GR132 Non-proliferation: current lessons from Iran and North Korea The landmark disarmament deal with Libya, announced on 19 th December 2003, opened a brief window of optimism for those pursuing international non-proliferation. One day earlier, Iran had reached agreement on an Additional Protocol with the IAEA, a more stringent arrangement than had previously been in place. And matters seemed to improve yet further when Pakistani nuclear scientist Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan went on record in February 2004 to admit his role in a series of major illicit transfers of nuclear technology and material. The reality, however, gives greater cause for concern. With mutual suspicion still prevalent over trust, the IAEA remains highly cautious in its dealings with Tehran, while North Korea continues to reject global and regional efforts to inhibit its nuclear programmes. Proliferation In recent years, Pyongyang has become adept at exploiting the international situation with an acute sense of timing - so exposing the non-proliferation regime as vulnerable, lacking in decisive leadership, and ultimately at risk of long-term failure. And with the US having consistently taken decisions to remove itself from the development of a sound non-proliferation framework, the wider debate as to how this situation might be reversed remains largely speculative. The May 2003 launch of a US-led Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) was an important step, but its core of just 11 members is small, and (Japan and Australia aside) the PSI has had little reach outside of established US links into NATO Europe. Consider the case of Pakistan s rogue nuclear scientist, Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan. Exposed to a large degree by Tripoli s new spirit of cooperation and disclosure, the weight of evidence showed Khan to have been central to the transfer of sensitive technologies (including centrifuge designs) to both Iran and North Korea. To have organized this extensive trade, it has been suggested that the Islamabad government must at least have been aware of his activities, if not actually complicit. And yet Pakistan is strategically vital as US forces continue to prosecute the War on Terrorism, 1 of 5
hunting al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden in particular. Accordingly, as one former senior US intelligence official told the New York Times: Khan was willing to sell blueprints, centrifuges, and the latest weaponry. He was the worst nuclear arms proliferator in the world and he s pardoned with not a squeak from the White House Washington s approach in Khan s case was hardly an endorsement of the nonproliferation regime, and one can only imagine the view North Korean and Iranian leaders will have taken over the whole affair. In truth, by February 2004, the US had already handed the lead in negotiations with Iran to the European Union, and ceded regular discussion on proliferation with North Korea to China. And considering that the US is itself not a party to other aspects of the non-proliferation regime not least in the area of biological weapons perhaps it should come as no surprise that nations with unsuitable intent can remain outside of the Non Proliferation Treaty. North Korea Pyongyang, for one, appears resolutely determined to acquire a nuclear weapons capability. Despite the abortive UN inspections regime, according to estimates from the US Central Intelligence Agency, North Korea may covertly possess enough plutonium to build one or perhaps two nuclear weapons. And an unknown quantity of spent fuel rods might potentially provide for the recovery of further stocks of usable plutonium. Arguably the greatest limitations of the non-proliferation regime have been shown up by North Korea. The country s emerging nuclear programme was initially addressed in 1993, through a commitment by both Pyongyang and Washington to create a nuclearfree peninsula, with the cessation of weapons developments and deployments both north and south of the Korean border. And yet just one year later, North Korea appeared to have discarded its pledges altogether. Following a sustained period of heightened tension in the region, an Agreed Framework was drafted in 1994, forming a landmark document for engaging Pyongyang and ensuring verifiable compliance with the UN-backed terms for the end of the North Korean military s nuclear projects. At the heart of the 1994 agreement was a US-led 2 of 5
Korean Economic Development Organization (KEDO) initiative to provide two light-water reactors in place of the country s existing facilities, and these would be commercial reactors without the scope for producing weapons-grade material. Moreover, while the new plants were being constructed, each year 500,000 tonnes of heavy fuel oil would be provided for power generation instead. The Agreed Framework never had a comfortable existence. Finance for supplying the heavy fuel oil, costing around US$60 million per year, was difficult to find from the outset. The working arrangements for the KEDO contractors became mired in diplomatic disputes. And then in 1998, for the second time in five years, North Korea suddenly tested its Taepodong ballistic missile, using a flight path that crossed Japanese airspace. Tokyo s support for KEDO was withdrawn. From this point on, the Pyongyang administration, the UN and the US all steadily grew apart. Four years later, in October 2002, North Korea announced that its nuclear programme had in fact resumed, and on 11 January 2003 the country formally withdrew from the Non-Proliferation Treaty, though