U.S.
On The Warpath With The IAEA
By Dr. Shireen M.
Mazari
22 September, 2007
The
News International
Being
at the IAEA these days has once again reminded one that U.S. diatribes
are not limited to regimes and states that act contrary to U.S. goals
or even wishes. In the usual alliance of the government and the media
-- clearly the U.S. media has its own interpretations of a "free"
media -- the Americans have launched a blitzkrieg against the IAEA and
especially its head, ElBaradei.
The issue, which has aroused
a hail of abuse is Iran's nuclear program. What has irked the U.S. is
the fact that the IAEA under its present leadership has proactively
sought to resolve this issue peacefully by dialoguing with Iran instead
of supporting the American position of seeking confrontation through
provocation so that a pretext can be provided for U.S. military action.
Remember Iraq and the WMD issue?
Now we have begun to see
a spate of articles targeting ElBaradai in the U.S. and U.S.-controlled
print media. Some have been downright abusive with the Washington Post
labeling him a "rogue" regulator. Ah that word which has become
so central to the Bush era in the U.S. If one is not falling in line
with the U.S., then one is a "rogue" of one form or another.
The problem arises when heads
of international organizations, selected by the international community,
are actually abused because they fall out of step with the U.S. Some
UN secretary generals also had to suffer a similar fate, but the language
now being used by the U.S. media for Baradei goes further than earlier
vilifications of international personalities.
Worse still, this time a
newly resurgent rightwing leadership in countries like France are supporting
this new aggression against U.S. detractors, while British publications
like The Economist continue to be predictable in their criticism.
Even the EU launched an attack
against Baradei in the just concluded IAEA Board meeting, which led
to the IAEA chief actually walking out for some time from the meeting.
Such are the antics of the U.S. and its European allies in international
organizations today.
Why is ElBaradai being abused
and vilified with such vigor? What is his crime? Very simply, he has
managed to get Iran back into a dialogue with a timeline for resolving
the nuclear issue.
The IAEA and Iran have recently
agreed to operationalize an agreement with specific timeframes for moving
from one stage to the next, in terms of ensuring Iran's compliance with
non-proliferation requirements under its NPT obligations and international
demands as embodied in the UNSC resolution putting sanctions on Iran.
And all this has been the
result of the IAEA's continuous pursuit of efforts to re-engage Iran
in a meaningful dialogue. That has clearly upset the U.S. and its allies
like France, where the new rightwing leader, Sarkozy, had threatened
Iran with military action if it did not do as the U.S. and its allies
demanded.
Nor is this the only disturbing
aspect of the new U.S. discriminatory approach towards non-proliferation
and nuclear disarmament, which is being fast-tracked after the Indo-U.S.
nuclear deal. So one can expect many more battles within the IAEA and
other disarmament fora for the future also.
There is the Indo-U.S. nuclear
deal itself, known as the 123 Agreement, which has now been revised
to accommodate the Indian demand that no conditionalities be put on
future testing by India in terms of assurance of nuclear fuel supplies.
The result is an American
commitment to build up India's strategic reserves of nuclear fuel and
to ensure that if the U.S. is unable to continue its supplies of nuclear
fuel, allies of the U.S. will step in.
The 123 Agreement's final
stage of fruition will come after India has evolved a Safeguards Agreement
format with the IAEA, and the Nuclear Suppliers' Group (NSG) has put
its support behind the Agreement. Clearly, the non-proliferation regime
reflected in the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which is now being
contravened across the board by the U.S. itself.
The first multilateral forum,
which will face the follow up from the 123 Agreement will be the IAEA,
since India has to evolve safeguards agreements for its civilian nuclear
installations with this Agency before the U.S. Congress can ratify the
Agreement.
The IAEA has a standard Safeguards
Agreement for non-NPT states, signed for instance by Pakistan for its
Chashma plant, which does not have a limited timeframe or any preconditions
for enforcement of the safeguards -- that is, no escape clause.
But countries can try to
add their own clauses in such an agreement, which is finally put before
the IAEA Board for approval. The assumption is that India would be seeking
an India-specific Safeguards Agreement with preconditions and with a
limited timeframe. Another step India has to cross is approval from
the Nuclear Suppliers' Group (NSG) for the 123 Agreement, which would
require the NSG to make India-specific exceptions in their export controls.
It is expected that India will get what it is seeking from the IAEA
and the NSG.
That is why the IAEA is a
critical forum for the U.S. and India right now and one can see the
U.S. and a number of European states having intense discussions with
India on the sidelines of the ongoing IAEA Annual General Conference.
It is at this conference
that the IAEA chief once again, in his inaugural speech, reiterated
Iran's cooperation with the IAEA and the IAEA's conclusion that it had
verified that of the declared nuclear materials by Iran none had been
diverted, even as ElBaradei continued to bemoan the fact that Iran has
shown no inclination to stop production of its Heavy Water facility
at Arak and there were still outstanding issues the IAEA had with Iran.
He referred to the positive development of the time bound agreement
between the IAEA and Iran to resolve all outstanding issues.
That is why one should expect
the U.S. diatribes against the IAEA chief to continue. After all, he
has not played ball with U.S. designs to up the ante against Iran --
something that will further destabilize the whole region.
These are certainly interesting
times at the IAEA, with one international organization proactively engaged
in carrying out its internationally-sanctioned mandate in the face of
a U.S. that is increasingly oblivious to international laws and norms
of behavior.
The pity is that states in
Europe that traditionally stood for such norms are falling in line with
the Bush administration. Perhaps most ironic, India, which had championed
an anti-imperial stance and a non-discriminatory approach to international
relations has now become a symbol of such a discriminatory approach
through its dubious nuclear deal with the U.S. Such are the ironies
of international politics!
Dr. Shireen Mazari
is director general of the Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad.
She received her PhD in political science from Columbia University,
New York and honors from London School of Economics and Political Science.
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