Posted on 11/22/2004 12:40:35 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Iran appears to have done enough for the time being to avoid United Nations Security Council sanctions for a programme the United States and others say is aimed at building nuclear weapons.
But Tehran's activities are looming as a major point of contention between China and the US, which wants resolute action by the Security Council to stem what the Bush Administration sees as a dangerous drift towards nuclear proliferation.
Beijing and Tehran appear to be cementing a long-term relationship in energy co-operation that will make it more difficult for the US to prevent Iran from developing a fully-fledged uranium fuel cycle, including enrichment which Washington believes could be used to develop nuclear bombs.
Just in time last week, Iran informed the European Union and the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, it had agreed to suspend uranium enrichment and related activities temporarily. The freeze would last until the completion of negotiations with Europe.
The IAEA had given Iran a deadline of November 25 to suspend its uranium enrichment or have its case sent to the Security Council, where it could face sanctions.
Tehran insists its activities are for peaceful purposes only, mainly to generate electricity. But the US has long suspected that Iran, which has huge reserves of oil and gas, is using the programme as cover for clandestine development of nuclear weapons.
Uranium can be enriched for nuclear power generation but if the process is extended it can produce bomb-grade fissile material.
For weapons use, scientists say uranium must be enriched so its concentration of fissile U-235 atoms is higher than 90 per cent, with at least 10kg needed for a bomb. To power a nuclear reactor it does not need to contain more than 3 per cent of U-235.
The EU has offered Iran access to imported nuclear fuel for its reactors. But Tehran maintains that it has a right to its own fuel fabrication cycle.
It also says that although it might agree to suspend uranium enrichment temporarily as a confidence-building measure, it will not abandon the programme as the US and the EU are demanding. So there is still a lot of difficult negotiation ahead.
Amid this high-stakes manoeuvering, China's Foreign Minister, Li Zhaoxing, announced that Beijing would oppose any move to refer Iran to the UN Security Council because of controversy surrounding its nuclear programme.
On a visit to Tehran, Li said he had told the US and Britain that Iran's co-operation with the IAEA was pretty good and that bringing the issue to the Security Council would only make it more complicated than necessary and more difficult to resolve.
China is one of the five permanent members with a veto power over UN Security Council decisions.
Meanwhile, in Beijing, China and Iran were announcing a preliminary accord under which China's state oil company, Sinopec Group, will buy 250 million tonnes of Iranian liquefied natural gas over 30 years, develop the giant Yadavan oil field in southwest Iran, and import 150,000 barrels a day of crude from the field at market prices.
It will be four or five years at the earliest before the LNG deliveries begin and the Yadavan field is developed. But the deal is valued at US$70 billion ($98.6 billion) and seems to draw China and Iran into an energy alliance that could have far-reaching geo-political consequences.
One of China's four state-owned oil traders signed a memorandum of understanding last March to import 110 million tonnes of LNG from Iran over 25 years at a cost of US$20 billion, starting in 2008.
China is becoming increasingly dependent on imported oil and LNG to fuel its fast-growing economy. Iran is the second largest oil producer in Opec after Saudi Arabia and holds 10 per cent of the world's proven crude reserves. It also has the second biggest natural gas reserves after Russia.
Official figures show that China is set to import about 120 million tonnes of oil this year, about 40 per cent of consumption.
Just over a decade ago, China was a net oil exporter. About 15 per cent of its oil imports come from Iran and the Iranian oil minister was reported as saying by official Chinese media that Tehran wants China to replace Japan as its biggest importer of oil and gas.
This year, US lobbying failed to dissuade Japan from signing a deal worth about US$3 billion that gave Tokyo the right to develop Iran's huge Azadegan oil field.
Japan is even more reliant than its rival China on energy imports and the latest Chinese inroads into Iran's oil and gas development will make Tokyo resistant to any US pressure to punish Iran for nuclear proliferation by applying sanctions and pulling out of the Azadegan field.
But Washington is likely to find China a far more difficult obstacle to budge than Japan.
The Iran sanctions act passed by Congress gives the Administration a stick to punish China. The act threatens penalties for firms making big investments in Iran.
But Bush needs China's support to resolve another pressing nuclear issue - North Korea's weapons development programme - which appears to be far more advanced than Iran's.
China has greater leverage over North Korea than any other country and is hosting the six-party talks that are intended to defuse one of Asia's most dangerous flashpoints.
The US may be reluctant to confront China over Iran if the price is Beijing's co-operation in corralling North Korea's nuclear ambitions.
Easy solution.....park some nukes on Taiwan and watch the Chicoms freak out. Tell them when they stop working with Iran we back off Taiwan
Yeah, that worked real good for the Russians and Cubans.
Perhaps China's good relations and aid and abetment of each of the three Axis of Evil nations means that China is CrucialTM for thwarting these Axis of Evil nations.
Oh Communist China, our champion...
We knew that the North Koreans, the Iranians, and A. Q. Khan were pushing a "proliferation for everybody" approach for all countries with interests inimical to ours (on the theory that we couldn't/wouldn't attack all such nuke-armed rogue states at once). What we didn't know was where the Chicoms stood on this, but the picture's becoming clearer now.
My theory since before 9/11 has been that China has been building up our enemies in the Middle East (as well as Southeast Asia, Africa, and Central America) to dilute our forces in Asia so they can make a full-court press there. As I'm reading things the speed and strength of our success in Afghanistan and Iraq threw a wrench into that game plan, and now they're clinging to Iran desperately to try to salvage their war plan. If we manage to defuse the time bombs in the Middle East it adds obstacles to their plans in Asia.
Make that "Latin America", to include Chinese activity in South America. Not to mention the Triad infiltration of Canada over the past couple decades.
And about Iran, China's been helping them with that for a decade.
Look at this from 1997 on the occasion of Jiang's visit in 1997 to Clinton:
One of the main things trumpeted is the deal whereby the PRC will decrease its' help to Iran in Iran's nuclear energy program and in return the US will allow US companies to sell their nuclear reactor components to the PRC. But this agreement had a big loophole in it. It said that the PRC would not begin any new programs with Iran. But ongoing programs will continue until they are done. This is a hole big enough to drive a truck through. So it is failry empty.Source: From 1997What I think the Clinton administration ought to have done is to simply have stated that they feel that American firms should be able to make money by selling their wares to the PRC. Rather than beat around the bush with this tie-in to Iran they should have just come clean and said we want to make some dough.
One overlooked aspect of this Iran tie-in is that three countries are involved. Not much was said about this but the reports from the Iranian government were not happy. They did not appreciate the Chinese Communists using them as a bargaining chip. They also will play up to the CCP the idea that the US is pushing them around with deals like this. And a most important thing to remember is that the CCP does not want to make Iran angry at them. Currently the biggest real problem in terms of violence facing the CCP is the unrest in their western "autonomous region" of Xinjiang. Tibet gets the ink but this region has seen bombings and fighting and have a dedicated group that are attempting to wage civil war against the CCP.
The group doing this are the Uighers, a non-Han group in China. They are Muslim. I don't think that the CCP want to get on Iran's bad side in that if they do Iran might decide to get ome revenge by helping out the Uighur separatists of Xinjiang with some guns and butter. So this Iran deal is most likely a bunch of smoke.
Obviously seven year old promises were not kept.
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