US says Iran policies unstable

WASHINGTON -- The United States sees "a lot of churning" among Iran's youthful population against the policies of the country's hard-line Islamic rulers, but has no plans to intervene as it did in Iraq, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Sunday.\nAt the same time, he said, America is working to persuade the Iranians to force change from within to make the oil-rich country a more productive, less troublesome member of the world community.\n"Regime change is not on our list right now," Powell said on CNN's "Late Edition" after ticking off a list of what he described as unacceptable Iranian practices: undermining Israeli-Palestinian peace moves; sponsoring, supporting and arming terrorists; trying to develop nuclear weapons.\n"It's up to the Iranian people to decide what's going to happen in that country," Powell said. "What we have to do is keep showing to the Iranian people that there is a better world out there waiting for you.\n"Iran is a problem," Powell said on "Fox News Sunday," "but there is a lot of churning taking place inside Iran (by) a very young population that realizes that its political and religious leaders are not pointing it in the right direction toward a better future."\nHe said the U.S. message to those restive people is to "put pressure on your political leaders and your religious leaders to allow more innovation within the Iranian society, within the Iranian economy, to start changing the policies of the past."\nThe Washington Post reported last month that the administration has cut off contacts with the Iranian government and appeared prepared to begin an aggressive policy of trying to destabilize it.\nA White House spokesman said at the time that there was no change in U.S. policy, that Iran must stop supporting terrorists and end illicit weapons programs.