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New
Delhi, 29 September 2005
India
voted against Iran in the Security Council and K Subrahmayam is
pleased but the Hindu Editor is angry and we reproduce the first
paragraphs of their writings to say that Indians have minds of their
own.
We
feel India has to toe the US line so that our economy improves at US
expense and India can tackle Iran separately with Artha Shastr
diplomacy of the Chanakya variety and say –– you Iran
signed the NPT so now you have to obey its International norms. Iran
is also a proud nation that needs understanding, and it has energy
resources. It has strategy and is opposing USA tooth and nail and
President Bush has no answers for the present, to rein in Iran's
nuclear ambitions. He needed India's cooperation.
Iranian
Defence without US support are keeping P3 Orions flying, they keep
old US Corvettes sailing and we saw their good condition at the
Indian Naval Fleet Review in Mumbai in 2002. The Iranians are making
missiles capable of hitting Israel and want the Bomb badly. They
have huge Uranium reserves, which India covets and we have a gas
deal with Iran –– so India has to play the game to win both
sides.
National
Geographic and Jane’s Defence weekly had done excellent stories in
the August issue about THE ATOM BOMB and Iran's nuclear capability
respectively, with pictures to understand that Iran is just a
screwdriver away from the bomb. Iranian leaders have ambitions to be
the regional power in the Middle East as they see Iraq crumbling.
In
Iraq the US Forces are very loyal and patriotic –– and we
venture to say that the fine Indian soldier fights first for his
regiment and then for his country but the US soldier fights for his
country first –– let us see for how long in Iraq. There are
predictions that there will be more countries broken up in the world
in the next 10 years –– such as Yugoslavia, USSR and
Czechoslovakia –– into 13 countries. Iraq may one day have a
Shiite South, a Sunni centre and Kurdish North and so forth.
This
suits Iran and in any case Afghanistan will break up in the coming
years if USA and NATO cannot tame the warlords. In all this India
must play a diplomatic role and in the case of Iran's nuclear
programme, PM Manmohan Singh has done his bit by seeing to it that
President Bush did not impose his will on Iran but let IAEA do its
job, as Iran is a NPT member and should abide by the NPT rules.
India cleverly never joined the NPT or the CTBT.
The
UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, speaking on behalf of the EU,
issued the following statement on 24 September, following the
adoption of a resolution at the IAEA Board of Governors in Vienna,
”Today, the IAEA Board has just passed a resolution finding Iran
not compliant with its Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) obligations,
whilst deferring Iran's report to the Security Council. The voting
was 22 in favour, with one against (Venezuela) and 12 abstentions. (
Venezuala's President hates America like Cuba's Castro but Venezuala
offered Bush any amount of oil to tide over Katrina which USA
refused.)
“Both
the fact of the resolution and the scale of the vote in its favour
are very important if we are to prevent the spread of nuclear
weapons capability. All this would not have been achieved without a
firm and united approach by the E3/EU and excellent work by our
diplomats in Vienna and other capitals. The details in Dr El
Baradei's latest report and Iran's failure to take and stick to the
confidence building measures the IAEA Board had earlier called for,
made such a determination inevitable.”
“My
European colleagues and I have listened carefully to the concerns of
our international partners that we should allow more time for
negotiations. That is why we agreed that a report to the Security
Council by the IAEA would not be made immediately. I hope Iran will
take this opportunity to meet the concerns expressed by the Board:
the European side for its part is prepared to resume negotiations
within the framework agreed between the Europeans and Iran last
November.”
“Iran
has an opportunity now to address the clear concerns of the IAEA,
and the lack of confidence in Iran's nuclear intentions. It is only
when Iran demonstrates beyond any doubt that it is not seeking a
nuclear weapons capability that it will be able to develop a better
relationship with Europe and the international community as a
whole.”
The
adoption of the resolution by majority vote followed several days of
intense debate at the IAEA Board following Iran's decision to
restart its uranium conversion facility at Isfahan in early August
and a consensus resolution adopted by the IAEA Board on 11 August,
which urged Iran to resume the suspension of its nuclear fuel cycle
activities. On 22 September, a Wall Street Journal article by E3
Foreign Ministers plus Javier Solana explained more fully the
European position on Iran’s nuclear programme in an EU statement
delivered to the IAEA Board on 21 September.
India’s Shameful
Vote Against Iran
The
Hindu, Editorial, September 26, 2005
The
decision to vote adversarially against Iran at Saturday’s crucial
meeting of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy
Agency is evidence of the Manmohan Singh Government’s shameful
willingness to abandon the independence of Indian foreign policy for
the sake of strengthening its "strategic partnership" with
the United States. Made in stealth without any broad-based
discussion within the Government or with allies and national
political parties, the top-level political decision (which was
reported in The Hindu of September 17) conflicts with proclaimed
Indian policy. It bears emphasis that the resolution adopted by the
IAEA Board 22-1 with 12 abstentions has grave international
implications. Specifically, it recalls Iran’s alleged
"failures in a number of instances," as a party to the
Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, to meet its obligations under its
NPT Safeguards Agreement, and its alleged "policy of
concealment." Adopting a menacing tone, the resolution finds
Iran in "non- compliance in the context of Article XII.C of the
Agency’s Statute"; among other things, this Article allows
the Board "to report the non-compliance to ...the Security
Council and the General Assembly of the United Nations."
Further, the resolution finds that Iran’s nuclear activities and
"the resulting absence of confidence" that its nuclear
programme is "exclusively for peaceful purposes" have
given rise to "questions that are within the competence of the
Security Council, as the organ bearing the main responsibility for
the maintenance of international peace and security." Finally,
it threatens that the Board "will address the timing and
content of the report" to be submitted to the U.N. Security
Council for possible punitive action.
Vote
in Vienna
A
Correct Stand; Not To Affect Ties With Iran
By
K. Subrahmanyam
The
Tribune, September 26, 2005
The
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution adopted on
September 24 on the implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement
in Iran earned 22 votes in favour, one vote against (from Venezuela)
and 12 abstentions. In other words, except for Venezuela, no country
found the resolution so objectionable as to vote against, neither
the four Islamic countries nor Russia and China, nor the nonaligned.
The
resolution makes no direct mention of a referral to the Security
Council nor of any sanctions. It asks the Director-General of the
IAEA to deal with the Iranian authorities further and leaves it to
the Board of Governors of the IAEA to address the timing and content
of the report required. In other words, the resolution is a victory
for all those who advocated that there should be more time for
diplomacy to work.
Now
the Iranians are on notice that they should demonstrate to the world
that they are cooperating to the satisfaction of the IAEA to fulfil
the requirements of the statute, and should not ask the IAEA and the
international community to accept prima facie the verbal declaration
that they are not attempting to develop nuclear weapons capability.
This suspicion about Iran is rooted in its attempts going back to
1987 to develop uranium enrichment capability with the help of Dr
A.Q. Khan and his associates from Pakistan.
Iran
carried on for well over a decade with its clandestine activity for
uranium enrichment in violation of its obligations under the NPT. It
was discovered because of the disclosures of a defector. Enrichment
of uranium for civil nuclear energy purposes is permissible. Then
why did Iran not notify its activities to the IAEA but preferred to
proceed clandestinely?
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