[Shadow_Group] Keeping Iran From The Bomb

[shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca]

Keeping Iran From The Bomb
Commentary > The Monitor's View 
from the November 16, 2004 edition 

FROM:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1116/p08s02-comv.html<http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1116/p08s02-comv.html>
The Bush administration's hope of punishing Iran for
hiding its nuclear-enrichment activities for 18 years
will just have to wait.    

Instead, three European nations, (Britain, France, and
Germany) have used the lure of possible trade openings
to win an Iranian promise this week to suspend the
type of enrichment activities that can be used for
both peaceful nuclear power and atomic weapons.

This troika of US allies are out to prove to
Washington that the honey of incentives can catch more
flies than the vinegar of sanctions (or even the
threat of a preemptive attack by Israel). So far,
President Bush is playing along.

The US had planned to ask a Nov. 25 meeting of the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to recommend
to the UN Security Council that it impose sanctions on
Iran. That move might have begun to put the UN and the
US on a trail like the one that led to the long
confrontation and eventual war with Saddam Hussein.
But the US military is stretched too thin for any
war-talk with Iran. And the Security Council isn't
likely to go along with the US.

Still, Iran has bought time for itself with an easy
give. By suspending its questionable nuclear project,
its ruling Islamic mullahs are promised negotiations
for special trade concessions from Europe. They need
that economic boost to create jobs for a huge and
restless mass of young people, many of whom are
pro-American.

The IAEA, meanwhile, reported Monday that all nuclear
material that Iran had declared in the past year has
been accounted for, "...and therefore we can say that
such material is not diverted to prohibited [weapons]
activities." The report, however, was inconclusive
about any undeclared material Iran may be hiding.

Distrust of Iran's intention runs deep in the West,
which fears a nuclear-armed Iran could unsettle the
region. A similar but weaker agreement to the one just
reached was violated by Iran last year. This time, the
fear of a US-Iran confrontation seemed more imminent,
especially after Mr. Bush's reelection.

The result of all this will probably be months or even
years of negotiations, similar to the multilateral
talks with North Korea over its bomb-grade nuclear
material. The crunch will be in whether Iran gives
IAEA inspectors the freedom to probe anywhere they
like to uncover any more clandestine nuclear work.

The Europeans and the US are playing effective good
cop/bad cop roles for now. As long as the carrots are
working, there's no need for a stick.




-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.resist.ca/pipermail/shadowgroup-l/attachments/20041115/c58a67ff/attachment.html>