Posts tagged ‘nuclear power’

Can anyone explain Iran?

Last week, the International Atomic Energy Agency released an independent report stating that Iran was not, in fact, developing nuclear weapons. This report corroborates almost everything Iran has said about its nuclear programme since 2003. However, the US is claiming that the report is wrong, and Iran is developing nuclear weapons, even though I haven’t seen a shred of evidence for it. Iran is now engaging in talks with the IAEA about their nuclear facilities at Isfahan, and everyone seems to hope that Iran will stop its nuclear programme. Under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968, every country, including Iran, has a right to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes (see Article IV). And yet, no one seems to want them to do this.

I could understand this anxiety if Iran had recently been trying to be an aggressive, dangerous country, but try as I might, I can’t seem to dig up anything that bad on them. Certainly, they’re not a shining utopia. But still, they don’t seem that bad. When the current government came to power in 1979, they took a bunch of Americans hostage for a year, but that was because the United States was initiating a covert CIA project called Operation Ajax to stop that same revolution and keep the Shah in power. I’d say this is mean, but justifiable. When another country is having a revolution, don’t go sticking your nose in their business, or else you might get in trouble. For several years after that, Irani gunboats shot at US warships, partly because the US was violating their waterspace (is that a word?). In response, we shot down their civilian aircraft (though we later apologized). Again, this isn’t particularly great, but I can understand why Iran might want to shoot at the ships in their waters, especially after Iran Air flight 655. During the 1980’s, Iran was an ally, albeit an unpopular one, in the Iran/Contra scandal (they don’t like Israel and had some Israeli hostages, but the US was the country doing all the illegal things). Again, they were an ally in the Gulf War.

I honestly can’t find anything particularly aggressive or bad that Iran has done since the current government came to power. The only thing I don’t like is that they seem to hate Israel, but even that is justifiable (after all, Israel can be considered an unjust occupation of a Palestinian state). Why are the US and EU so distrustful of Iran that they are trying, against all evidence, to keep Iran from exercising what everyone acknowledges is an inalienable right to peaceful nuclear power? Any insight is welcome.