Opinion - Editorials   

Engage positively with Iran

The resumption of Iran's uranium conversion and enrichment activity, with the potential to produce nuclear weapons, after a nine-month freeze and the consequent International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution urging continuation of the suspension brokered by the European Union (EU) last November have again turned the spotlight on the credibility of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Teheran, whose nuclear ambitions have become suspicious since its hidden uranium processing programme of 18 years was exposed by an opposition group in 2003, broke the November deal with the EU, describing the latter's incentives in trade and energy cooperation as doing little to address the negation of the country's right under the NPT to develop an indigenous nuclear programme for civilian purposes. The EU, which is engaged in a diplomatic initiative with Iran over the imbroglio, and the United States have consistently demanded a complete and permanent halt to the country's uranium enrichment, although the nuclear-weapons states have an obligation under the NPT to cooperate with non-nuclear-weapons states in the development of this technology for the generation of nuclear fuel. The EU's engagement has led Iran to accept intrusive inspection of installations hitherto unknown to the nuclear watchdog, as well as sign the 1997 Additional Protocol on its IAEA safeguards agreement pending ratification. By contrast, the U.S. sabre-rattling, with threats of referral to the United Nations Security Council and refusal to rule out the military option, has pushed the nationalist elements in Iran to adopt an even tougher posture. It is not surprising, therefore, that Iran's newly-elected hard-line government, which has reopened the Isfahan nuclear plant, has rebuffed the EU's recent proposals even as it has left the doors open for negotiations.

Apprehensions about Iran's covert development of nuclear weapons, legitimate as they are, do not detract from the basic inequity of the global non-proliferation regime — accentuated by the failure of the nuclear powers to honour their disarmament obligations — or the further arbitrariness of the demand that Iran should relinquish its rights under the NPT. Moreover, the refusal to acknowledge the de facto nuclear status of Israel and the provocative and destabilising role of Western countries led by the U.S. in the geopolitics of West Asia will only further drag the region down the road of defiant nuclear ambitions to a nuclear catastrophe. In the wake of the renewal of Iran's nuclear programme, everything must be done to ensure that the Iranian leadership continues to engage the international community by guaranteeing the IAEA inspectors access to its nuclear sites, which is possible only as long as the country remains within the NPT. The world cannot afford to let Iran go North Korea's way; and the responsibility to ensure that it does not rests squarely with the United States and Europe.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

BJP's crisis widens and deepens
Engage positively with Iran
Posco venture: capital investment or exodus?
Sustaining our shared way of life
Minimum wage must be treated as sacrosanct
Indonesia's burning problem
Inevitable
Act tough
Irresponsible
Admission quota
Privilege issue
Gaza pullout
Time-tested food

Copyright © 2005, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu