Saturday, May 14, 2005

Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [5/8-5/14] major news events regarding Iran.

Iran's Presidential Elections:
The EU3 Negotiations with Iran:
Saturday -
Friday -
Thursday -
Wednesday -
Tuesday -
Monday -
Last Sunday -
Iran's trouble making outside of Iran:
Iran's military:
Iran's Economy:
US Policy and Iran:
Rumors of War:
Human Rights/Freedom of the press inside of Iran:
Popular struggle for freedom inside of Iran:
Popular struggle for freedom outside of Iran:
Iran and the world community:
Strange Reporting:
And finally, The Quote of the Week:
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said:
"The capitalists have forged dominance over the mass media and the press and there is no real democracy in the Western states."

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 05:21:00 PM  

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 5.14.2005:

US Citizen wants to become Iran's President?

MPG:
Hooshang Amirahmadi is leaving the U.S. for Iran to register as a candidate in Islamic Republic's upcoming presidential elections, according to an academic source.

Amirahmadi is the president of the American Iranian Council, which has tried to improve relations between Islamic Republic and the U.S.

Mr. Amirahamadi who holds American passport in an interview with Farda Radio mentioned, there is no reason for Guardian council to reject his candidacy since he has never done anything against Islamic Republic. READ MORE
Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 03:54:00 PM  

US Citizen wants to become Iran's President?

MPG:
Hooshang Amirahmadi is leaving the U.S. for Iran to register as a candidate in Islamic Republic's upcoming presidential elections, according to an academic source.

Amirahmadi is the president of the American Iranian Council, which has tried to improve relations between Islamic Republic and the U.S.

Mr. Amirahamadi who holds American passport in an interview with Farda Radio mentioned, there is no reason for Guardian council to reject his candidacy since he has never done anything against Islamic Republic.
I have been told Mr. Amirahmadi has made a recent appearance on CNN's with Wolf Blitzer.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 03:38:00 PM  

Now it Gets Sticky

The Economist:
It is no longer a threat; it is now a promise. Iran has told Britain, France and Germany, the three countries trying to talk it out of producing uranium and plutonium that could be used to fuel nuclear power reactors or misused to make bombs, that it will soon end the suspension of uranium-related work that it agreed to six months ago in Paris. Since that suspension was the Europeans' condition for talking in the first place, hopes that diplomacy might avert a confrontation over Iran's nuclear ambitions are also at the point of collapse. READ MORE

Iran's first step, it says, will be to resume work at its uranium-conversion plant at Isfahan, where natural uranium (yellowcake) is turned into a gas that can then be spun in centrifuge machines to produce more usable uranium. If the Iranians go ahead, the Europeans will call an emergency meeting of the 35-member board of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN's nuclear guardian. A very different diplomatic process will then be under way, one that could soon see Iran referred to the UN Security Council.

Undeterred, Iranian officials say that work could also resume later this year at a pilot centrifuge plant at Natanz. That would cause even greater alarm, since mastering the techniques involved in enriching uranium (so far Iran claims to have done only experimental work) is also one of the biggest hurdles to bomb-building.

Iran insists that its nuclear programme is peaceful. Its foreign minister, Kamal Kharrazi, told the five-yearly review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty last week that his country had a right under the NPT to all such technologies and was determined to use them. Yet Iran has a 20-year record of lies, cover-ups and evasions (which it shrugs off as “discrepancies”) in its dealings with IAEA inspectors. With the NPT spotlight already on its transgressions, why provoke a showdown now?

Both Iran and the Europeans said their aim was to agree on “objective guarantees” that Iran would not be doing any military dabbling. This, Iran said, could be achieved through inspections, while it got on with enriching uranium, first using tens of machines, then thousands. The Europeans argue that, given Iran's record of breaching safeguards, the only objective guarantee would be a permanent halt to all uranium and plutonium work.

They offered inducements, including trade and other less proliferation-prone nuclear technologies. Earlier this year, they persuaded America's president, George Bush, to support them too. He agreed that Iran could open talks on membership of the World Trade Organisation and import spare parts for its ageing fleet of civilian aircraft. Iran's response, however, was to back away from these talks.

America's involvement, the Europeans had hoped, would keep Iran at the table at least until after the country's presidential election next month. But politics could complicate things. This week Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president, officially launched his bid to reclaim the job. Some observers speculate that Mr Rafsanjani's supporters might have engineered the current crisis, so he could take credit for resolving it. Others suspect that, on the contrary, his harder-line rivals are hoping to escalate matters so that even he, Iran's arch deal-maker, cannot find a solution. No outsider really knows what Iran's leaders are up to.

Although inspectors have uncovered a string of nuclear activities that make little civilian sense, no direct evidence of bomb-making has turned up. Instead there are questions: about the different uranium traces found in the country; about whether Iran just filed away designs for more advanced centrifuges, as it claims; about how much plutonium it produced, and when. Inspectors are still investigating orders for a site at Lavizan, which Iran had bulldozed, carting away all the topsoil, before they got there. After one quick look, they have been barred from poking about at a site at Parchin where there are suspicions of high-explosive work (needed to perfect triggers for nuclear bombs).

Pakistan has not allowed any outsiders to question Abdul Qadeer Khan, its former nuclear chief who masterminded an illicit nuclear supply network that was tapped by Iran, among others. Earlier this year inspectors gleaned more details of Iran's nuclear imports from Buhary Syed Abu Tahir, Mr Khan's former right-hand man, who is under arrest in Malaysia. That prompted Iran reluctantly to produce more documents. But now Mr Tahir is off-limits too.

America's intelligence on Iran's programme is limited. However, it is increasingly confident that a cache of computer files that came into its possession, and were said to be from Iran's missile programme, are genuine. These show design work on cones for missiles built around an unexplained object that it is thought could represent a relatively compact nuclear warhead. Whether Iran has, or is working on, such a device is not known, however.

