1

Iranian crisis worries U.S.

NZPA-Reuter Washington

The Secretary of Energy (Mr James Schlesinger) said yesterday that mandatory measures may have to be taken to restrain United States demand for crude oil if full production in Iran is not restored by the summer. “We will be under conditions of stringency. We and other nations will have, to take measures to alleviate this stringency,” he said, noting that when Iran was in full production it supplied about 5 per cent of United States imports and 15 per cent of world-wide imports. Iran is the world’s second-biggest oil exporter, and before its oilworkers shut down the country’s fields in protest strikes against the Shah, it was exporting about 5.5 million barrels a day. The non-Communist world used about 55 million barrels a day, with the United States easily the biggest consumer. At present, the United States imports about nine million barrels a day—about half the amount it consumes. Meanwhile, Iran’s future Prime Minister predicted that his government would refuse to sell oil to Israel and South Africa. Dr Shapur Baktiar, addressing a press conference after being nominated as Premier by both houses of parliament, also described the Central Treaty Organisation (CENTO) alliance as “militarily dead.”

Iran is linked in the CENTO defence pact with Britain, Turkey, and Pakistan. The United States participates but not as a full member. Dr Baktiar was asked whether he wanted the Shah’s leading opponent, Ayatollah Khomeiny, to return to Iran from his present exile in Paris.

“I hope he will do us the honour of returning as soon as he can and when he wants to,” he said. Dr Baktiar said he hoped to present his Cabinet to Parliament in the next three days. It would be composed of men who had not held high office in the last 25 years of the Shah’s rule. Dr Baktiar said that if the Shah left on holiday a Council of Regency would have to be set up under the law to carry out his functions as Head of State while he was away. If the new Administration failed, Dr Baktiar said, Iran would slide into chaos.