A masked exiled Iranian man protests outside the Geneva headquarters of the U.N. during a meeting on nuclear power in Iran, Oct. 1, 2009. Six world powers met with Iran in Switzerland for talks at which U.S. officials said it was necessary for Tehran to show it was not hiding plans for a nuclear bomb. (Ruben Sprich/Reuters)

Opinion: A hidden deal on Iran sanctions?

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Since Russia and China will not be on board, one can only hope the Obama Administration has other plans, writes David J. Kramer.

By David J. Kramer — Special to GlobalPost

Published: October 17, 2009 09:11 ET

WASHINGTON, D.C. — For those hoping the international community might finally be getting more serious about possible sanctions against Iran for its continued defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions, the headlines this week were downright discouraging. “In Face of Sanctions Push, China Warms Up to Iran,” The New York Times declared on Friday. “China Lauds Ties with Iran,” according to Thursday's Wall Street Journal. And, as Charles Krauthammer noted in his column in Friday’s Washington Post, his own paper said on Wednesday: “Russian Not Budging on Iran Sanctions; Clinton Unable to Sway Counterpart.”

None of this, of course, should be a major surprise in light of the Oct. 1 meeting in Geneva of the so-called P5+1 with Iran. At that meeting, Iranian representatives agreed to a process by which Iran might let in international inspectors and might send lightly enriched uranium to Russia for further enrichment. Russia and China have been hoping for that process, which removes the need for even any talk of sanctions, let alone the sanctions themselves.

Russian and Chinese resistance to sanctions is certainly not new. Several U.N. resolutions against Iran passed during the Bush Administration were severely watered down at the insistence of Moscow and Beijing. Now, those capitals don’t even want to talk about the possibility of taking U.N. action against Tehran. It would be “premature,” in the words of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Added Prime Minister Vladimir Putin several thousand miles away in Beijing: “There is no need to frighten the Iranians” with talk of sanctions. “If now, before making any steps we start announcing some sanctions,” Putin said, “then we won’t be creating favorable conditions for talks to end positively. This is why it is premature to talk about this now.”

Despite this crystal clear rejection from Russia, Clinton voiced optimism in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that if sanctions become necessary, “we will have support from Russia.” Her optimism apparently is based on what U.S. officials claim she was told by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Tuesday. These same officials got carried away when Medvedev, in New York for the U.N. General Assembly session last month, criticized sanctions but said they might be inevitable anyway. Alas, for those of us no longer working in the government, we can rely only on Lavrov’s and Putin’s public comments to divine Russia’s position. And based on those comments — and the fact that it is Putin, much more so than Medvedev, who is calling the shots in Russia on issues of this importance — Clinton’s optimism seems sadly misplaced.

Comments:

2 Comments.

Posted by Esther Haman on October 17, 2009 11:23 ET

Mr. Kramer what screams out of this article is another attempt by a Neo-Con to put everything and everyone back on track with G.W. Bush's policies. Although Mrs. Clinton is and was a great supporter of G.W. Bush and never swayed from supporting his agenda, she is not cutting it for you guys any longer and she is disappointing you. Your familiar scare tactics and background "...a senior transatlantic fellow... in the George W. Bush administration." speaks for itself. You guys need to understand that your opinions does not matter any longer and the Americans are wise to your selfish policies and warmongering. Your Zionist view is bankrupt. we will not go to another war, because it is not good for the USA and you and your buddies need to get that through your heads. We have shed enough blood and spent enough treasure because of your false beliefs and views. Your answers to everything is WAR and more WAR, but none of you would drop a single drop of blood for your beliefs.
What is good for the USA is more commerce and open market. To expand the global cooperation and provide competition. To bring the standard of living up around the world. Iran's industrialization will be part of that and will create a market that we can be a big part of it. The nature of their culture even religion is more than compatible with the free enterprise. We need to help that and not to impose meaningless sanctions on it.

Posted by ankhfnkhonsu on October 18, 2009 14:15 ET

OMG. Another hysterical rant by a comrade using the overused and tedious epithets of "neocon" and "zionist" which are merely substitutes for intelligent analysis. A simple commentary by the author on what most thinking analysts would consider to be a sensible approach to this fascist regimes obvious race for nuclear weapons and its mendacious pattern of behavior evokes this nonsensical rant. The approach of the so-called "Left", which is entirely silent on any fascist movement that happens to be anti-U.S. or anti-West speaks volumes about the sincerity and truthfulness of its adherents in respect of the humanism that they proport to espouse. The use of the term "zionist" in this context (as it is increasingly appears in virtually all other media) is particularly troubling as it is very clear evidence of a conspiracy view of everything that is most obviously nothing more than gross anti-Semitism. Interestingly, the sanctions approach is what is advocated by most Iranian exiles. Ms. Haman (how ironic a name in the context of Persia (and obviously, Jews in the not-so-abstract sense that she intends) suggestions are a shockingly disingenuous approach to a noxious regime that that has murdered at least 200,000 of it's own civilians since its inception, according to leading Iranian exile opponents, and which regularly executes minors? At this point in the game only persons such as this blinded by their conspiracy view of the U.S. and the world could deny the quest for nuclear arms by this horrific regime.