If Iran is indeed intent on building a bomb, then diplomacy never stood a chance. Either way, it may calculate that its best tactic is to return to enriching, while offering to stay under inspection in the NPT and hope it can get away with pursuing what Iranians call the “Japan model” (though Japan has never been accused of nuclear cheating). This would involve building up sizeable legitimate stocks of uranium and plutonium to have on hand when needed. Yet this would also leave Iran the option of a quick break-out from the NPT at a time of its own choosing.

So far the IAEA's board has been united in calling on Iran to come clean about its nuclear programmes and co-operate with inspectors. Yet if the Europeans press for stronger action, including referral to the UN Security Council, that consensus may fray. Several countries, including South Africa and Brazil, are loth to set precedents that could curtail their nuclear-fuel plans.

Russia, for its part, hoping to protect its legitimate trade with Iran in reactor-building and fuel services, has indicated it will not stand in the Europeans' way. If Iran refuses to reconsider, a simple majority can refer the matter to the Security Council. But it will be hard to keep up the pressure there. Sanctions are unpopular and often ineffective. Iran is counting on that.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 03:10:00 PM  

Iran Uses Presidential Campaign to Advance its Nuclear program

Patrick Clawson, The Washington Institute:
Iran appears to be fomenting a crisis over its nuclear program as the campaign for the June 17 presidential elections gets underway (by May 14, candidates have to register; by May 24, the Guardian Council will announce which candidates are approved). READ MORE

Assertiveness on the Nuclear Program

Ever since Iran signed an October 2003 agreement with the Europeans to freeze its nuclear program, Tehran has been pushing the envelope with a series of small steps, none large enough to scuttle the deal. For instance, it has continued fast-pace construction of a heavy-water plant with no known civilian uses. During a November 2004 crisis, Iran converted 37 tons of uranium oxide(U3O8, or yellowcake) into uranium tetraflouride (UF4) -- the intermediary step for making uranium hexaflouride (UF6), which is the feedstock for centrifuges. Judging that the West did not react vigorously to such small steps, Iran has hinted broadly that it will begin taking larger ones. Specifically, Iran has warned that it wants to convert the 37 tons of UF4into UF6.

The reasons behind recent Iranian assertiveness are unclear.

Tehran may assume that the West would be reluctant to provoke a crisis during the Iranian presidential campaign, since such a move could help the hardline candidates. This possibility contrasts with the widely held expectation (including by this author) that Iran will spend the spring preoccupied with the presidential election; in this latter scenario, the nuclear issue would not come to a head until later in the year.

There have also been longstanding suspicions that Iran suspends its nuclear activities when its scientists hit a technical barrier; once the problem is resolved, the program is unfrozen until a new problem arises. Some suspect, for example, that Iranian complicity in freezing its centrifuge program in October 2003 was directly related to a technical problem of linking together individual centrifuges into a "cascade" of up to 164 units, which is the only practical way to enrich uranium. When its facility in Esfahan was ready to produce UF6 in October 2004, Iran terminated the October 2003 freeze and began to operate that facility. Then, once Iran realized that only the first part of the process (from U3O8 to UF4) worked well, Iran agreed to renew the freeze. Perhaps Iran now thinks it can achieve the second part of the process (the UF4-to-UF6 conversion).

At the same time, there are accumulating indications that Iran may have a clandestine, parallel centrifuge program. One easy-to-explain indicator has been Iran's proposal to the Europeans that it be allowed to produce UF6, which could then be sent abroad for centrifuging into reactor fuel. From an economic or political point of view, this proposal makes no sense: why would Iran spend billions of dollars and much prestige to develop centrifuges, only to yield them while maintaining a lower-profile UF6 plant? One explanation is that UF6 is produced in a large plant that is difficult to keep clandestine, whereas centrifuging can be accomplished in small facilities that are easier to conceal (even a 164-unit cascade can be produced in a building no larger than a typical U.S. home). In other words, Iran is proposing that it be allowed to keep the one link in the nuclear chain that would otherwise be most vulnerable to military strikes.

Presidential Elections

While Tehran may hope that the West does not want to provoke a crisis during the Iranian election campaign, in fact the West has little reason to concern itself with who is elected president. The Muhammad Khatami years have exposed the weakness of the Iranian presidency, and the Guardian Council has made clear that it will only approve candidates if they agree to the continued empowerment of the Supreme Leader to make all important decisions-- including on issues concerning the nuclear program.

One of the main contenders in this election is Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who served as president from 1989 to 1997 (the Iranian constitution barred him from running for a third successive four-year term). Despite hopes that he may strike a deal with the West if elected, his record as president included stepping up terror outside Iran -- such as attacking Iranian dissidents abroad and bombing the U.S. barracks at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia --despite implementing some reform at home. Rafsanjani has also experienced a difficult relationship with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei for the last twenty years. Even if Khamenei wanted to normalize relations with the West -- and there is little evidence that he is desirous of any ties other than economic-- he has no wish to see Rafsanjani receive credit for what would be a very popular step. Meanwhile, illustrating the limited nature of Iranian reform, Rafsanjani is drawing much support from reformers who are pessimistic about the prospects of the only reform candidate, former minister Mostafa Moin.(When Rafsanjani last went before voters in the 1999 parliamentary elections, he was humiliated by reformists, who saw him as a corrupt figure of the past.)

Rafsanjani's main opposition is the self-described "principled" camp, more hardline than himself. This camp made a vain attempt to coalesce around one figure, but few of its candidates have withdrawn from the race despite a prior agreement that only the one highest in the polls would run. The most important hardline candidate is Ali Larijani, who could receive more votes than Rafsanjani if turnout is low(Larijani's voters are dedicated; Rafsanjani's are not). But there are several other hardline candidates likely to be approved by the Guardian Council: police chief Mohammed Baqer Qalibaf, ex-Revolutionary Guard commander Mohsen Rezai, and Tehran mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad. It is a distinct possibility that no one will achieve a majority of the vote on June17, requiring a runoff between the top two vote-getters on July1.

