Iranian officials have confirmed top-level discussions about the country’s potential exit from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). What does this mean for the Middle East and for the world?
Essence of the Matter
Currently, the question of withdrawing from the NPT is being discussed at the highest levels of the country’s leadership and may be submitted for consideration to the Majlis (the Iranian parliament). In that case, a decision on it will be made by the lawmakers in an accelerated, urgent manner, since they have had more than enough time to study the issue. A comment by a representative of the Majlis presidium, Abbas Goudarzi, has also circulated in the media. He called Iran’s withdrawal from the NPT “a very real and easily achievable step”. Parliamentarian Ali Nikzad added that in Tehran they have already begun studying the possible international consequences of such a scenario.
What Next?
Withdrawing from the NPT is in itself a fairly complex and time-consuming procedure, in accordance with the terms of the treaty binding all its participants. However, if Iran, after a thorough analysis of the situation and weighing all the pros and cons, firmly resolves to go through with it, then it will undoubtedly achieve its goal. In that case, the restrictions imposed by the treaty will remain in its past, and the country will be able to take steps in whatever direction it deems necessary.
Or is it not that simple?
Russia has repeatedly called on all participants in international affairs to heed the ideas of the Greater Eurasian Partnership put forward by President Vladimir Putin. The main feature of the very concept of security in this paradigm is its unified and indivisible character. The implementation of policy and the maintenance of peace, in the most general terms, are ensured by the coordinated activity of international associations with a network structure, based on the principles of multilateral diplomacy, equality, responsibility, and mutual respect, such as BRICS, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, the Eurasian Economic Union, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations etc. Regional organizations of the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America could act in the same vein.
The fundamental point is that security in any region of the world becomes truly achievable and durable when its countries themselves determine their own agenda, their own boundaries of what is acceptable, their own mutual rights and obligations, rather than following rules imposed from the outside, someone else’s “morality” (but really its absence), the postcolonial diktat of the West, and the military pressure it exerts on any- and everyone it can reach.
A country’s withdrawal from the NPT, with all the ensuing consequences, risks, and the small number of possible scenarios (which, by and large, is clear to any level-headed specialist and can be counted literally on the fingers of one hand), is, needless to say, an extraordinary undertaking. If we are talking about a serious understanding of the world order that has fundamentally changed in recent years and of the relations of the global majority within it, of the multipolar world, then such an event should probably be preceded not only by consideration of the matter by the Iranian Majlis itself, but also by consultations with allies.
The multipolar world has, in effect, accepted the relatively new (on the scale of history) nuclear status of three powers: India, Pakistan, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. No one questions them about their status, except for the American satellites who are used to yapping away at the DPRK. It must be said that all three behave quite responsibly in this regard and implement the possibilities of nuclear deterrence with dignity.
As is well known, the thing that has evoked the most attacks, distortions and sanctions in the Western part of the world is North Korea’s acquisition of a nuclear shield. Russia has repeatedly noted that the DPRK’s de facto nuclear status is already a closed and settled matter. Moreover, as Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov emphasized, “we respect the actions of the DPRK; we understand the reasons why they are pursuing their nuclear program”. The leadership of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, as the head of the Russian foreign policy agency rightly noted, “drew the relevant conclusions long before the Israeli-American strikes on the Islamic Republic of Iran. And it is precisely because these conclusions were drawn in a timely manner that no one even thinks of using force against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, although military buildup around the DPRK with the participation of the US, South Korea, and Japan is underway”.
Security Dilemma or a Lack Thereof?
Whether Iran will follow the path of the DPRK, given all the organizational complexities of withdrawing from the NPT, the ongoing state of war with Israel and the US, and the differing points of view among Iranian political figures of different generations on the prospects of possessing nuclear weapons, is premature to say for now. What is important here is to grasp the very essence of the problem and honestly answer the questions that arise for ourselves. The main one is the following: if –let’s call things what they are – Iran ever becomes a nuclear power, how will that affect international security? Not in the speculative, hypothetical sense of the shouting of paid-off Western media and NGOs, but in terms of real policy, deterrence, and the balance of power?
It would seem that the answer to this question will have to be found not only by Iran itself, but also by its allies, its comrades in the multipolar world, in the emerging new security system involving BRICS and the SCO. And what about the international organizations of the Middle East? Here, on the contrary, the question of the independence of action of regional multilateral associations and the risks of influence on their decision-making by extra-regional Western and pro-Western actors arises. So whether they will consider themselves safer with a single nuclear and hostile-to-its-entire-surroundings Israel for the whole region, or whether they will start thinking about Iranian prospects for a nuclear balance, is a question that also concerns their own sovereign thinking and survival.
And what about the International Atomic Energy Agency? Ali Nikzad stated outright that Iran does not trust the IAEA and its current director. Well, we know perfectly well that this organization under the leadership of Rafael Grossi behaves in a biased and dishonorable manner; there is no longer any doubt about that. Therefore, the opinion and possible actions of the IAEA with regard to Iran, which is already under all kinds of sanctions and has nevertheless found the strength and the ability to leave no stone unturned of the myth of US military superiority, is perhaps the very last thing worth talking about at all in this context.
For now, we can only wait for events to unfold. The question is truly serious and, perhaps, could become an important test both for Eurasian and for international security as a whole, at least in the form in which it is conceived by the existing centers of power of the global majority, the non-Western multipolar world.
Ksenia Muratshina, PhD in History, Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and Culture Editor of “New Eastern Outlook”
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