Sanctions aimed at averting wider
conflict By Barbara Slavin
WASHINGTON - European countries are
imposing unprecedented sanctions against Iran in
part in hopes of preventing an Israeli attack on
Iranian nuclear installations that could further
destabilize the Middle East and wreak havoc on the
global economy.
The decision on Monday by
the European Union to phase out purchases of
Iranian oil by July 1 is timed to US legislation
that has the same deadline for sanctions against
foreign banks that continue to do business with
the Iranian central bank. However, European and US
experts on Iran cite the fear of a new war as a
key reason for the EU decision.
"The
French administration is worried about Israel
attacking Iran this year," a French researcher,
speaking on condition of
anonymity because he
advises the French government, told Inter Press
Service (IPS) on Wednesday.
British
Foreign Secretary William Hague, answering
questions on Tuesday in the House of Commons, said
the new sanctions were designed "to lead us away
from any conflict by increasing the pressure for a
peaceful settlement of these disputes".
The EU decision reflects Israeli success
in pressuring both the United States and Europe.
Israeli officials have repeatedly called for
"crippling" sanctions against Iran, suggesting
that might forestall their use of military force
against Iran's nuclear facilities - and collateral
damage in terms of sharply higher oil prices and
increased regional instability.
There is
particular concern that Israel might act in 2012
out of concern that Iran is nearing nuclear
weapons capability and in the belief that the
Barack Obama administration would be obliged to
support Israel in a US presidential election year.
Stuart Eizenstat, who negotiated with
Europeans a decade ago after the US Congress first
enacted sanctions that sought to penalize foreign
oil companies doing business with Iran, told IPS
on Wednesday that the EU turnaround was
"remarkable and stunning, given where they were on
sanctions in general and Iran in particular".
Eizenstat credited the Obama
administration's success in "multilateralizing"
the dispute, building on the basis of United
Nations Security Council resolutions initiated by
the George W Bush administration.
Eizenstat, who co-chairs an Iran task
force of the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based
think-tank, added that the current US government
had benefited from a dual track policy of
extending "the hand of friendship along with the
club of sanctions".
Europe's willingness
to deprive itself of Iranian oil at a time when it
is facing a possible new recession is also the
result of Iran's actions, particularly since the
disputed 2009 presidential elections.
Iran's government, once practiced at
driving a wedge between the United States and
Europe over policy toward Iran, has instead united
them by accelerating its nuclear program, abusing
human rights and targeting European nationals and
the staff of European embassies.
Accusing
Europeans of fomenting anti-government protests,
the Iranian government in 2009 detained several
Iranian staff of the British Embassy, a
British-Greek journalist and a French academic.
Last January, Iran executed a
Dutch-Iranian woman, Zahra Bahrami, a rare use of
capital punishment against a dual national.
Bahrami was arrested during the post-election
disturbances and subsequently convicted of being a
drug smuggler.
Finally, last November,
Iranian paramilitaries invaded and trashed the
British Embassy in Tehran, leading Britain to
close the embassy, withdraw foreign staff and
expel Iranian diplomats from London.
At
the same time, Iran has continued to enrich
uranium to higher levels and earlier this month
began enrichment at a facility near Qom that is
burrowed into a mountain and less vulnerable to
attack.
"There has been a hardening of the
European position, that's for sure," Anne Penketh,
program director of the British American Security
Information Council, a think-tank that seeks a
nuclear weapons-free world, told IPS.
Penketh pointed to the leading role of
France under President Nicolas Sarkozy in pushing
for more concerted European action against Iran.
At times, Sarkozy - who is also running for
re-election this year - has been even more hawkish
than Obama.
The French expert on Iran
attributed the tough stance to Sarkozy's personal
political views and to Iranian actions, including
the detention of French academic Clothide Reiss.
Reiss spent six weeks in Tehran's Evin prison in
2009 and was forced to remain in Iran for nine
more months after being convicted of spying.
Eizenstat said that the combination of
Sarkozy and the leaders of Germany and Great
Britain had been crucial in building a consensus
against the Iranian nuclear program. Europe,
Eizenstat said, feared that an Iran with nuclear
weapons would "unravel the entire
non-proliferation regime".
He added that
"there was and is genuine concern that if they
didn't go this way on sanctions, there was a real
threat of an Israeli military strike." The
consequences of a European oil embargo on Iran
pale in comparison to those of a new war, which
would be "catastrophic", Eizenstat said.
Writing in The New York Times on
Wednesday, Ronen Bergman, an Israeli journalist
and expert on Iran, added to the media drumbeat by
predicting an Israeli strike on Iran in 2012.
Asked if Israeli threats of military
action were designed to produce an oil embargo,
Eizenstat said the Israelis "are legitimately
planning it [military action] but are aware of the
grave risks. They have played their hand with
considerable skill."
In his State of the
Union address to the US Congress on Tuesday night,
Obama took credit for Iran's growing isolation.
"Through the power of our diplomacy, a world that
was once divided about how to deal with Iran's
nuclear program now stands as one," he said.
While repeating that the US would "take no
options off the table" to prevent Iran from
developing nuclear weapons, the president asserted
that "a peaceful resolution of this issue is still
possible, and far better, and if Iran changes
course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin
the community of nations".
There have been
no negotiations with Iran for over a year and
optimism about a renewal of talks is limited.
Despite statements by Iranian officials that they
were ready to return to negotiations, the Iranian
government has not responded in writing to a
letter last October from the chief European
official in charge of foreign policy, Catherine
Ashton.
The United States and its partners
in the so-called "Iran Six" - the five permanent
members of the United Nations Security Council
plus Germany - are discussing what they might
propose to Iran should new negotiations take
place. The most urgent demand is for Iran to stop
enriching uranium to a level of 20% U-235, the
isotope necessary for nuclear explosions.
However, the US and its partners have not
decided what to offer Iran beyond fuel for a
reactor that produces medical isotopes.
A
hardline Iranian newspaper, Keyhan, defiantly
suggested on Wednesday that Iran immediately cut
off oil sales to Europe, which in the past has
purchased about 18% of Iran's oil exports. Keyhan
also repeated Iranian threats to close the Strait
of Hormuz, through which 20% of world oil supplies
pass.
Other Iranian media were more sober,
reflecting a deepening economic crisis that has
seen the Iranian currency, the rial, lose more
than half its value in recent months. The
newspaper Javan, according to a translation by
Mideast Mirror, called the new sanctions "a
planned conspiracy, which we need to deal with
wisely and cautiously and not provide opportunity
to our enemies".
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