The main difference between Rafsanjani and the "principled" camp is generational. In almost any country that goes through a major war, the war generation eventually comes to power, and this trend now seems to betaking place in Iran. Nearly all of the important political figures to date -- reformers and hardliners alike -- came from the 1979 revolutionary generation. By contrast, many of the hardliners elected to the Majlis last year were new political faces from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war generation (to which the rest of the candidates openly appeal). This war generation may pose problems for the West. Perhaps most worrisome, they apparently support an increasingly assertive role for the military and the Revolutionary Guards on sensitive decisions. This trend was evident during a just-ended yearlong struggle in which the military and Revolutionary Guards publicly forced the civilian government to accept their position on who would run the new Tehran airport (and therefore control the profitable smuggling route). The war generation's support for this kind of assertiveness is particularly troubling since the military and the Guards have also taken over parts of the nuclear program.

In general, the war generation has had less experience with the outside world than has the revolutionary generation (many of whom studied abroad), and it is disinterested in the globalization that excites the younger "Khatami" generation. Its formative experience was a near-decade-long war fought while the world community either did little to help or actively assisted its enemy, Iraq (despite the latter's blatant aggression and use of chemical weapons). But the war generation can also be a practical group, prepared to compromise when its objectives cannot be achieved.

In the end, no matter who wins Iran's presidential election, the Supreme Leader still calls the shots. Indeed, who gets elected is less important than voter turnout; turnout is an indicator of regime support, as those who do not vote can be viewed as rejecting the system altogether. Many democratically minded Iranians are calling for a boycott of the elections, arguing that no change can come from within the framework of the existing constitution, and that the only vote should be a referendum on a forming a new constitution. As a result, the regime will take great pains to produce a credible turnout among Iran’s 48 million eligible voters. The pattern of recent elections suggests that real turnout will be much lower than government figures indicate. It is possible that less than 15 million will vote, compared to the 30 million who took part in the 1997 election (20 million of whom voted for Khatami).

Prospects

Many in the West hoped that Khatami's victory in 1997 was a sign that the Islamic Republic had begun a process of evolution. Instead, a veritable regime change has taken place in Iran during the Khatami years. Indeed, power has shifted from technocrats who agonized about reforming the system, to hardliners ignorant of how to run the country and ill-informed about the world.

Consider the economy. After years of talking about reform, the Iranian government has returned to the most revolutionary policies of the past. For example, instead of welcoming foreign investment during the last year, the Majlis cancelled a Turkish cell phone project and harassed Renault's billion dollar automobile plant project. Instead of saving oil windfalls in the Exchange Reserve Fund, the Majlis ordered at least $7 billion dollars to be taken from the fund this year. Instead of using the windfall revenue to create new jobs, the Majlis increased subsidies, including $2 billion on bread, $4 billion on imported gasoline, and at least $4 billion on locally produced energy. With inflation raging, the Majlis also ordered price controls on many products, including fresh fruits and vegetables.

Although to date, hardliners have most actively restored old revolutionary policies in the area of economics and other domestic issues, Iran's current offensive on its nuclear program suggests that foreign and security policy may be falling under their ill-informed, ill-considered influence. If so, expect a crisis over Iran’s nuclear activities sooner rather than later.

Only a clear message and strong actions will get hardliner attention. A striking example is the tough letter sent this week to Iran by the British, French, and German foreign ministers, warning that restarting the UF6 plant "would bring the negotiating process to an end." British prime minister Tony Blair added, "We certainly will support referral to the United Nations Security Council[which the United States has long wanted] if Iran breaches its obligations and undertakings." In response, Iran backpedaled on its plans to inform the International Atomic Energy Agency that the UF6 plant would be restarted. The lesson from this episode should be that a strong, unified transatlantic stance precipitates Iranian reassessment.

Patrick Clawson is deputy director of The Washington Institute.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 02:51:00 PM  

A Bigger Threat Than The Bomb

The Guardian UK believes that an imagined U.S. war against Iran is a greater threat to world security than a nuclear Iran.

They stated today...
once it [Iran] possessed such a capacity [a nuclear bomb] it would use it aggressively is hard to credit. Against Israel, whose response would be devastating? Against which other neighbour? Against the US, except in the event of an American invasion, and then only on the invading forces? The conclusion must be that an Iranian weapon might constrain Israel and the US a little in their dealings with Iran, but it would not threaten them or anybody else.
But the Guardian forgets the many statements that Iran's leaders have made to destroy America, the obstacle standing in the way of the Iran's vision for the world.

Rafsanjani the new darling of the mainstream media has said:
"We have some scores with America that must be settled one day." The NY Post.

"The Islamic Republic must get ready for confrontation against the enemy’s attack by answering its offensive right in its heartland." Iran Press Service.
There are many scenarios in which Iran could, using its terrorist proxies armed with nuclear weapons, attempt to decapitate the U.S. Lacking a clear smoking gun it would be difficult to prove that Iran was behind the attack. It would appear the Guardian would be among those calling for American restraint after such an attack.

The Europeans have less to fear of a nuclear Iran, immediately.

What is surpising is that they seem oblivious to the idea that the U.S. could easily switch to a regime change policy towards Iran. One wonders why the Guardian left out this option?

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 12:53:00 PM  

Iran leaves the world guessing

BBC News:
Iran's threat to restart the process of enriching uranium has kept the world guessing about its ultimate intentions and has put its opponents on the back foot again.

Its obfuscation is in keeping with its past tactics. READ MORE

The one thing Iran has not offered in this whole saga is clarity.

Yet without clarity, nobody knows how to respond - not the US, nor the European countries negotiating, with grudging US support, with Iran - Britain, France and Germany - nor the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), nor the Russians nor the Chinese, let alone the UN.

Iran's intentions

The sophistication of the Iranian threat is shown in the limited steps it proposes to take.

This would involve the conversion of crushed uranium ore (yellowcake), which it already has, into uranium hexafluoride, a gas that then has to be spun in centrifuges to separate the parts needed for nuclear power.

It could argue that conversion is a "pre-enrichment" process.

