How Iran buys friends........

"Why this failure of the best efforts of the United States and the European Union to heel Iran's atomic aspirations? Tehran is countering via increasingly cozy relationships with China, Russia and India.

And why are Beijing, Moscow and New Delhi dragging their feet on dealing decisively with Iran's nuclear program? Raw self-interest.

Take China: Now perhaps the world's No. 4 economy, China is also the No. 2 energy consumer — scouring the globe for new energy sources to stoke a decade of double-digit economic growth. And Iran is now China's third-largest oil supplier.

Moreover, China has invested nearly $100 billion in developing Iranian oil/gas fields. By some estimates, Iran will provide China with over 250 million tons of natural gas and 150,000 barrels of crude oil per day over the next 30 years."