During Thursday's Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, Sen. Marco Rubio (R., FL) asked Under Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, what country Iran's nuclear program resembles.
Sherman responded Iran is "in many ways more dangerous than any country who has the ability to reprocess, enrich or has nuclear weapons or seeks to get nuclear weapons."
Below is a transcript of the exchange:
SENATOR MARCO RUBIO (R-FL): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you for being here today, Madam Secretary -- over here. Thank you.
You -- first of all, this is not a new issue for us. As a country, we -- back in the '90s -- I know you were involved, with President Clinton, in the North Korean experience. At the time President Clinton was adamant that North Korea would not attain a nuclear capability, and of course they did.
And I raise that for the following question that I have, and let me preface it with this. There are five countries in the world that enrich uranium or reprocess plutonium, but they don't have a weapon. Those countries are Germany, Japan, Brazil, Argentina and the Netherlands. Then there are two other countries that enrich or reprocess but do have a weapon: North Korea and Pakistan.
So I guess my first question is, which one of these two types of countries does Iran look like the most? Do they look more like North Korea and Pakistan, or do they look more like Germany and Japan and Brazil and Argentina? Who do they resemble the most?
MS. SHERMAN: Senator, I'd make a couple of comments. One, they resemble themselves. They are a sui generis case, in many ways more dangerous than any country who has the ability to reprocess, enrich or has nuclear weapons or seeks to get nuclear weapons.