That argument has already been dismissed by the European Union Three (EU3) who say that under an agreement last November, Iran agreed to suspend all enrichment "activities" while holding talks about agreeing "objective guarantees" that its future nuclear power programme would be peaceful.

Why now?

Quite why the threat has resurfaced at this moment is not clear. Nor is it clear why the threat was not carried out immediately.

It could be that Iran thinks that its talks with the three European countries are getting nowhere and that this is a way of trying to get some progress.

It might have wanted to test the waters to see what might happen next. There could even have been disagreements in the Iranian government itself.

It could also be that the Iranian presidential elections next month have something to do with it.

The previous president, the conservative though pragmatic Hashemi Rafsanjani, has announced that he is to stand and maybe the threat is part of manoeuvring connected to that.

One theory is that uncertainty would be good for him as he is an experienced hand and Iranians might vote for experience.

But nobody really knows and diplomacy is reduced to guesswork.

"I thought the Iranians would wait until after the presidential elections, " said Dr Gary Samore of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London.

"But maybe they have decided to have the confrontation sooner rather than later. They might think they are strong enough anyway. Alternatively, they might resume activities now only to suspend them again later."

Sanctions threat

The only clarity has come from the EU3, supported by the United States. They have said that if Iran does resume enrichment, then a special meeting of the IAEA governors will be called with the intention of reporting Iran to the Security Council for violating the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty in the past.

If the Security Council orders Iran to stop enrichment and it does not, then it could face sanctions.

These could include an arms embargo, a ban on nuclear co-operation and restrictions on investment in oil and gas development.

But it is a big if, given that Russia and China would have to agree.

Russia is itself involved in completing a nuclear power station in Iran and China buys a great deal of oil from Iran.

The risk is that Iran is simply acting tactically and that strategically it still intends to master the technology of the full enrichment cycle.

If that is the case, it will have to declare its hand at some stage and face the consequences. Ultimately these could go beyond UN sanctions and could involve a threat by Israel to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.

Trust issue

Iran argues that under the NPT, a country wanting to develop nuclear power - and that is all it wants to do, it claims - is allowed to enrich its own fuel.

This is true, but Iran's problem is that the IAEA has established that it hid an enrichment programme for nearly 20 years.

The US and the EU3 now argue that it cannot be trusted and must therefore not be allowed to enrich.

In their view the only effective "objective guarantee" would be to have no enrichment at all.

They reject the increased inspections that Iran is offering as inadequate. This is because the same technology used to enrich uranium to a level needed for nuclear power can also be used to enrich to a level needed for a nuclear bomb. If Iran were allowed to develop an enrichment cycle, it would be able to use the technology to make a nuclear bomb in due course, at a time of its own choosing.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 12:44:00 PM  

Sanction Bill Against Iran Advances in Congress

The Jerusalem Post:
As Iran appears to move closer to resuming nuclear activities, support has been quietly building in Congress for new US sanctions, including penalties that could affect multinational companies and recipients of US foreign aid. READ MORE

The legislation would put the United States on a more confrontational course than the one thus far pursued by President George W. Bush's administration. Bush has supported European efforts to offer Iran incentives in exchange for abandoning its nuclear program.

More than 200 members of the House of Representatives, almost half the body, are co-sponsoring a bill that would tighten and codify existing sanctions, bar subsidiaries of US companies from doing business in Iran and cut foreign aid to countries that have businesses investing in Iran.

Additional lawmakers, Republicans and Democrats, are adding their names to the bill every week.

The bill faces big hurdles before becoming law. Support may not be as strong in the Senate, which is considering a more limited version of the bill. Key lawmakers in both chambers could block the legislation. The White House has not taken a position, but generally opposes congressional efforts to steer foreign policy.

Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations said unilateral sanctions imposed by Congress could hurt US-EU cooperation if they penalize European companies doing business in Iran.

He said it would be difficult for Bush to say he supports EU diplomacy, "but we are going to sanction the following British, French and German firms."

The EU objected to a 1996 law that called for penalties against foreign firms that invested more than $20 million a year in Iran's energy sector. Seeking European cooperation on Iran, neither Bush nor his predecessor, Bill Clinton, penalized companies.

The House bill now goes before the full International Relations Committee and the Senate bill to its counterpart, the Foreign Relations Committee. The chairmen of both panels, Rep. Henry Hyde and Sen. Dick Lugar, both Republicans, tend to be skeptical about sanctions and are likely to give strong weight to the administration's viewpoint.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 12:12:00 PM  

Ministers Try to Defuse Iran Nuclear Crisis

Roula Khalaf, The Financial Times:
Iranian and European officials on Friday were trying to arrange a high-level ministerial meeting in the hope of defusing the crisis provoked by Tehran's threats to restart suspended nuclear experiments.

European and Iranian officials suggested Tehran was, in principle, willing to delay the resumption of the conversion of raw uranium into gas, until Hassan Rohani, the top Iranian official responsible for the nuclear file, meets with the foreign ministers of the UK, France and Germany.

But the two sides were wrangling on Friday over the venue and the Iranians were keen to ensure that European envoys would have more than threats to deliver. A compromise venue, Dubai or Turkey for example, was being explored. “We offered a meeting and the Iranians expressed interest and are discussing the modalities,” said a British official. READ MORE

If the meeting is held it would be expected in a week's time it could provide a temporary respite in the crisis, possibly pushing the controversy back until after the June 17 Iranian presidential elections.

The nuclear dispute has been exacerbated by rivalry between factions in the Iranian regime ahead of the poll.

The high-level talks were suggested by the foreign ministers on Wednesday in a letter to Mr Rohani. The message warned that a resumption of enrichment-related activities would force the Europeans to abandon their 18-month negotiations with Tehran and back US efforts to report the nuclear controversy to the UN Security Council, where the US would lobby for sanctions.

Iranian officials say the negotiations were going nowhere in any case. They argue that there is no legal basis under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to refer Iran to the Security Council.

The three European countries have been seeking to persuade Tehran to give up its uranium enrichment programme, insisting this would be the only guarantee that Iran would not produce nuclear weapons. Tehran, however, wants to keep a limited enrichment capability and says it is willing to accept greater international scrutiny over its experiments.

