Reflecting a growing pessimism, a leading London think tank said Tuesday that the diplomatic talks appear doomed to failure.
"Prospects that the current negotiations between the EU-3 and Iran will produce a lasting resolution of the Iranian nuclear issue are not encouraging," said John Chipman, director of the International Institute of Strategic Studies. "The EU3-Iran talks seem headed for inevitable failure."
LONDON: Failing global efforts to curb nuclear proliferation could see nuclear weapons fall into the hands of terrorists, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) think-tank warned yesterday.
The current system to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, based around the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the 187-signatory agreement which came into force in 1970, was in danger of “eroding”, the London-based group said.
The feared spread of nuclear weapons to North Korea and Iran was among factors helping to accelerate this process, it said in its Strategic Survey 2004/5 publication.
Regional instability, “gaping” loopholes in the NPT regime, illegal supply networks and “lax leadership” by the existing nuclear powers pointed to “a first-order crisis that, if not urgently addressed, could trigger an nuclear catastrophe”, the report said.
“The most chilling possibility is the acquisition of a nuclear weapon by Al Qaeda or a similar terrorist group dedicated to inflicting mass civilian casualties and impervious to threats of retaliation,” it noted.
“The possible emergence of new nuclear-weapon states in North Korea and Iran, the threat of nuclear terrorism around the globe and the relaxed pace of nuclear disarmament strongly suggest the existing nuclear non-proliferation regime – with the NPT at its core – is eroding.
“Moreover, it is being replaced with an ‘every man for himself’ mentality that, if left unchecked, could spawn a new generation of nuclear weapons and increase the risk that the transnational Islamist terrorist network over which Osama bin Laden loosely presides becomes a nuclear power.”
Iran was still most likely “several years away” from developing a nuclear weapon, but North Korea probably already had at least one if not two nuclear bombs.
“North Korea raises the dual risk of a growing nuclear-weapon inventory in the world’s most isolated regime, and the possibility of nuclear terrorism through the sale or transfer of nuclear material or weapons,” the report said.
The IISS called for a renewed commitment to the principles of non-proliferation and disarmament by the existing nuclear powers.
The annual report also said Washington’s policies of promoting democracy in Iraq and elsewhere look “increasingly effective”, and even the threat from terrorism abated slightly during 2004.
The think-tank noted however that the situation in Iraq was also creating a recruitment effect for terrorist groups, an aspect which remained “the proverbial elephant in the living room” of US foreign policy.
The report said that the improvement in the overall strategic climate was helped by factors such as the death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, but it added that US President George W Bush’s foreign
policies also seemed to be bearing fruit.
“Even though the Bush policy was bold, controversial and sometimes divisive, his aggressive global agenda of promoting freedom, and democracy appeared increasingly effective,” the IISS said.
Counter-terrorism efforts over the period had also seen an overall net gain, the report argued, despite the seemingly “counterproductive” aspects of some of the United States’s self-declared “war on terror”. – AFP
