Monday, December 3, 2007

Nuclear-Free Iran

The US intelligence community in an astonishing report has reversed its previous findings and now believes with high confidence that Iran halted its nuclear weapon program in fall 2003. The new National Intelligence Estimate believes with moderate confidence Iran will not be able to enrich enough fissile material for a weapon until sometime between 2010 and 2015.

For many Iran analysts, including this lowly reporter, the findings were as explosive as highly enriched uranium! How could we now explain the nuclear policy of the Islamic Republic if the country was not working on a bomb? Has the Iranian government taken life-and-death risks only to enrich uranium to run an electricity-generating power plant?

The growing isolation of Iran as a result of its non-compromising policy on uranium enrichment has already been a disaster for the country’s foreign trade and international relations. As late as last Friday, the chief nuclear negotiator of the extremist government in power in Tehran made such a scene during his meeting with EU foreign policy chief that it even convinced China to agree to a third round of sanctions against Iran (please see the article below posted earlier today).

Short of irrationality and a Saddam-syndrome prevalent among the power circles in Tehran, the nuclear policy of this government can not be easily explained and can only result in more serious disasters for the country.

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