The Iranian offer was rejected by the Europeans in a meeting at the end of April. A frustrated Tehran then decided to step up the pressure on the Europeans by declaring that it would resume work at one of its nuclear plants. Iranian officials underlined that they had voluntarily agreed to suspend all enrichment-related activities and had repeatedly warned that they would resume them if the negotiations fell apart. ...

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 11:59:00 AM  

Return of the Axis of Evil

The Economist takes a looks at the present situation with Iran and North Korea and concludes:
An embarrassment for George Bush, and a test for his critics

You do not hear George Bush talk much about the “axis of evil” these days. That is no surprise. Rather a lot has gone wrong in the three years since America's president told Congress that it would be catastrophic to allow Iraq, Iran or North Korea to acquire weapons of mass destruction. From the beginning, the melodramatic phrase never travelled well. And after the intelligence fiasco in Iraq, which was discovered after being invaded not to have any especially sinister weapons after all, Mr Bush cannot be eager to cry wolf again.

But despite the phrase, despite Iraq and despite the understandable desire of Mr Bush to change the subject, the fact remains that the wolves are indeed at the door. In the coming days or weeks, the world may face a double nuclear challenge from the axis's surviving members. From North Korea, which quit the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 2003, have come reports that the regime is preparing its first nuclear test. And Iran has just informed Britain, France and Germany that after six months during which it had suspended these activities, it will shortly resume converting yellowcake into the uranium-hexafluoride gas that can be enriched for a nuclear bomb (see article). It would still be several years from making such a weapon, but it would be back on the way.

If you want a multipolar world, do something

Should either or both of these events come to pass, note please that it is the world and not just America that will have to rise to the challenge. A lot of Mr Bush's critics will not see it that way. They will take satisfaction in his failure to achieve an aim he put at the forefront of his foreign policy in 2002—and they will argue that the example America made of Saddam Hussein turns out to have fed rather than curbed the nuclear appetite of Iran and North Korea. But that argument is magnificently beside the point. The point now is that both Iran and North Korea are unpredictable regimes whose possession of nuclear weapons would be dangerous in its own right and might also persuade other countries in their neighbourhoods to go nuclear as well. Whatever can reasonably be done to stop this proliferation nightmare should be done. And this, for all the talk of a unipolar world with one superpower, is not a job that America should have to do, or probably is able to do, alone.

After the war in Iraq, the British, French and Germans started to talk to Iran about a history of nuclear cheating under the NPT that stretches back 20 years and has cast deep suspicion over the regime's claim that it is interested only in peaceful nuclear energy. One European motive was to see whether there was a better way than American pre-emption to discourage rogue regimes from acquiring nuclear weapons. If the Iranians ignore last-minute pleas and resume converting yellowcake or enriching uranium, the European three will not necessarily have “failed” (though, again, some American critics of Euro-wimpery will say gleefully that they have): the Europeans can justly claim that it was a success of sorts to have talked Iran into stopping for a period. But it would be a failure to leave it at that. To be taken even half seriously in future, the Europeans must do just what they have promised to do in such circumstances, which is to refer Iran to the United Nations Security Council, with an eye to imposing sanctions.

During Mr Bush's first term, the Americans expressed private exasperation with the Europeans. They were impatient for action in the Security Council. Now that America may at last get its way, it will rediscover that the UN is no panacea. The Iranians, after all, have a case to make. They admit to having bent the rules of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which supervises the NPT, but say that they have come clean and have every right to enrich uranium for peaceful ends. Iran's story of innocence is pretty tall, but it is one that powerful members of the Security Council may pretend to believe. Russia wants to sell Iran its reactors, China and Japan to buy its oil and gas. With oil at $50 a barrel, this is not the ideal moment to cut off one of the world's biggest suppliers. If the UN imposes sanctions at all, they are likely at first to be modest.

What, though, is the alternative? The Americans and Europeans have a bad habit of trying to scare the Iranians by threatening them with the Israelis: Congress, as it happens, has just approved the sale of bunker-busting bombs to Israel's highly capable air force. But although the Israelis do not rule out pre-emption as a last resort, they say they would prefer other countries to solve the problem politically. A military strike against Iran's dispersed, buried and concealed nuclear facilities might not succeed, and even if it did could provoke retaliation—with missiles against Israel or by other means against the American project in Iraq. As for North Korea, which is capable of flattening South Korea's capital even without using the nuclear bombs it may already possess, there is no military means of disarming it that does not look prohibitively dangerous.

In theory, the absence of promising military options should be welcome news to Russia, China and the countries of Europe that took such exception to Mr Bush when he seemed to claim a general right of American military pre-emption. But it also obliges them to find another way. China has helped to organise a desultory series of six-country talks with North Korea, and the European three squeezed that six-month freeze out of Iran. What the Europeans and Chinese have yet to do is show that they take the proliferation threat seriously enough to take any risks or make any sacrifices to avert it.

Now is their chance
In the end, there may be no way to persuade countries that are sufficiently paranoid to forgo nuclear weapons. But Iran needs access to world markets—not least in Europe—to provide jobs for a fast-growing population that has fallen out of love with the Islamic revolution, and a pauperised North Korea depends on China for almost all its energy. If these regimes faced credible economic threats at the same time as being offered the right sort of security assurances by the United States, the nuclear genie might yet be pushed back into the bottle. But this will take unity, co-ordination and statecraft of a kind the world has not seen for many years. And time is running out. READ MORE
After the typical Bush bashing that the Economist is famous for, they argue that the Iranian and North Korean threats are real. But their solution is to push for tough sanctions and "security assurances" to these rogue regimes. They seem to forget that in the case of Iran, the regimes are weak and a popular regime change is possible if the international community were to agressively support them. This summer and opportunity is coming for such a change. This is the best possible solution in that country. Lets hope the Europeans choose this path rather than more appeasement.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 09:47:00 AM  

Israel Says Iran will have Nuclear Bomb Knowledge Soon

Reuters:
Iran will have the technological know-how within six to nine months to build a nuclear bomb, Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said on Friday. "They (the Iranians) have one aim -- to achieve the capability to produce a nuclear bomb," Shalom told Israel Radio.

