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APLN member C Uday Bhaskar argued that Israel’s airstrikes on Iranian nuclear and military sites risk severe regional escalation and have disrupted ongoing US-Iran nuclear diplomacy. Amid growing instability and a weakening global consensus on nuclear governance, middle powers such as India, Germany, and Japan should help de-escalate the crisis and prevent a complete diplomatic breakdown.

The fallout on energy markets and the brittle West Asian security situation will depend on the scale and nature of Iran’s response. This conflict is being played out in the backdrop of a breakdown in the longstanding nuclear consensus among major powers, enhancing geopolitical risks. Middle powers such as India, Germany and Japan have a stake in sustaining the current equilibrium and therefore need to step up.

While the extent of damage caused to the Iranian WMD (weapons of mass destruction) capability, which includes missile sites and nuclear enrichment facilities remains opaque, Tehran has confirmed that senior military leaders including the head of Iran’s IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) Major General Hossein Salami have been killed.

Earlier, even as reports of an Israeli attack were revealed – the IRGC had vowed to retaliate if nuclear facilities were targeted and added that this would invite a “devastating and decisive response” on targets, including US military infrastructure in the region.

However, Washington has already distanced itself from the Friday Israeli attack and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated that the US is not involved in the strikes. Ironically, the US was in bilateral negotiations with Iran to reach an agreement that would be acceptable to both sides, wherein Iran would not go down the nuclear weapons path – and the US-led Western sanctions would be progressively relaxed. The last US-Iran meeting was held in Rome on May 23 and the sixth one was scheduled for Sunday (June 15) in Oman, Muscat. Clearly this negotiation process that US President Donald Trump had endorsed has now been stalled and this is a setback.

Ironically, Iran’s nuclear enrichment program got a domestic boost

Iran not acquiring nuclear weapons is an objective that has many advocates, with Israel and some Arab states leading the charge. Paradoxically, the Friday attack will have the opposite effect, with hardliners in Tehran becoming more defiant and resolute in protecting their nuclear enrichment program and related sovereignty.

The trigger for the unilateral Israeli attack was the resolution passed by the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) on Thursday (June 12) which declared that Iran is not in compliance with its commitments to the nuclear safeguards – the enrichment restrictions and site inspections that it is obliged to conform to as a signatory to the NPT (Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty) as a non-nuclear weapon state.

The June 12 IAEA resolution censuring Iran comes after two decades and the voting pattern is instructive about the geo-political orientation among the major powers over the Iranian nuclear profile. The resolution was passed with 19 votes in favor, three against – China, Russia and Burkina Faso – and 11 abstentions. India was among those who abstained.

Israel used this IAEA resolution as the justification for its unilateral action and PM Benjamin Netanyahu described the attack as “a targeted military operation   to roll back the Iranian threat to Israel’s very survival”. He added that this operation named Red Lion would “continue for as many days as it takes to remove the spread”– this being a reference to Iran seeking to weaponize its enriched uranium.

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Image: iStock