It's all good: Iran unlikely to build a bomb this year

The remarks of General David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, seemed in part designed to back up the current stance of the Obama administration that – despite the acute anxieties of Israel and moderate Gulf states – there is still room for diplomatic and economic sanctions to persuade the Tehran regime to halt its uranium enrichment programme.

“It has, thankfully, slid to the right a bit and it is not this calendar year, I don’t think,” General Petraeus testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee when asked when he thought Iran would have a nuclear weapon.