Desperately in search of
compromise By Victor Kotsev
That the nuclear talks in Baghdad between
Iran and six world powers (the United States,
Britain, France, Russia, China plus Germany, also
known as P5+1) produced no grand breakthrough is
hardly surprising. At least they have set a date
for another round in Moscow next month.
The gaps between the sides are so wide
that negotiations failed for years; as former
high-ranking American official Dennis Ross put it
on Tuesday, cited by Foreign Policy Magazine, "The
idea that you have a breakthrough after only two
rounds, I think, given everything going on, is
just not realistic."
By most accounts,
both Iran and the Western powers share a strong
interest to reach a compromise, and one is within
reach. Still, formidable obstacles remain. Should
the negotiations collapse, the US, which has
reluctantly stated that, as a last resort, it
would go to war with the Islamic Republic in order to
prevent it from
acquiring nuclear weapons, will not only find
increased international legitimacy to attack, but
also will experience increased pressure to do so.
Still, real progress was reportedly made
in the talks, even though many important details
are not available to the public. "Even given
significant differences, there is and this is the
important part, common ground," a "senior US
administration official" told blogger Laura Rozen.
"There is agreement to deal with all aspects of
20%."
This refers to enrichment of uranium
to 20% purity of the fissile uranium-235, a level
considered only a relatively short technological
step away from the 90% needed for nuclear weapons.
Iran has insisted on enriching uranium to this
level - higher than what is needed for most
civilian applications - stating a need to produce
medical isotopes. Putting an end to such
higher-level enrichment - and the closing of the
Fordow plant which is buried deep underground and
is reportedly intended especially for the purpose
- is one of the key Western demands.
Yet
there is no agreement on how to deal with 20%
enrichment, and besides, the common ground seems
to end here for now. Iran insists on the right to
enrich uranium, at least to the level of 3.5-5%,
and most analysts agree that it would be extremely
difficult to force it to give up that program.
Normally, as a member of the nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), Iran would be
allowed to enrich uranium, but in 2006 the United
Nations Security Council, with Resolution 1696,
formally took that right away because of
unresolved suspicions over the nature of the
Iranian nuclear program and a series of violations
of the NPT by the authorities in Tehran.
Moreover, uranium enrichment is only one
component of the alleged Iranian military nuclear
program, and many analysts believe that even
stopping it altogether might not derail the
Iranian progress toward a bomb. [1] Similarly,
Iran's nuclear activities are only one area of
friction between the Islamic Republic, its
neighbors, and the West. Iran's apparent
aspirations and gradual ascendance to major
regional power status worry gravely both its
neighbors in the Persian Gulf and numerous other
powers with stakes in the region.
The
Iranian regime, in turn, harbors fears and
suspicions of its own. According to Iranian-born
analyst Mehdi Khalaji at the Washington Institute
for Near East Policy, "the supreme leader
[Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] is convinced that the
West is seeking to undermine the Islamic Republic
through a 'soft' assault of culture and politics,
and that compromise on the nuclear program would
lead inevitably to concessions on issues such as
human rights and democracy, and eventually to
regime change."
Khalaji argues that
concessions could undermine Khamenei's domestic
standing, and that "the biggest obstacle to a
successful outcome is the contradiction of his
situation: to compromise, he must save face; but,
to save face, he must not compromise."
"Given this situation, a guarantee that
the West, especially the US, is not seeking the
overthrow of Iran's leaders would have to be a key
component of a nuclear compromise," Khalaji
writes. "Indeed, Khamenei might well demand that
this guarantee cover Farsi broadcasts, financial
and political support to opposition groups, and
censorship of the Internet." [2]
Nobody
expects the larger problems to be solved very
soon, but time is running out on negotiations over
the Iranian nuclear program in particular. Israel,
which due to technology limitations, is on a
shorter military time-table than the US, has
threatened to attack within months if diplomacy
fails, [3] and the pressure to avoid war has led
to the current attempts to reach an interim
agreement of sorts.
As a minimum, reports
have it, the West expects Iran to stop
higher-level enrichment of uranium and to transfer
its roughly 100 kg of 20% enriched uranium stock
abroad.
However, as the talks in Baghdad
showed, the P5+1 are unwilling to offer much in
exchange, and perhaps unable to do so at present.
While Iran demanded an easing of the crippling
financial sanctions to which it has been
subjected, reportedly they offered only
concessions such as fuel for its medical research
reactor, spare parts for Iranian civilian
aircraft, and some nuclear safety cooperation.
Part of the difficulty in lifting the
sanctions comes from the demand on Iran to stop
enrichment altogether, codified into international
law by Resolution 1696. As Reuters reported, the
US seems adamant on this point. [4] Creative
solutions, nevertheless, are possible-for example,
pre-2006 proposals exchanged between Iran and the
Western powers include the suggestion that Iran
suspend enrichment for 10 years, after which this
policy would be subject to review. It is fairly
simple to repeal UN Security Council resolutions,
and all that is needed is consensus within the
council.
In order to find a solution, it
will most likely be necessary to address at least
some of the issues beyond 20% enrichment; to this
purpose the next round of talks is scheduled for
June 18-19 in Moscow. Other obstacles,
nevertheless, abound, not least of which are the
ongoing American presidential election campaign
(which makes compromise less palatable for US
President Barack Obama) and a recent push in the
US Congress to make the sanctions already imposed
on Iran even more harsh.
In this context,
it is remarkable that the venue for the next talks
will be Moscow. Despite approving four rounds of
sanctions against Iran at the UN, Russia is
considered to be one of the Islamic Republic's
main backers, and holds a lot of sway over Tehran.
If the Kremlin throws its full weight behind the
pressure campaign, the Iranians would be
hard-pressed to say no.
Russia has several
reasons to do this: first and foremost, it is
geographically located much closer to Iran than
either the US or the European states, and it is
hardly in its interest to see Iran develop a
deliverable nuclear weapon. Also, we should not
underestimate the issue of national pride: it will
be a matter of prestige for new-old Russian
President Vladimir Putin to claim credit in one
stroke for what the US and the Europeans failed to
achieve for years, and we can expect him to make a
serious effort to do so on his home turf in Moscow
next month.
A major wild card in these
calculations is the behavior of Israel. On
Wednesday morning, just as the talks were about to
start, the Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak
issued the latest threat that "all options remain
on the table".
For now, Israel seems
inclined to wait a little longer and to give the
negotiations a chance. Among other reasons, a
major motivating factor for such a choice seems to
be a generous military aid package which the US
has apparently put on the table.
According
to a recent Defense News report, the US is
considering a lavish military aid package to
Israel, in addition to a separate $680 million for
procurement of anti-missile technology and the
annual roughly $3 billion in aid. The package
includes aerial refueling tankers, additional
concessions on the purchase of fighter planes,
munitions, drawdown gear from Iraq, sharing of
satellite intelligence, air force training
opportunities, and even integration of Israel into
US regional defenses.
It is very likely
that Washington would demand something on par in
return. Interestingly, the specifics of the
package broadly resemble the recommendations of a
recent RAND Corporation report which essentially
counsels Israel to come to terms with Iran's
unavoidable nuclear capability and
less-than-subtly hints at regime change in the
Islamic Republic as the best policy available.
According to the report, "to prevent the
rivalry between Israel and Iran from escalating
into armed conflict, the United States should
continue to discourage an Israeli military strike
while strengthening Israeli capabilities in
preparation for a future in which Iran may have
managed to acquire nuclear weapons. US leaders
should bolster security cooperation and
intelligence sharing with Israel while maintaining
pressure on Iran, thus weakening its capacity to
project power and fueling the debate within Iran
over nuclear weapons."
Still, it is
unlikely that Israel will be lured into
acquiescence to an American policy of
containment-if this is in store-by aid only. By
most accounts, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu is deeply convinced that the Iranian
nuclear program poses an existential threat to his
country, and is determined not to let Iran develop
an atomic bomb on his watch. So are others in his
circle.
Thus, while it is far from clear
that an Israeli attack will stop Iran's nuclear
program permanently-in fact, the opposite seems
likely, that Tehran will openly pursue a bomb if
attacked-if Israel feels that a strike will slow
down the Iranian nuclear program significantly
more than whatever compromise comes out of the
talks, it may choose to attack.
In this
context, the increased Russian role in the nuclear
negotiations spells some uncertainty. Moscow has
proposed its own plan for resolving the crisis,
which involves reciprocal "step by step" measures
and reportedly involves gradual easing of
sanctions. This plan, in which the Iranians are
believed to be particularly interested, will
likely gain traction during the next round of
talks. However, top Israeli officials as well as a
number of Western analysts have criticized this
approach, claiming that it will give Tehran an
opportunity to cheat and to buy time.
Remarkably, an Israeli diplomat claimed
recently in an interview with the Jerusalem Post
that there had been a "positive evolution in the
Russian attitude toward Iran".Whether this is so,
and whether Russia will extract from Iran
concessions that Israel can live with, remains to
be seen.
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