Europeans prepare broad deal for Iran

International Herald Tribune:

By Steven R. Weisman, The New York Times

FRIDAY, AUGUST 5, 2005

WASHINGTON In a first test of the new leadership in Iran, the senior envoys of Europe are preparing a sweeping proposal that raises the possibility of Iran's acquiring light-water reactors and nuclear fuel, and of achieving a full political and economic relationship with the West, if Iran ends nuclear activities believed to be part of a weapons program, diplomats said Thursday.

The European proposal, which has been drafted in consultation with the Bush administration, could go to Iran as early this weekend, the diplomats said. They said it laid out a full spectrum of relationships with the West, from technology sharing and trade preferences to security guarantees, for Iran.

But because its bottom line is to seek a pledge by Iran to end activities that it insists on being able to continue, there is considerable doubt that Iran will accept it, at least right away.

Details of the package were disclosed by diplomats familiar with its content but who asked not to be identified, even by their country, because the package is supposed to be secret and they did not want to make them public before they went to Iran. "Our proposal pulls together a whole range of different ideas intended to forge a framework for an arrangement between Iran and the rest of the world," said a European official. "There are lots of political, economic and security elements, but the biggest piece is the offer of cooperation on a civilian nuclear program for Iran. We've never said that Iran cannot have one."

What the proposal makes clear, however, is that Iran cannot have what is called a "closed" fuel cycle in which every aspect of producing fuel, using it and disposing of it is in control of Iran. Instead, the proposal suggests that Iran be given supplies of fuel and then transfer them back after use for reactors to another country.

Iran would be obliged to continue its current suspension of the conversion of raw uranium into a form of gas that could then be enriched for use as a fuel with the use of centrifuges that international inspectors have found are in place in Iran in several places.

At the same time, the diplomats said, the proposal contains a face-saving provision for Iran that would concede that it has the "right" to the nuclear activities it is being asked to give up.

A diplomat said that the proposal suggests that nothing in any agreement with Iran should be interpreted as "affecting the inalienable rights of all the parties to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes," adding: "What it doesn't do is say that Iran can enrich uranium. The implicit meaning is clear."

Some diplomats said they did not think Iran would be surprised by the basic outlines of the proposal, because France, Germany and Britain - the partners in the talks with Iran that started last year - have held firm while preparing it, in spite of Iranian demands that it would not accept any proposal in which it would be barred from uranium conversion and enrichment.

Indeed, Iran announced last week that it was renouncing its pledge of last year to suspend these uranium activities and has called on the International Atomic Energy Agency to come to its facilities and break the seals that have prevented these activities, and also to install monitors and sensors for the purpose of observing them. Iran's announcement, made in the days leading up to the inauguration on Wednesday of the newly elected president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, until recently mayor of Tehran. Ahmadinejad was installed in office even as the leader of Iran's negotiating team declared that Iran would resume its nuclear activities but also wanted to continue the negotiations with Europe.

The European package, besides offering light-water reactors - which are considered by experts to be easier to monitor for proliferation problems than heavy water reactors - is to be accompanied by what one diplomat said was "a whole bunch of carrots" that might entice Iran to change its practices.

These include, he said, giving Iran favorable treatment in international conferences and security arrangements in the region and accelerated negotiations on trade and cooperation with the European Union. In addition, the offer is to include an offer of spare parts and equipment for aircraft, an offer that had been previously disclosed after it won the approval of the Bush administration earlier this year, since the supply of the parts would require American waivers.

The entire package is a culmination in what has been a two-year dance of diplomacy by the Europeans, with the Bush administration staying at a distance. The administration disdained the European initiative with Iran last year but reversed itself in the spring after consultations between President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Europe.

A European official said the proposal to Iran was likely to be controversial, no matter how attractive or unattractive it is to Iran. "The Iranians are certain to say that it is not enough, because that's what they usually say right away," said this official. "But others are bound to say that all these incentives being given to Iran should be given to other countries, too."

The dance with Iran has gone through an odd contortion even in the last week, with Iran saying - even before the new president was installed - that it would go ahead and break its earlier pledge to suspend uranium conversion and enrichment pending the outcome of current negotiations. Europeans warned that if Iran did so, they would immediate seek sanctions.

The belief in the West now is that Iran decided to do so because Iranian clerics and other leaders who control the process did not want Ahmadinejad to be tainted by having his first decision be to walk away from the discussions.

On the other hand, Iran is said by the West to be playing a shrewd game. It is not unilaterally breaking its promise to suspend uranium enrichment. Instead it is calling on the International Atomic Energy Agency to come to its nuclear facilities to break the seals and install new monitors and sensors so it can assert to the world that, while it is proceeding with uranium processing, not a single gram of fuel will go to a weapons program. The atomic agency, meanwhile, is slow-walking its plan to install the sensors and monitors to give the Europeans time to refine their proposal.

That Iranian tactic, said several Western diplomats, seems designed to woo wavering board members of the atomic agency - notably Russia, China and several countries with similar enrichment programs - that it is simply doing what other countries do and should be allowed to do. The Iranian tactic raises doubts in the West that if Iran continues to defy Europe and the United States, then they will be able to get the agency board to refer Iran's case to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions.