Latest news with #NuclearNonProliferationTreaty
Express Tribune
5 days ago
- Politics
- Express Tribune
Israel will spread nuclear arms everywhere
Listen to article When ISIS started around 2014, many people opined that this terrorist group was created by the United States in order to further its interests in the Middle East. While that was not true, the United States actually created the conditions, which created the terror group. The US invaded Iraq and captured and tortured some of the men who had nothing to do with Al-Qaeda. Some of those men went on to create ISIS as a result of the humiliation they had faced at the hands of American occupiers. Similarly, the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty has been successful in preventing most of the states around the world from acquiring nuclear weapons not because the Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer, who was accused of selling the formula for nuclear bomb to US-designated rogue states, was confined but because most states did not feel the need to go nuclear. Nation states strongly believed that international laws, international bodies, and especially the United States would do the moral thing if these states ever faced aggression from other countries. That may have changed for good now if not before. Libya was one of those states that gave up its nuclear programme in exchange for benefits and guarantees from the United States. Gaddafi faced the result of that bad calculation and Libya is no longer there as we knew it. North Korea showed defiance in the face of similar pressure to give up its nuclear programme and while it is very poor, it has survived the American onslaughts and shenanigans. Pakistan is a vivid example as well. Iran signed the NPT. It allowed international inspectors on its soil to satisfy the needs of the world that it was not making a nuclear bomb. The result was that Iran was always accused of cheating and planning to rush toward making a bomb. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned the world that Iran would become a nuclear armed state within 3 to 5 years. He first said that in 1992 and then in 1995. He said it in 2015 and before and after that as well. None of it was true. Every time an American president opened his mouth about Iran, he issued a threat against it. Obama said, "I don't bluff" and "all options are on the table" including the "military component". After the 1979 revolution in Iran, America has worked against Iran at every step. It provided chemical weapons to Iraq to be used against Iran. It has imposed sanctions on Iraq and deterred other countries from buying Iranian oil. All despite Iran choosing not to go nuclear or maybe because of it. The truth is Iran never wanted to make a bomb. But that may have just changed. Their calculus, if they have people who can do so much as add and subtract, would only come to one conclusion: Iran must have nuclear weapons in order to deter the world from acting against it. Israel and its unconditional supporter America criticise and impose sanctions on nations that are capable of fighting and defending their sovereignty. Bloody wars are waged against countries that are defenseless, that are not nuclear armed states. Israel would have never ever dared of attacking Iran, had Iran been a nuclear armed state. More importantly, Iran playing the nice guy and being the norms following player have not yielded any defence benefits for it. It has rather weakened its defence. And this is not just playing inside the mind of Iran but rather inside the mind of every nation state. Being in the good books of the US by giving up the thought of nuclear weapons isn't a currency strong enough to be banked upon to ensure defence should a US ally attack you. Israel is creating the desire for states to want to go nuclear. Despite the habit of the world to tap itself on the shoulder for being civilised, in the end survival comes down to brute power. Not values, not education, not anything else.
New York Post
17-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Post
Israel's strikes on Iran: Letters to the Editor — June 17, 2025
The Issue: Israel's attacks on Iran's military leaders and its nuclear scientists and facilities. It was only a matter of time before Israel pulled the trigger ('Israel strikes Iran,' June 13). Iran and its proxies have been taunting Israel (and, for that matter, the United States) for a very long time. The revelation of nuclear near-preparedness was the straw that broke the camel's back. Israel will come out of this victoriously, and its neighbors and the rest of the world will be grateful for Israel's assault on this evil regime. Ronald Frank West Orange, NJ National security is the responsibility of the governing body of a nation. It is Israel's decision to bomb Iran to protect itself. It is not based on the opinion of other nations or groups. Ed Houlihan Ridgewood, NJ The bitter lesson from the 9/11 terrorist attack is to neutralize threats before they materialize on our shores. As the saying goes, 'If people show you who they are, believe them.' The last thing we need is to allow the world's most prolific sponsor of terrorism to have the world's most deadliest weapons. President Trump bent over backward to 'give peace a chance' and to remedy this dangerous standoff diplomatically. Whether the liberals of the world want to acknowledge it or not, the world is a lot safer with Iran defanged. Luana Dunn Medford President Trump loves to make deals, but there are no deals that the Iranian regime can be trusted to honor. A regime that violated the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty and the 2015 JCPOA (former President Obama's Iran deal), as well as its agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency on nuclear-facility inspections, can't be trusted to honor any deal concerning its nuclear weapons and ballistic-missile programs. The only acceptable conclusion to the current conflict between Israel and Iran is an Israeli victory. This means the complete nuclear disarmament of Iran, overseen by the United States and the IAEA. No deal that grants the Iranian regime anything else should even be considered, as this would be a recipe for a return of the Iranian nuclear threat currently being removed at such great cost. Daniel H. Trigoboff Williamsville In June 1981, Israel destroyed an Iraqi nuclear reactor, depriving Saddam Hussein of the ability to develop nuclear weapons and simultaneously doing the world a favor. This led to the declaration of the Begin Doctrine, which outlines Israel's policy of preventative military strikes to protect itself. Forty-four years later, Israel has delivered again by crippling the nuclear program of yet another rogue nation. Toda lech! Peter W. Kelly Hazlet, NJ The Issue: Sen. Alex Padilla being handcuffed and thrown out of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem's briefing. Last week, we witnessed a lawfully serving US senator wrestled to the floor and manhandled by security ('Senator in Noem boot,' June 13). Is George Orwell's fictional world now the reality in President Trump's American autocracy? Malcolm Odell, Jr. Exeter, NH I sent farewell letters to all my loved ones before carrying the sign 'De-throne the lying king' in a protest march this weekend. I figured if a US senator could be thrown to the ground and handcuffed for simply asking a question, they wouldn't hesitate for a moment in sending this 82-year-old woman to El Salvador. Sharon Austry Fort Worth, Texas
