Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press April 07, 2004
Muammar Qaddafi Is Enriching Himself With Uraniums
By Boris Volkhonsky.
Source: Kommersant, March 11, 2004
Participants in a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency's Board of Directors in Vienna focused their attention yesterday on two countries -- Libya and Iran. . . .
Tripoli's statement of Dec. 19 of last year, in which it announced that it was abandoning all plans to acquire weapons of mass destruction, basically turned the entire system of Libya's relations with the world community upside-down. In the eyes of the West, Libya instantaneously went from erstwhile enemy and "rogue nation" to all but an example to be emulated. Yesterday's meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors only confirmed this trend, which has been evident since December.
The IAEA Board adopted a resolution yesterday giving high marks to Tripoli's steps to dismantle its program to develop weapons of mass destruction. Granted, the resolution calls for referring the Libyan program to the UN Security Council for consideration, but only for informational purposes. Libya is in no danger of having sanctions imposed on it. . . .
The day before yesterday's meeting of the IAEA Board, the eldest son of Libyan revolutionary leader Muammar Qaddafi, Saif al-Islam Qaddafi, who is on a visit to Paris, outlined the very bright prospects that are opening up for his country as a result of the recent breakthrough.
First, cooperation in the oil industry, especially with American companies, is picking up. The younger Mr. Qaddafi said that representatives of ConocoPhillips, Marathon Oil and Occidental Petroleum returned to Libya last week after an almost 20-year hiatus (they ceased all operations in Libya in 1986 in the wake of a toughening of sanctions that the US had imposed back in 1981). The heads of those companies will visit Tripoli next week. . . .
Second, Libya is gradually emerging from diplomatic isolation. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi visited the country in February. And during his visit to Paris, Saif al-Islam Qaddafi has conveyed an invitation to French President Jacques Chirac. Tripoli is also expecting to host US Assistant Secretary of State William Burns and US Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham.
Washington has also softened its position with respect to military programs. An unidentified State Department official said that Libya might be allowed to keep the Scud ballistic missiles in its arsenal. According to the globalsecurity.org Web site, Libya currently has 80 launchers and approximately three times that many missiles.
The situation with Iran is much more complex. Tehran is stubbornly insisting that its nuclear program is intended for exclusively civilian purposes. Washington is just as stubbornly rejecting Iran's statements. On Tuesday [March 9], representatives of the US, on the one hand, and the "European trio" (Great Britain, Germany and France), on the other, managed to reach a compromise on the text of an IAEA resolution on Iran. They deleted the most threatening passages from the resolution -- passages that condemned Iran for refusing to cooperate with the IAEA and demanded that the issue of sanctions against Iran be referred to the UN Security Council. The resulting draft resolution was well balanced: It applauds Tehran's efforts to be more open, but also expresses concern over the fact that Iran's cooperation with the IAEA is "incomplete" and that information about past and current nuclear programs gives an "inexact picture."
The IAEA has taken the issue of sanctions off its agenda for now, but Washington is still considering the possibility. A high-ranking State Department official said that "if Iran remains obstinate, sanctions will be the logical consequence of that."
Even the compromise resolution drew a very sharp reaction from Tehran. Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said that his country might cease cooperating with the IAEA altogether unless the European states can persuade the US to stop putting pressure on Iran. . . .
Mr. Kharrazi added that Tehran reserves the right to resume its uranium-enrichment program. Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani acknowledged yesterday that Iran's defense industry had already built several centrifuges for obtaining enriched uranium. But the minister stressed that Iran needs the enriched uranium solely for civilian purposes -- its nuclear power industry. . . .
© Copyright 2004, The Current Digest of the Soviet Press
