Venezuela-Iran: A Budding Nuclear Love Story

http://www.floppingaces.net/2009/09/26/venezuela-iran-a-nuclear-relationship/ ^ | 09-26-09 | Wordsmith

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Love at First Sight Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (R) greets Venezualan President Hugo Chavez in Tehran July 29, 2006. REUTERS/Raheb Homavandi (IRAN)

Last November, MataHarley mentioned about how Russia was planning to help Hugo Chavez build a nuclear energy program. Of course, like the typical power-hungry dictator that he is, all he claims to want is to acquire nuclear power for clean energy and peaceful medical purposes.

At this point, they are still in the planning stages, with Chavez explaining, "not to worry, folks":

"I say it before the world: Venezuela is going to start the process of developing nuclear energy, but we're not going to make an atomic bomb, so don't be bothering us afterward ... (with) something like what they have against Iran," Chavez said Sunday. The socialist president is closely allied with Iran and defends its nuclear program while the U.S. and other countries accuse Tehran of having a secret nuclear weapons program.

What, what, whaaaat?! Countries accusing Tehran of ambitions to deceive the "international community" on nuclear programs? No way!

Iran's deception (no surprises there) and the failure of the international community to curb its nuclear ambitions, is inspiring the Viper of Venezuela to emulate the defiance of Iran. Equally troubling, is news of nuclear collaboration by this budding "Axis of Unity":

the label that Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez have themselves chosen for their alliance. The rise of this partnership, according to Morgenthau, dates from Ahmadinejad's election as president of Iran in 2005. At that point, said Morgenthau, what had been relatively routine ties between the two countries "changed dramatically."

Over the past four years, the two despotic rulers have exchanged multiple visits, struck extensive military and business deals between their two countries, supported each other in cultivating policies and practices hostile to the U.S. and introduced each other to like-minded actors in their respective regions of Latin America and the Middle East.

Morgenthau cited reports that Iran has been building and running mysterious factories in parts of Venezuela so remote that they lack such basic amenities as restaurants and grocery stores. He added that since 2006, Iran has been embedding advisers with the Venezuelan military--which has thrown out its old U.S. army field manual and replaced it with instructions in asymmetric warfare as taught to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and Iranian-backed terrorist groups Hezbollah and Hamas.

Iran has also opened a bank in Venezuela, the Banco Internacional de Desarrollo, or BID. With Iran already under a long list of U.S. sanctions, as well as under a number of targeted sanctions by the United Nations, the U.S. Treasury last October added the BID to its blacklist. But Venezuela itself is under no broad sanctions. Its banks enjoy access to the U.S. financial system. Morgenthau warned that this is a "perfect" sanctions-busting setup for Venezuela to help Iran process dollar-denominated purchases of materials needed for making missiles, nuclear weapons and roadside bombs.

Morgenthau highlighted two investigations, publicly announced by his office this past year, that have uncovered "a pervasive system of deceitful and fraudulent practices employed by Iranian entities to move money all over the world without detection."

One of these investigations, for which Morgenthau said further results may be announced within the next 30 days, already led to a deferred prosecution agreement this January. In that instance, a British bank, Lloyd's TSB, agreed to $350 million in fines and forfeitures for stripping out details that would have identified as illegal more than $300 million worth of Iranian transactions running through the U.S. financial system. Another investigation led to the indictment this spring of a Chinese company, LIMMT, and its manager, Li Fang Wei, for using aliases and shell companies to get around U.S. sanctions meant to block payments involved in "shipment of banned missile, nuclear and so-called dual-use materials to subsidiaries of the Iranian Defense Industries Organization."

Morgenthau warned that "based on information developed by my office, the Iranians with the help of Venezuela are now engaged in similar economic and proliferation sanctions-busting schemes."

The international body seems adept at issuing "serious threats", "harsh warnings", "strong reprimands", with military action (although unstated) off the tables. The IAEA appears inept at preventing illegal nuclear proliferation. Sanctions did not deter the nuclear ambitions of Saddam; nor have they deterred North Korea or Iran- the other two nations in President Bush's "Axis of Evil" triumvirate. Nations undermined sanctions against Saddam by doing business with the Butcher of Baghdad.

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Monroe Doctrine time.

[Nathan Zachary]