No New UN Sanctions on Iran Now Despite US Concessions

By Victor Comras

Word is out that today’s last ditch efforts to come up with new Security Council sanctions measures on Iran have failed. The Political Directors of the Security Council’s Permanent Five Members ( US, UK, France, Russia, China) and Germany reportedly threw in the towel following a fruitless international conference call between them earlier today. The matter will now be referred up the line to Foreign Ministers to see if anything can be salvaged. This time round it appears that China was the principal holdout - refusing to consider additional sanctions on Iran at this time. Russia also reportedly indicated differences with the United States with regard to the severity of the sanctions measures to be considered and the timing for such sanctions.

The US had hoped that a compromise package was possible given a major recent tactical concession on our part. For a while now the US has indicated that it would not oppose the EU’s carrot and stick negotiating approach. But, our policy had been to stand apart from it. This has now apparently changed. The US seems to have agreed to sign on to a European/Russian plan to offer Iran significant economic benefits and access to nuclear fuel if Iran comes into compliance with the Security Council’s previous non proliferation resolutions. This new approach was reflected in statements made earlier this week by US representatives, including at the Security Council’s December 17 open briefing on Iran sanctions. At that meeting the US representative indicated that the US would now “join the Russian Federation and other members of the P5 + 1 in offering Iran, if it complied with Council requirements, cooperation in development of a civil nuclear power programme, with reliable access to nuclear fuel.” This is a significant change in policy given our often stated unwillingness to engage in such dealings with Iran so long as Iran continues to support international terrorism.

News reports indicate that Secretary Rice is still optimistic that the Security Council will come up with a useful Iran resolution. "We are all in agreement that the two-track strategy that we have been pursuing is the right strategy,” she said at a news conference today. What is not clear is whether the EU Council is still poised to take up the slack if the Security Council fails to act. As I, and my colleagues Matthew Levitt and Michael Jacobson have written here previously, Europe holds the real key to putting real economic and political pressure on Iran.

Access to European businesses and banks is still very crucial for Iran’s fledgling middle class. European sanctions now, if formulated adeptly could have a very significant impact on this Iran commercial class. And this commercial class is critical to holding Iranian urban unemployment figures from plummeting further. And this may well represent Iran's Achilles heel.

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