its membership can hardly ever have been considered official. Inspections teams from the UN and the IAEA left North Korea shortly afterwards. As Mohamed El Baradei of the IAEA stated to the Security Council, Pyongyang has been in chronic non-compliance with its safeguards agreement since 1993, and has now established a dangerous precedent with clear consequences for the global non-proliferation regime. The routes forward are difficult to define, especially given the current priority afforded to Iraq by both the US and the UN. Some have suggested that the EU, previously a major supporter of the North Korean KEDO scheme, step in to drive non-proliferation forward. But in reality, the EU has much more to offer in terms of encouraging Iran to comply with its non-proliferation obligations under the NPT. Rather, China ought to be regarded as the key partner in encouraging Pyongyang to greater transparency and overall cooperation. Indeed, Beijing is to hold the fourth round of the six-party talks in late September. However, negotiations were delayed in August and are most likely to be again not least with Bush and Kim Jong II exchanging insults, but more significantly with Pyongyang waiting for the result of the US Presidential election in November. Therefore, for now, any serious progress on nuclear disarmament is doubtful. 3 of 5
Iran Pyongyang s perspective may to some extent be informed by the IAEA s growing impatience with Iran, evident during their mid-june 2004 conference in Vienna. A lack of disclosure on Tehran s uranium enrichment programme was again the central issue. But while the non-proliferation community will concede that it often fails to fully understand the political imperatives of North Korea, much the same can also be said for Iran. The approaches of Europe and the US, perhaps too simplistically divided into strategies of engagement vs. containment, fall short in the face of Iran s complex dynamics of power a near constant flux between conservative and reformist elements. (see UK Defence Forum paper RS 30A After Iraq: Washington s view of Iran, May 2003) Both support the nuclear programme, though each differs on quite how hard they ought to push against the NPT regime in order to achieve their aims. By comparison with North Korea, Tehran has in recent years done what it can to appear cooperative. There have been no sudden changes of course, no withdrawals from the non-proliferation regime. In fact, with the December 2003 Additional Protocol, Iran has accepted an even greater regulatory scope from the IAEA. But at the same time, details continue to emerge which cast doubt on Iran s commitment to non-proliferation that is, the consensus increasingly shows Tehran to be complying with the letter, if not the spirit, of the NPT. As an illustration, Article III of the Treaty prohibits the export of technology and materials which may be used for nuclear weapons development; it does not require any declaration of imports. Much of Iran s nuclear capability is based upon imports from Pakistan and Libya, creating what might be called a Natanz-like surprise. At the end of the day, Iran s clandestine acquisition of foreign centrifuge components to equip huge uranium enrichment facilities, such as the one at Natanz, did not contravene the Safeguards Agreement that was negotiated with the IAEA. The Additional Protocol was to have tightened up the arrangements, and though this was signed in December 2003, Iran more recently has openly declared that it had continued assembling centrifuge components until March 2004. In addition, Iran did not admit until October 2003 to a significant laser enrichment project which had been active since the 1970s. 4 of 5
With both a uranium and a plutonium programme, Tehran nevertheless maintains that its nuclear interests are for civil power projects and legitimate research even announcing plans to sell nuclear fuel abroad, to help justify the extensive activities revealed to the IAEA during 2003 inspections. What is clear is that Iran s nuclear sector, started four decades ago upon receipt of a single US research reactor, is a symbolic source of considerable national pride. And on that basis, the Iranian approach to non-proliferation will remain cautious and reserved, demonstrating a degree of cooperation, whilst never compromising the steady development of future capabilities. Conclusion In the cases of both Iran and North Korea, the challenges are two-fold, beginning with the management of the immediate risks, and extending to the longer-term risks of a failing nuclear non-proliferation framework. Most important is the current lack of leadership behind the NPT and other measures, in part the result of a US administration that has deliberately stepped away from multinational accords such as the 1972 Anti- Ballistic Missile Treaty and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention of the same year. The Libyan experience re-focused US attention on the non-proliferation issue, but was arguably a source of false hope. The chances that Tehran and Pyongyang will be similarly motivated to disengage from years of expensive nuclear development are slim. Disclaimer The views of authors are their own. The UK Defence Forum holds no corporate view on the opinions expressed in papers or at meetings. The Forum exists to enable politicians, industrialists, members of the armed forces, academics and others with an interest in defence and security issues to exchange information and views on the future needs of Britain s defence. It is operated by a non-partisan, not for profit company. July 2004 Updated Sept.04 5 of 5