While the UN Security Council had given Tehran August 31 as the date by which it was asked to end its nuclear programme, cracks are evident in the five veto wielding permanent members of the UN body on how to deal with the issue.
As the US and its sidekick, Britain, have been pushing for sanctions against Iran; the other three, China, Russia and France have said that there is still room for more diplomacy. China, in fact, termed Iran's response as having some "positive elements", which need to be studied carefully.
Although little is known of the proposals that Iran has sent to the UNSC, but it has been consistently refusing to renounce its right to the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes - something it is entitled to as an NPT signatory.
The sticking point has been Iran's insistence to continue its uranium enrichment programme, which the US and Europe's big-three - Britain, France and Germany - say it could use to make bombs.
The incentives package that the Europeans offered Iran in exchange for a commitment to discontinue the enrichment programme include offers to provide light water nuclear reactors, lifting of restrictions on technology transfer, and the country's full rehabilitation in the international community. For its part, Russia had offered to do the enrichment work for Iran on its own territory.
On the face of it, these offers look pretty good. But what they fail to do is to address Iran's basic security concerns. It has good reason to be suspicious of US intentions since the latter has made no secret of its desire to bring about a regime change in Tehran, which, not too long ago, the Bush administration had included in its infamous 'Axis of Evil' designation.
Besides, while the Americans are now participating in talks with another "Axis of Evil" member, North Korea, they refuse to have direct discussions with Iran to resolve the nuclear issue. Recently, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made it clear that her country has no intention to address Iran's concerns when she said that it is strange that Tehran should talk about security guarantees when its nuclear programme is for its energy needs.
Iran's security is threatened not only by Washington's overt and covert efforts to isolate and punish it through whatever means possible. Another source of its worries is the nuclear programme of Israel which is known to possess some 200 nuclear weapons.
In fact, Iran alone is not uneasy about Israel's nuclear arsenal, Arab countries, too, are fearful of it and have been calling for a nuclear-free Middle East. Iran having emerged as a strong regional power which poses a challenge to the Zionist state's policy of aggression and expansion, Washington has openly been indicating it could use all means at its disposal, including sanctions and outright attack on its nuclear facilities.
As long as Washington brandishes threats of regime change and destruction of its nuclear facilities by Israeli forces, Iran is unlikely to give up its nuclear programme. Going by the neo-con mindset, it is quite possible that they would want to resort to military force to achieve their objective.
In fact, experts point out that they would have acted by now but for the fact that the country's nuclear facilities are spread out over a vast area and are located underground, making it difficult to eliminate them completely. Still, Bush keeps saying that the military option remains on the table.
The French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy, speaking in the context of possible UN sanctions warned of grave dangers that are inherent in such a West vs. Iran confrontation. It would be worse, he said, "to lend fire to a confrontation between Iran on one side - the Muslim world - and the West." Having learned a sobering lesson in the Iraq adventure, it should be clear to the Bush administration by now that military power has its limits.
It must, therefore, talk directly to Iran, along with its European allies, to find a way out of the present impasse. Otherwise, given the existing divisions within the UNSC permanent members any country in Iran's position would be tempted to go ahead to create a balance of terror to counter its threat perception.
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