"The important question is not whether they will have a bomb in 2009, 2010 or 2011, but when they will have the know-how to produce a bomb. According to our estimates, we are talking about six to nine months," he said. READ MORE

Shalom, whose country is widely believed to have some 200 atomic bombs, said a nuclear Iran would pose "an existential threat" to Israel.

Iran has called for the destruction of the Jewish state.

Shalom made the comments after France, Britain and Germany warned Iran they would break off talks and join Washington in seeking U.N. Security Council action if Tehran made good on its threats to resume atomic work.

Iran insists its atomic fuel program is only for nuclear power plants, not for arms.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon voiced concern last month the world was growing accustomed to the idea Iran would build a nuclear bomb. But he said he preferred economic and diplomatic pressure, rather than military action, against Iran at this stage.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/14/2005 09:40:00 AM  

Friday, May 13, 2005

Iran switches economy to gas; saves oil for exports

The Gulf Times:
Iran, the site of the world’s second-largest natural-gas reserves, will double gas production over the next five years, shift its domestic economy to gas, and save oil for exports, a gas official said.

Gas will provide 72% of the nation’s energy, up from 55% now, Azizollah Ramezani, the planning director at the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC), said in an interview.

Iran’s gas output should reach 700mn cu m a day in 2010, compared with 375mn cu m today, he said.

“We’ve got plans to cover all the country’s energy needs with natural gas,’’ Ramezani said in an interview on the 15th floor of NIGC’s headquarters in central Tehran. Out of these 700mn cu m of gas, 50mn will be for exports and “all the rest’’ for domestic use, he said.

Switching to gas could help Iran export more crude oil, as it struggles to meet quotas set by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries. READ MORE

Gas is the fastest-growing energy source in the world, with consumption projected to double to 176tn cu ft by 2025, according to the US Department of Energy.

For the past four months, Iran, Opec’s second-largest producer, has failed to reach its Opec quota. The country’s crude oil production has declined since January, reaching 3.88mn bpd in April, according to Bloomberg estimates. Its Opec quota stands at 4.04mn bpd.

Iran’s revenue from oil exports will rise $4.5bn to $36bn in 2005, Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said last month. It will get about $900mn from exports of natural gas and gas condensates in 2005, Ramezani said yesterday.

To increase gas output, Iran is relying mainly on South Pars, the world’s largest gas reservoir, which it shares with Qatar. Gas output from the deposit will reach 600mn cu m a day when the project’s 20 phases are completed, Khatami told reporters last month, calling it the “beating heart of Iran’s flourishing economy.’’

Production from the Iranian field, about 100km (62 miles) off Iran’s southern coast, already accounts for more than a third of Iran’s gas output.

The South Pars deposit was discovered in 1966 by the Royal Dutch/Shell Group. Little was done to develop the field until the 1990s. It contains 600tn cu ft of gas, or about a tenth of the world’s gas reserves.

Iran imports about 26mn cu m of gas a day from neighboring Turkmenistan and exports “up to 25mn cu m’’ a day to Turkey, Ramezani said. “We’ll become a net exporter next year,’’ the planning director said, counting on an increase in gas exports to Turkey to 30mn cu m. In addition, Iran has plans to sell gas to Armenia and Kuwait.

Gazprom’s Armenian venture is about to start building a natural-gas pipeline from Iran, which will be finished by 2007, Vremya Novostei reported in March. A $4.2bn, 2,775-km pipeline to India from Iran through Pakistan is also on the agenda to meet growing demand for gas in Asia’s fourth-largest economy.

The pipeline, which the US opposes because of Iran’s alleged support of terrorist groups as well as pursuit of nuclear weapons, would allow Iran to export an additional 70mn cu m a day, Ramezani said.

In addition, Iran plans to acquire six liquefied natural gas carriers by 2010 to deliver gas to Asia. It agreed last year to sell China 250mn metric tonnes of LNG over a 30-year period. At least four phases of the 20-phase South Pars development will be devoted to LNG, producing the equivalent of some 100mn cu m of gas, Ramenzani said.

LNG is natural gas that is cooled to a liquid so it can be carried by tankers rather than pipelines.

Iran’s state-owned gas company will spend $15bn – or $3bn a year – through 2010 to lay new pipes and build gas compressor plants, Ramezani said. The length of the gas pipeline grid will grow 50% to 30,000km, he said.

“Some $7.5bn will be financed internally, and the rest through loans, mainly from Naftiran Intertrade Company,’’ a Switzerland-based subsidiary of state-owned National Iranian Oil Co, the manager said.

It will also increase the number of service stations providing cars with natural gas to make the fuel more attractive, he said.

Both oil and gas is heavily subsidised in Iran, contributing to waste and pollution. A liter of gasoline costs Iranian drivers about 800 Iranian riyals (9 US cents). The parliament earlier this year rejected a plan to gradually remove subsidies.
“This is a parliament decision, and we follow it,’’ Ramezani said. ``Personally, I believe price is a good tool to reduce consumption. We should make use of it.’’

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 06:16:00 PM  

Iran frees political dissident

The Pennisula:
Iran has freed a leading political prisoner jailed for publishing a survey suggesting Iranians favoured resuming dialogue with their supposed arch-foe the United States, his lawyer said yesterday.

Iran's hardline judiciary in 2003 sentenced Abbas Abdi to four-and-a-half years in prison for selling intelligence to the enemy, referring to a poll that suggested three-quarters of Iranians wanted dialogue with the United States.

But the supreme court last week ruled the United States was not officially defined as an enemy. Following this verdict, Abdi walked free after 30 months in prison.

This is an unprecedented ruling, because five senior judges including a cleric suggest the United States is not an enemy, Abdi's lawyer Saleh Nikbakht told Reuters by telephone.