Wall Street Journal
01-06-2025
- General
- Wall Street Journal
Iran's Latest Nuclear Weapons Progress
Which is more troubling—what we know about Iran's nuclear program or what we don't know? Two new reports from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) underscore Iran's unceasing pursuit of nuclear weapons and longtime deception about its efforts. The IAEA is the United Nations nuclear watchdog, and its new reports were prepared in advance of a board meeting. In the past, Iran would slow its uranium enrichment before IAEA meetings and escape with a slap on the wrist. This time the Iranians haven't bothered with the charade. They've increased their stockpile of 60%-enriched uranium by about half since early February, the IAEA finds, amassing enough for 10 nuclear weapons. Note that this is since President Trump took office. Iran is the only state without nukes to produce 60%-enriched uranium, which is a stone's throw from weapons-grade and well beyond the levels required for civilian energy or research. The only reason to enrich to that level is for nuclear bombs, and Iran has been adding one bomb's worth of fissile material a month. A second IAEA report details Iran's noncompliance with an investigation into its undeclared nuclear material. Under its safeguards agreement, part of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran is obligated to account fully for its nuclear material and activities.
The Guardian
24-04-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Iran rejects demand from US to rely on imported uranium
Iran has insisted it must be allowed to have its own uranium enrichment capacity for its civil nuclear programme, rejecting a US demand that Tehran must rely exclusively on imported nuclear fuel. If Washington sticks to the position taken by Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, in the third round of talks in Oman on Saturday, the two sides will have hit their first major negotiating hurdle. They are trying to reach an agreement that blocks off Iran's access to a nuclear bomb in return for relief from economic sanctions. The Rubio plan is an attempt at compromise between those inside the US administration who say the only certain way to close off Iran's path to a nuclear bomb is to dismantle its entire nuclear programme and those that say Iran should be allowed to enrich low purity uranium subject to a full external inspection. That proposal is similar to the system set up in the 2015 nuclear deal from which Donald Trump withdrew the US in his first term. US national security adviser Mike Waltz had argued Tehran must agree to the 'full dismantlement' of its nuclear programme. But Rubio this week told The Free Press podcast: 'If Iran wants a civil nuclear programme, they can have one just like many other countries in the world.' He added that Tehran would be required to 'import enriched material'. Iran's chief negotiator, Abbas Araghchi, speaking in China, said: 'If America's only demand is that Iran not have nuclear weapons, this is an achievable demand, but if it has impractical and illogical demands, it is natural that we will run into problems.' In the text of a speech he had been due to deliver virtually to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace this week, Araghchi said: 'Iran had a right to be treated with equal respect and this includes our rights as a signatory the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, including the ability to produce fuel for our nuclear power plants. Iran must not be treated as an exception within the global non-proliferation framework. 'We have made abundantly clear that we have nothing to hide which is why Iran under the 2015 nuclear deal agreed to the most intrusive inspection regime the world has ever seen.' Araghchi spoke of Iran's long-term plan to build at least 19 more nuclear plants, vowing US firms could bid on the projects meaning 'tens of billions of dollars in potential contracts are up for grabs'. This was enough alone, he said, to revive the stagnant nuclear industry in the US. The former CIA director William Burns, speaking this week at the University of Chicago, said: 'I don't personally think that this Iranian regime is going to agree to zero domestic enrichment. And again, in the comprehensive agreement, that was limited to under 5%, which is what you need for a civilian programme, not for a weapons programme. But that's going to be one of the big challenges'. The US has appointed Michael Anton to head a technical team that will work alongside chief negotiator Steve Witkoff. Anton, a speech writer, chef and fashionista, is director of policy planning staff at the Department of State and not an expert on nuclear issues. However, he served on the national security staff in the first Donald Trump administration. He will head a team of 12 officials. Andrea Stricker, research fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, said it was 'a real risk that Trump could be pushed to negotiate something like an interim deal that would leave Iran's breakout capability intact with a short timeline to the bomb'. She added: 'We have to remember that Iran only needs a few 100 advanced centrifuges at a secret site to be able to ratchet back up within a couple of months to the level of Iranian stockpiles that it has now, and unless you're dismantling all of that infrastructure, the equipment, the stockpiles permanently, then you're not really getting much'. She predicted Trump might have trouble getting a weak deal through Congress which was 'already mobilising on the issue'.
