A possible way forward?
Now that the furore created by IAEA’S latest report on the Iranian nuclear program has subsided and the sword, temporarily at least, returned to the scabbard the international community needs to make another effort to explore avenues for resolving the crisis peacefully before it explodes on the world stage again.
For the moment, wiser counsel seems to have silenced the Israeli war trumpet. Objective assessment of the implications of military action has created a visible current of opinion against this option. The very real apprehension that surgical strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities would likely trigger an uncontrollable wider conflict has inducted a measure of moderation in the Western calculus.
Sanctions remain an option but their successful implementation would require the support of Russia and China who are opposed to the imposition of wider restrictions against the Islamic Republic. The current penalties have proven to be largely ineffective.
A balanced approach, which upholds Iran’s right to access nuclear technology for peaceful purposes while eliminating that country’s potential for acquiring nuclear weapons needs to be explored. Given the heavy political overhang of this issue, the Secretary General of the United Nations will have to take the lead. He would need to come out of his self-imposed inactivity and take some bold initiatives in the higher interest of international stability and security.
The previous head of IAEA, Mohammad el Baradei, had made vigorous efforts to peacefully defuse the crisis. One of his proposals warrants special mention. In February 2006, he put forward a package under which Iran would forego industrial scale enrichment limiting its programme to a small pilot facility and import its nuclear fuel from Russia for use in its power plants. This compromise would have effectively excluded weaponisation while giving Iran a face saving concession.
The Iranians indicated that though they would not, as a matter of principle, sign away their right to enrichment, they would be prepared to consider the suggested formula in all seriousness. Hope evaporated when a month later President Bush announced that his administration would not allow any enrichment in Iran. Even the act of symbolic enrichment in a fully safeguarded pilot facility was found objectionable.
Earlier, to allay fears of diversion, Iran had itself offered a range of concessions including more intrusive and stringent verification measures, renouncing plutonium reprocessing and immediate conversion of enriched uranium into fuel rods. More importantly the package included the key offer to operate the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz as a multinational fuel centre with the participation of foreign representatives. Most of these ideas were drawn from the findings of an IAEA Committee which was set up to investigate avenues to minimise the risk of diversion from peaceful applications to weapons programmes. None of these useful suggestions were seriously pursued by Iran’s interlocutors.
Given that this issue carries the potential of creating incalculable afflictions in the region, a fresh effort for peaceful resolution needs to be launched. Since bilateral efforts between the EU and Iran have so far failed, the UN Secretary General should step forward. One possibility would be for him to appoint a Special Representative to pick up the threads from previous efforts. Mohammed el Baradei, provided he can be persuaded to spare time from his political preoccupations, is ideally suited for this assignment. His deep personal knowledge of the relevant issues as also his stature and objectivity cannot be easily matched.
Prior agreement on two basic precepts would need to precede any such mission: acceptance of Iran’s right to peaceful uses of nuclear energy and categorical renunciation by Iran of nuclear weapons. Within this paradigm, it might just be possible to successfully explore a mutually acceptable solution.
The right to engage in peaceful nuclear applications under appropriate safeguards is granted by the IAEA and the NPT. This universal right cannot be denied to Iran. Admittedly, it used deception in developing its nuclear infrastructure incurring widespread global distrust. The answer to this rests not in the denial of a fundamental right but in the enforcement of stronger verification measures to pre-empt diversion. A right granted under law cannot be taken away by any one or group of countries. Insistence on denying Iran the benefits of nuclear technology is no solution but a signal of disinclination on the part of the adherents of this view to a negotiated settlement.
Second, Iran would need to agree to give concrete and practical shape to its avowed renunciation of nuclear weapons. Mere pronouncements would not suffice. Iran would have to notify in advance its willingness to accept the most stringent verification mechanisms permitted under the IAEA system. This would be necessary to dispel the doubts created, in good measure, by Iran’s own past behaviour.
It is plausible that one or both of these assumptions may turn out to be incorrect but that is no justification for the Secretary General of the United Nations to fail to act on the mandate given to him by the Charter in his capacity as the custodian of international peace and security.
The writer is Pakistan’s former Ambassador to the United Nations and European Union. He can be contacted at shaukatumer@hotmail.com