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 06:13:00 PM  

German BMW takes Iran as a primary regional market

IranMania:
German automobile manufacturing giant BMW said that it forecasts sales to increase sales to over 13,000 units in the Middle East in 2005 and has picked Iran as one its primary regional markets in the region. READ MORE

The Internet site Iran economist.com quoted Bolumberg News as saying that the company's Middle East sales volume has increased four fold since 1994.

It quoted Chairman of BMW Helmout Planck as saying "we have very right prospects in selling our products in Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan and have decided to increase our exposure in these countries more than before." The company has also announced that the revenues dropped in the first quarter of 2005 by 11 percent primary due to significant hike in oil prices and rise in the Euro/Dollar exchange rate.

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 06:10:00 PM  

Friday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 5.13.2005:

Iran Works to Get Out the Vote, but the Disillusioned Aren't Biting

Nahid Siamdoust, The LA Times:
Fearing low turnout, the regime has begun an ambitious campaign to get citizens to the polls. Meeting with university students in the southern province of Kerman, Khamenei this week stressed a theme that has become a constant in his speeches: "Participation in the elections is not only a right, but a religious duty."

Voter turnout is a sign of legitimacy the Islamic Republic needs more than ever, as international pressure mounts over its nuclear program and strife with the United States continues. READ MORE
Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/13/2005 01:16:00 PM  

Iran Works to Get Out the Vote, but the Disillusioned Aren't Biting

Nahid Siamdoust, The LA Times:
Fearing low turnout, the regime has begun an ambitious campaign to get citizens to the polls. Meeting with university students in the southern province of Kerman, Khamenei this week stressed a theme that has become a constant in his speeches: "Participation in the elections is not only a right, but a religious duty."

Voter turnout is a sign of legitimacy the Islamic Republic needs more than ever, as international pressure mounts over its nuclear program and strife with the United States continues. READ MORE

On this campus, it could be a hard sell. Students were instrumental in helping reformist President Mohammad Khatami sweep into office eight years ago, but they have gradually become disillusioned as unelected hard-liners blocked reforms, closed dozens of newspapers and disqualified more than 2,000 reformists from running in parliamentary elections last year.

"The past eight years show us that elections don't bring us closer to our goals," said Abdollah Momeni, 28, leader of the Office to Consolidate Unity, Iran's largest pro-reform student group.

"Reforms are not possible from within the confines of the current constitution, not as long as certain appointed bodies have more power than institutions elected by the people," Momeni said, referring to organizations such as the hard-line Guardian Council that hold greater sway than the president or parliament.

On straw mats across the way from the election tent, Momeni had joined other student activists at a sit-in to protest the continued detention of political prisoners and the tight lid on political dissent. Many of the demonstrators said they had no intention of voting. "We protest the killing of freedom and justice," read a handwritten banner behind them.

"The system has effectively told them, 'Your vote doesn't count,' " Tehran University sociologist Hamid Reza Jalaipour said. "People turned out en masse for the past eight years to vote for reforms, but the reformists weren't able to transform Khatami's promises into law."

The June 17 election presents a dilemma for Iranians who seek greater democratization. They are divided into two camps: One is disillusioned and favors an election boycott; the other argues for participation. Followers of the latter group fear that withholding votes will play into the hands of the conservatives, who have already taken over the Majlis, or parliament. ...

Candidate registration began this week. Polls indicate that the popular favorites are former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, who announced his candidacy Tuesday; former Iranian Police Chief Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf; and reformist candidate Mostafa Moin, who resigned from his post as science minister in 1999 after police violently put down student protests.

Once registration is complete, the Guardian Council will qualify or disqualify the candidates within two weeks.

Moin has geared his campaign toward universities, where he hopes to draw students back into the political arena. During his appearance at the media exhibit this week, he called for the release of political prisoners and journalists. He has also met with Iran's active blog community, many of whom had until recently called for an election boycott.

The bloggers, whose personal websites are filled with political commentary, are considered a key voice in Iran, and the mood among them is shifting as the election draws closer. Many increasingly argue that the reform process cannot be abandoned after eight years of struggle. ...

More than 20 bloggers were arrested in December on charges of disturbing the public and threatening national security. Most were held for weeks before being cleared. Ironically, some of those bloggers could help the state achieve a higher turnout by mobilizing their readers.

"They now understand that weblogs can actually play an important role in inviting people to participate in the elections," said former Vice President Mohammed Ali Abtahi, who started a blog more than a year ago, where he posts his observations on the inner workings of the government along with pictures snapped on his mobile phone.

Recent surveys indicate that turnout next month could be between 45% and 60%. "That is based on the presumption that the elections are relatively free, meaning reformist candidates are not disqualified," said Jalaipour, the sociologist.

For Iran, where voter participation is usually much higher, those figures are bleak.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/13/2005 12:52:00 PM  

Nothing to gain from taking Iran to UN, says Blix

Islamic Republic News Agency:
Former director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Hans Blix, expressed doubts if anything will be achieved by taking Iran to the UN if it restarts its fuel cycle program, suggesting it could prove to be counterproductive.

"I am not sure much will be gained from taking to the Security Council, except more escalation and getting into more dangerous situation," Blix said. READ MORE

"I hope there will be a continuation of negotiations" between the EU and Iran in trying to reach long-term arrangements on its nuclear program, he said, believing that it was not too late to find an amicable compromise.

Blix, who also headed the UN Arms Inspection Program in Iraq before the launch of the US-led war in 2003, criticized British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw speaking about the situation with Iran as being "five to midnight." "It sounded like autumn of 2002, giving Iraq the last opportunity," he said in an interview with BBC Radio Four's PM program.

"I think we are at a negotiating stage and hear different parties 'upping the anti' all the time," the former head of the UN nuclear watchdog said.

He also expressed doubts about the latest claim that Iran was threatening to restart its fuel cycle program, saying "as far as I understood Iranians beginning to make hydrofluoride, which is not enriched uranium." Blix was also uncertain whether it was Iran's intentions to develop an nuclear bomb as alleged by the US. They "certainly want to retain enriching uranium (and) the rest of world is rightly worried," he said.

