Armed
With Nuclear Certificate, Iran To Enter Conference on Syria
Saeed
Naqvi
On January 20 and 22 Middle East
watchers will be riveted on two different conference venues in Geneva or thereabouts.
The first meeting will concern itself
with the agreement on Iran’s nuclear program.
The five Permanent Members of the
Security Council, United States, Russia, China, UK, France plus Germany and
Iran agreed on a deal on Sunday, January 12. It will be watched for six months.
The same deal, in a somewhat raw form, had actually been announced in November.
Technical details had to be filled in. This was accomplished on Sunday.
Coming Monday the process of
implementation of the agreement begins. This will be simultaneously accompanied
by a “corresponding” lifting of sanctions. The six month period has been
divided into 180 days. On each day, or week, you give so much and take so much.
Ofcourse, there will be accusations of the scales being tipped one way or the
other. But Secretary of State John Kerry is very determined this time.
The second event is a full blown
conference known famously as Geneva II, focused on Syria. Geneva I was held in
June 2012, a little over a year after the conflict began. It was largely a
process led by governments. A concept of a “Syrian led” process towards Geneva
II emerged. This resulted in rapid multiplication of insurgent groups inside
Syria, some so brutal as to challenge credulity. The anxiety was to cobble
together some kind of an opposition to President Assad. So, more murder and
mayhem including the destruction of the great mosque in Aleppo, followed.
The war dragged on and on. Saudi Prince
Bandar bin Sultan kept asking the Americans to give the rebel forces more time
to alter the ground realities. Only then would a group emerge to give weight to
an opposition delegation to Geneva II. Really, more power to the hardline
Salafist–takfiri groups who have recently proliferated in Iraq and Syria will
result in a credible delegation to Geneva?
All those supporting the conflict from
outside have, ofcourse, succeeded in causing half of the population being
internally displaced; millions of refugees pushed into neighbouring countries;
about 5,00,000 civilians killed, and hundreds of years old monument in one of
the world’s great civilizations, wantonly destroyed.
But they have not been able to obtain
the trophy they most covet: the head of President Bashar al Assad. They were
not able to affect regime change in Syria.
When all else failed, the chemical
weapons attack in August 2013, allegedly by the regime (it was never proved),
appeared to be the answer to their prayers. What President Obama described as a
“Red Line” had been crossed. Missile attacks would follow.
Sergey Lavrov, the most respected
Russian Foreign Minister since Andrei Gromyko, intervened creatively. Syria
would voluntarily surrender its chemical weapons. The bargain would be
straightforward: a political solution to the conflict involving all Syrian
stakeholders.
For all their exertions, there is no
coherent opposition yet to meet in Geneva to set into motion a “Syrian led”
process for peace. Free Syrian Army and the Transitional Council members are
hopping from one host country to another in quest of a delegation for Geneva
II.
Are these conditions propitious enough
for Geneva II to be convened on Wednesday?
Broadly, the game is as follows: the
United States and Russia have agreed on two critical issues. That an agreement
on Iran’s nuclear programme should be given momentum for the next six months.
There will then be a pause for stock taking before negotiating the next, long
term, agreement.
They are also agreed on the Syrian
conflict being brought to an end through a political process.
On both these approaches, Iran, Iraq,
Egypt and Syria are more or less satisfied. But Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey,
Israel and France are in various degrees of disappointment and nervousness.
This gang’s dream scenario would be that
the nuclear deal with Iran be scuttled. Freed of the nuclear taint, (these
countries fear) Iran will begin to play a regional role which will diminish
theirs. The Middle East will never be the same again. They are trying to scare
Washington. “Look a risen Iran will undermine the US in the Middle East”. This
kind of talk has some purchase in the US Congress.
Rumours wafting from Riyadh suggest some
sort of a conclusion to the Kingdom’s succession stakes. This may bring about a
change in its recently aggressive diplomatic style credited to Intelligence
Chief and former ambassador to Washington, Prince Bandar bin Sultan.
Riyadh and Jerusalem, hand in hand, are
imploring Washington to go slow on Iran and certainly not to invite Iran to the
Conference on Syria, Geneva II. Kerry is walking around the minefields with
great skill. “Iran has not been invited” says he, or words to that effect. And
he is not telling a lie. Iran has not been invited, “not yet”.
It will be different situation when the
nuclear deal with Iran is set into operation on Monday. Kerry has made it clear
on several occasions that he accords a higher priority to the nuclear deal than
to Iran’s stand on Syria.
Once the nuclear arrangement gets going,
and Iran emerges with a non stigmatized image in a region riven with terrorism,
why would anyone stand in the way of a country with so much influence in Syria?
In fact it could be curtains for the
Saudi sponsored Al Qaeda affiliates running amuck in Syria, Iraq, Turkey,
Lebanon, Pakistan, Afghanistan? When the sponsorship of these groups is
terminated, how will these clusters of high voltage fundamentalism ever be
tamed?
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