Iran,
International Law
and Nuclear Disarmament
PressInfo #
236
March
28, 2006
By
David
Krieger,
TFF Associate*
See also Associate
Richard Falk's TFF PressInfo 237 - a different angle on
the same issues.
Iran has been accused of secretly
pursuing a nuclear weapons program. Although Iranian
leaders claim to be enriching uranium only for peaceful
nuclear energy purposes, these claims have been treated
with derision by the West. Despite the fact that most
experts believe that Iran is still years away from
developing a nuclear weapon, there are media reports
suggesting that Israel and the US are making plans to
attack Iran's nuclear facilities, should Iran not give up
its uranium enrichment program. Given this possible
military scenario, and the recent vote by the Board of
the International Atomic Energy Agency to report Iran to
the United Nations Security Council, what is Iran likely
to do?
First, Iran will continue to assert
its right under Article IV the Non-Proliferation Treaty
(NPT) to pursue a peaceful nuclear energy program.
Article IV refers to the "inalienable right" of states to
nuclear energy. The parties to the treaty are promised
assistance from more technologically advanced countries
in pursuing this right. While this may be considered an
untenable stipulation in the treaty, it is, nonetheless,
the way the law stands. In accord with the treaty, in
exchange for pursuing this right, Iran must agree to
inspections of its nuclear facilities to assure that
there has been no diversion of nuclear materials for
making weapons. In fairness, if this aspect of the
Non-Proliferation Treaty is to be altered, it must be
done for all states, not singling out Iran for special
punitive treatment.
Currently, uranium enrichment
plants are operating in China, France, Germany, India,
Japan, Netherlands, Pakistan, Russia, United Kingdom and
United States. Of these, Germany and Japan are
non-nuclear weapons states that are parties to the
Non-Proliferation Treaty, and thus have a similar
relationship to the treaty as does Iran. Brazil, another
party to the NPT, is reported to be close to starting up
a uranium enrichment plant.
Second, Iran will assert that under
Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, the United
States and the other nuclear weapons states have not
fulfilled their obligations for "good faith" negotiations
for nuclear disarmament. It will point to the 1996
International Court of Justice advisory opinion that
states: "There exists an obligation to pursue in good
faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to
nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and
effective international control." And it will point out
the blatant refusal by the nuclear weapons states to
carry out their Article VI commitments, including the
plans by the United States to develop the Reliable
Replacement Warhead, a new type of nuclear warhead to
extend the viability of the US nuclear
arsenal.
Third, Iran will question the
unequal treatment that it is receiving as compared to
another Middle Eastern country, Israel, which is thought
to possess some 200 nuclear weapons. Iran will note that
there is not only a double standard between nuclear
"haves" and "have-nots," but also a double standard
between Israel and other countries in the Middle East. It
will rightly point out that there have long been calls
for a Middle East Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone, including at
the 1995 Non-Proliferation Treaty Review and Extension
Conference, which have been largely ignored by Israel and
the Western countries.
Article X of the Non-Proliferation
Treaty allows for a party to withdraw after giving three
months notice if it decides that "the supreme interests
of its country" are being jeopardized by the treaty. With
threats of an attack against Iran if it does not cease
its uranium enrichment, and the example of Israel
developing a nuclear arsenal outside the NPT, it would
not be unreasonable for Iran's leaders to conclude that
Iranian interests were better served by withdrawing from
the treaty. Should they reach this conclusion, they may
also point to the precedent of the Bush administration's
withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty
in 2002 on grounds that US national interests were being
jeopardized by that treaty.
The Non-Proliferation Treaty is the
most widely adhered to treaty in the area of arms control
and disarmament. Only four countries are not parties to
this treaty - India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea -
and all have developed nuclear arsenals.
To effectively preclude Iran from
leaving the treaty and possibly developing a nuclear
arsenal, and avoid risking the significant dangers
involved in preventive military strikes, larger problems
must be solved. First, the Non-Proliferation Treaty
regime must be made universal, applicable to all states,
bringing in the four states currently outside the treaty.
Second, the nuclear weapons states, both within the
treaty and those currently outside of it, must begin the
good faith negotiations for nuclear disarmament required
by the treaty. These negotiations must be aimed at a
Nuclear Weapons Convention that provides for the phased
and internationally verifiable elimination of all nuclear
weapons from all national arsenals. Third, all enrichment
of uranium and reprocessing of plutonium, fissile
materials that can be used to make nuclear weapons, must
be brought under strict and effective international
control.
If this sounds utopian, it is
surely no more so than believing that the current set of
double standards, those that allow some states to
continue to possess nuclear weapons while seeking to
prevent others from having them, will be maintainable
indefinitely. It is also certainly no more utopian than
believing that preventive war, such as that waged
illegally against Iraq, is a reasonable answer to every
suspicion of nuclear weapons proliferation.
The only safe number of nuclear
weapons in the world is zero. The only way to reach this
number is for the nuclear weapons states to become
serious about the "unequivocal undertaking" to eliminate
their nuclear arsenals that they made at the 2000
Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference.
Until they do so, the prospects are
high of countries like Iran following North Korea's
example of withdrawing from the Non-Proliferation Treaty
and pursuing nuclear weapons programs.
*) David Krieger is president of
the Nuclear
Age Peace Foundation. He is
the author of many studies of peace in the Nuclear Age,
including Nuclear Weapons and the World Court.
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