The former IAEA director general also told the BBC that it was "right" Iran wanted its own enriched uranium to be independent, but added that they "will be able to get an assurance of supply both from the Russians and the Europeans and perhaps from the Chinese." "But they may not have been able to get that assurance if they had not threatened to enrich themselves. I think there is a lot of bargaining going on" even at this late hour, he said.

"What the Iranians, I think, might need to have will be an assurance that they will not be attacked if they abstain from this," Blix further said.

He said they have "a right" to enrich. "It is in the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The Japanese are parties of that treaty, the Brazilians are parties of that treaty, they do it, (and) no one objects to that," he said.

"Hypocrisy is not the word I would use, because it is true the Japanese do it, but it is not that sensitive. If you do enrichment in that area, the Middle East, it will increase the tension, I think the Iranian should abstain from it," Blix said.

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 12:14:00 PM  

Belgian parliament delegation to visit Iran

Islamic Republic News Agency:
A 4-member delegation from the Belgian parliament led by the President of the external relations commission of the house, Mr. Karel Pinxten, begins a visit to the Islamic Republic on Saturday for talks aimed at boosting bilateral parliamentary cooperation. READ MORE

The Belgian MPs will hold talks with the speaker of the Iranian Majlis, Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, head of the foreign relations committee of the majlis and with other Iranian deputies.

They are also expected to meet foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi and other Iranian officials during their 4-day visit, sources in the Belgian parliament and Iranian diplomatic sources told IRNA.

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 12:12:00 PM  

Iran, Cuba to boost economic ties

Islamic Republic News Agency:
Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for Euro-American Affairs Morteza Sarmadi met with Cuban Minister of Government Ricardo Cabrisas Ruiz in Havana to discuss expansion of bilateral economic cooperation, Iran's Embassy in Havana announced Thursday. READ MORE

During the meeting, Cabrisas termed as successful the holding of the recent Iran-Cuba Joint Economic Commission session.

He expressed satisfaction over the upward trend of Tehran-Havana economic relations.

Sarmadi, for his part, expressed readiness of Iranian industrial and trade sectors to bolster further cooperation.

During the two recent years, the two states have expanded their cooperation in the fields of textile, agriculture, water, electricity and petrochemistry.

posted by Anonymous @ 5/13/2005 12:03:00 PM  

Iranians Hold Their Noses as They Pick New President

Simon Tisdall, The Guardian UK:
Iranians may have to hold their noses when they go to the polls in next month's presidential election. This is only partly the result of a new craze for surgical nose jobs among Tehran's fashionable youth. READ MORE

Like the British electorate, Iran's 46 million voters are a bit sniffy about the candidates on offer. The favourite, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, 70, conveys a distinct whiff of mothballs. A loyalist of Iran's revolutionary leader, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, he has been president twice before, from 1989 to 1997.

Mr Rafsanjani is being portrayed by some in the west as the only man (women being ineligible to stand) capable of bridging the gulf between Iran's dominant mullahs and thwarted reformers.

But the real contest may lie elsewhere. The reform movement is in disarray after eight years of lost battles under the discredited outgoing president, Mohammad Khatami.

The more fundamental question, not to be decided at the ballot box, is whether Mr Rafsanjani can reconcile the warring conservative factions of ideologues and pragmatists that collectively control the levers of power.

The touchstone issues are Iran's controversial nuclear programmes, its under-performing centralised economy, and pent-up social discontent. Any one, if mishandled, could trigger a new national convulsion.

"Although Iran's hardline leadership has maintained a remarkable unity of purpose in the face of reformist challengers, it is badly fragmented over foreign policy issues, including the importance of nuclear weapons," said Kenneth Pollack, a former US national security council official, in Foreign Affairs magazine.

"At one end of the spectrum are hardliners who disparage economic and diplomatic considerations and put security concerns ahead of all others. At the opposite end are pragmatists who believe that fixing Iran's failing economy must trump all else if the clerical regime is to retain power over the long term."

Mr Rafsanjani, doyen of the pragmatic tendency, told a radio interviewer recently that western pressure on Iran to permanently freeze its nuclear enrichment activities was unjust and must be rejected.

"The Americans need a tangible enemy they can parade before other countries," he said. "Americans have always done that. And now Britain has joined them. It's nothing new. Britain often acts as America's lap-dog."

Yet unveiling his election manifesto this week, Mr Rafsanjani adopted a more positive tone towards Iranians, half of whom were born after the 1979 revolution, who yearn for normal relations with Europe and the US and a more open, civil society.

He promised to "build international confidence" by fostering links with the west and "meet the challenge of a young society" by addressing unemployment, poverty, gender inequality and greater economic liberalisation.

Whether his balancing act will work this time is doubtful. Hardline clerics are determined to oppose him come what may. Allegations about extra-judicial killings and corruption during his presidency have been resurrected.

His shop-worn brand of ambiguous pragmatism also has scant appeal for impatient younger generations, said Mohsen Sazegara, a former Khomeini official turned government critic. Iran had "undergone a profound post- revolution social transformation" not matched by its political institutions, he said in an online debate hosted by openDemocracy.co.uk.

"There is huge dissatisfaction with the way the country is governed. The overwhelm ing majority of young Iranians are against the regime. This situation is really dangerous." Radical reform, starting with a new constitution, was essential, Mr Sazegara said.

Mr Rafsanjani's strategy, assuming he is victorious, remains a mystery. "He must have made a deal with the supreme leader [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei]," a western diplomat speculated. "I can't believe he wants to be more repressive. They must have agreed on some sort of programme."

Arab newspapers have reported that Mr Rafsanjani will move to repair relations with the US, back the Saudi peace plan for Israel-Palestine, and revive his predecessor's domestic reforms.

But if he really has such plans, he is not letting on. Crossed fingers as well as nose-pegs may be needed on June 17.

posted by DoctorZin @ 5/13/2005 11:41:00 AM