WASHINGTON - While top United States officials touted the United Nations
Security Council's approval of a new sanctions resolution against Iran as a
major diplomatic breakthrough, most nuclear and Iran specialists say they are
unlikely to be effective and could prove counter-productive.
Even if, as expected, they are followed up by additional unilateral sanctions
on the part of both the US and the members of the European Union (EU), the aim
of persuading Iran to curb its nuclear program is unlikely to be achieved,
according to these experts.
"It's almost impossible to find anyone here in Washington who believes
sanctions will make any difference," noted Suzanne
Maloney, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who worked on Iran issues
under presidents Bill Clinton and George W Bush at a forum on Iran at the
Wilson International Center for Scholars on Monday.
"The Iranian leadership has demonstrated that under pressure they are most
averse to compromise," she added, noting that Tehran has faced more formidable
diplomatic and economic pressures in its 31-year history, particularly during
the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s and when the price of oil fell to record lows.
Other analysts said the new sanctions, particularly if combined with additional
US and EU measures directed at Iran's financial and energy sectors, are likely
to strengthen hardliners in Tehran and rally nationalist sentiment behind them.
The new resolution, the fourth aimed at getting Iran to freeze its
uranium-enrichment program since 2006, forbids UN members from transferring
most conventional arms sales to Iran, calls for greater scrutiny of Iran's
overseas banking operations, adds more Iranian companies and individuals to a
UN blacklist, and authorizes countries to stop and inspect Iran-bound ships
suspected of carrying cargo connected to Tehran's nuclear program.
The resolution, a top priority of the Barack Obama administration for the past
six months, passed by a margin of 12 to two, with Lebanon abstaining. Previous
sanctions resolutions against Iran were passed unanimously.
The two "no" votes were cast by Turkey and Brazil, which last month jointly
negotiated an accord with Tehran under which the latter would transfer about
half its low-enriched uranium (LEU) stockpile to Turkey as a
confidence-building measure designed to facilitate the resumption of talks
between Iran and the five permanent members of the Security Council and Germany
("Iran Six").
While a statement issued by the Iran Six foreign ministers after passage of the
resolution expressed appreciation for the Brazilian-Turkish initiative, it did
not indicate any interest in following up.
Indeed, according to one report, Washington sent a confidential negative
response to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), to which the
Brazilian-Turkish initiative was directed on the eve of Wednesday's vote,
although one senior US official, Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs
William Burns, told reporters on Wednesday the accord was still being
discussed.
"Today's events are likely a setback for resolving the nuclear issue," said
Jamal Abdi, policy director for the National Iranian American Council. "There
are fears that this may mark the United States' return to the [George W] Bush
paradigm in which we apply pressure for pressure's sake and squander
opportunities for engagement in favor of talking tough."
While ministers from the "Iran Six" countries (also known as the P5+1) stressed
their eagerness to resume talks with Tehran based on earlier proposals, at
least one of which is similar to the Brazilian-Turkish initiative ''at the
earliest opportunity'', observers expressed skepticism.
"I see the P5+1 statement inviting further dialogue as just a fig leaf for a
policy of confrontation," said Jim Fine, a regional specialist at the Friends
Committee on National Legislation, a Quaker lobby group.
"Now congress is certain to go ahead with energy sanctions. Overall, I think
this will put Iran in an uglier mood, reinforce the hardliners, and move us
closer to military confrontation," he said.
As to the new UN sanctions themselves, analysts disagreed with Obama's
characterization of them as "the toughest sanctions ever faced by the Iranian
government".
In a draft resolution circulated in March, Washington had asked for mandatory
sanctions denying Iran access to international banking services, capital
markets and access to international airspace and waters for its commercial
trade. Those provisions were deleted early in discussions by the Security
Council's permanent members at the insistence of Russia and China, which
succeeded in further diluting the resolution over the following three months.
Indeed, most of the restrictions included in the final draft are voluntary.
"As a result, the resolution is not strong enough to change Iran's strategic
calculation any more than the three resolutions that preceded it," according to
an article posted by Christopher Wall, an international lawyer who served as
assistant secretary of commerce for export administration under Bush, on
foreignpolicy.com.
"The UN sanctions against Iran have been watered down to almost nothing," he
added.
That assessment was echoed by Flynt and Hillary Leverett, Iran specialists
under both Clinton and Bush, who have long argued for a "grand bargain" with
Iran on a host of issues and criticized Obama for not breaking decisively with
Bush's policy. They called the new resolution "remarkably weak".
Meanwhile, Democratic leaders in congress said a conference committee set up to
reconcile versions of a unilateral sanctions bill passed by the House of
Representatives and the senate earlier this year will wrap up its work and send
a final version to Obama by the end of the month. That bill is certain to
include penalties on third companies of third countries that do business with
Iran, particularly in the energy and telecommunications sectors.
"We now look to the European Union and other key nations that share our deep
concern about Iran's nuclear intentions to build on the Security Council
resolution by imposing tougher national measures that will deepen Iran's
isolation and, hopefully, bring the Iranian leadership to its senses," said
Howard Berman, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
"The [Barack] Obama administration has indicated that it anticipates these
provisions will provide a legal basis for other states - like members of the
European Union and Japan - to enact tougher national sanctions of their own,"
the Leveretts wrote in a post on their website, www.raceforiran.com.
"But the United States is not going to get anything approaching universal
compliance with these 'optional' sanctions," they added. "The net effect will
be to accelerate the reallocation of business opportunities in the Islamic
republic from Western states to China and other non-Western powers."
Moreover, according to Maloney, additional unilateral sanctions, notably those
favored by congress to penalize companies that export refined oil products,
such as gasoline, to Iran, "will make it more difficult to get follow-up
actions by the international community".
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