IRAN ON TARGET OR TEHRAN IN THE FIRING LINE

The Near East and adjacent regions, including the South Caucasus, again find themselves threatened by a major war, and a war whose consequences could be dire for the whole world. I am talking about a possible strike against Iran. What had long been an exaggerated scenario has now assumed the contours of reality after news filtered through the world's media, clearly with the help of interested forces, about a new report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) which said that Iran had made considerable progress in developing the military aspects of its nuclear programme. The document gives no direct indication that the Islamic Republic is actually currently engaged on manufacturing a nuclear bomb, but it stresses that "the agency is unable to provide creditable assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material or undeclared nuclear activity in Iran and, consequently, it cannot confirm that all the nuclear material in the IRI is being used exclusively for peaceful purposes". According to the report, Tehran was working on creating nuclear weapons at least before 2003. In particular, it was working on mounting a nuclear warhead on the Shahab-3 medium-range missile which is capable of hitting targets in Israel. Extracts from the IAEA report were like an exploding bomb in the flow of global information. Israel immediately announced its intention to inflict a mass strike on Iranian nuclear facilities. In any event, Israeli President Shimon Peres said that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made it clear he was just one step away from giving the order to strike against the IRI.

Fat was thrown into the fire by a report in the British Daily Mail newspaper which said, quoting sources in the special services, that Israel would inflict strikes on Iran either at Christmas or early in the New Year. At the same time, the Jewish state would rely on the "logistical support" of the USA. By this they clearly mean the transfer by the United States to Israel of 55 bombs to destroy well defended facilities (hidden deep underground) on Iranian territory, which the Israeli media reported, quoting reliable French sources.

It has been clear for a long time that the West, and above all the United States, will stop at nothing to halt Tehran's nuclear programme. And no sooner had there been speculation that Iran might be close to possessing nuclear weapons than there began a mass brainwashing of world public conscience to convince them of the need to destroy the Islamic Republic's strategic potential. Taking this into account, the question as to precisely which states would take part in a proposed military campaign, instigated by the US and Israel is, to all intents and purposes, of no major significance.

At the same time, it cannot be ruled out that the West has unfurled another cycle of escalation of tension around the IRI's nuclear programme just to get a decision in the UN Security Council on imposing a strict regime of economic sanctions against that country in order to virtually paralyse domestic life there. This is supported by the fact that immediately after the publication of the data in the IAEA report, the US, France, Germany and Great Britain spoke of the need to tighten sanctions against Iran. At the same time relevant work began with Russia and China who opposed the adoption of another anti-Iran resolution in the UN Security Council. In the opinion of Beijing, imposing new sanctions is not a constructive way of solving the Iranian nuclear problem.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry warned that "additional sanctions against Iran could lead to new shockwaves in the Near East". Russia, meanwhile, believes that the only way out of this situation is a resumption of talks between the "six" (Russia, China, the US, France, Britain and Germany) and Iran. They were broken off in 2009 when the IAEA Board of Governors condemned Iran for the construction of a second uranium enrichment plant. Russian diplomats note that the new IAEA report on Iran's nuclear programme contains no fundamentally new information, and is merely a "compilation of known facts which have deliberately been given a political slant". In this regard one recalls the story of the "existence" of weapons of mass destruction in the Saddam Hussein regime which, it would seem, had to be weaned off showing similar indiscretion.

Meanwhile, Iran itself described the IAEA's statements as fabricated and groundless. IRI President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stressed that his country had no intention of stopping work on its nuclear programme. As regards the threat of a strike against Iran, Tehran did not mix its words in its response. The deputy chief of the general staff of the Iranian army, Masoud Jazaeri, warned that if Israel dared to attack Iran the Islamic Republic would wipe Israel off the face of the earth. And one of the main targets of Iranian strikes would be the Israeli nuclear reactor at Dimona.

So, the situation around Iran has reached rock bottom. Will the world breathe more easily if it is convinced that the threat of a new major war in the Near East has been removed, or will the region inevitably be dragged into a bloody confrontation, the consequences of which could destroy the whole, already shaky, system of international security? We may get the answers to these questions very soon and one would like to hope that the region and the whole international community will be given the chance to find a peaceful solution to the so-called "Iran problem".