Women's International League for Peace and Freedom--open letter to UNSC P5
- From: jennacrouch@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: 22 Feb 2006 09:00:22 -0800
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Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
Open Letter to the Permanent Five Members of the Security Council
on the IAEA reporting Iran to the Security Council
February 4, 2006
Dear Ambassadors,
Tensions over Iran's nuclear program have been mounting for months,
and now the International Atomic Energy Agency has just reported Iran
to the Security Council. You can increase the tension or choose the
path of peace. Threatening Iran is not working, and continuing this
strategy will unite the Iranian population in defiance of your threats.
With a full understanding of the situation, the only rational path
forward is to peacefully address its root causes. The stakes are too
high.
We, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, work
every day for peace in a world constantly being pushed to war,
injustice, hunger, and destruction of the planet. We have been working
for total and universal disarmament, including the abolition of nuclear
weapons, since man made the bomb. We understand that if Iran masters
the full nuclear fuel cycle as it intends, this could provide the
material for a nuclear weapon. Although we do not know if it intends to
develop nuclear weapons, it is a possibility. The prospect of another
nuclear weapon state is devastating, and the potential for a new arms
race in the Middle East even more so. There is no justification for
developing or keeping these suicidal, genocidal and ecocidal weapons,
and the international community cannot accept one. Iran must not
develop nuclear weapons, and after years of hiding its nuclear energy
program it must show the international community it does not plan to do
so.
However, you are also all culpable in the current situation, and we
hold you accountable. In order to solve this problem, you must address
your own roles in it.
You are stoking the fires of hysteria over an artificial urgency you
created. Conservative estimates put Iran 10 years from making a nuclear
weapon, if that is their intention. Still, three of you could not wait
even one month to report Iran to the Security Council, turning a
concern into a crisis. You interrupted negotiations on the compromise
to move the potential bomb-making part of the fuel cycle to Russia, a
compromise you claimed to support. Then, even though the International
Atomic Energy Agency planned to distribute the findings of its
investigation on March 6, you called an emergency meeting of the Board,
preempting the regularly scheduled meeting by a single month. As a
result, Iran is restricting international access to its nuclear sites
and resuming all activities it had suspended, just as they said they
would.
Worse, for years you have held on to your own nuclear weapons, even
after the Cold War ended. You have increased their importance in your
security plans. If you want governments around the world and the people
of your own countries to believe you when you object to nuclear
weapons, you must get rid of your own. Otherwise it is clear that you
just want to maintain your monopoly on power, at the risk of the
planet's security.
Since you refused to get rid of the weapons as you promised the world,
and your own people, states without such weapons made a reasonable
request. They asked you to legally promise never to use nuclear weapons
against them, when they had the moral character to choose not to
acquire such weapons for themselves. But even though your justification
for keeping these weapons has been to deter other countries with
nuclear weapons, you refuse to make this international law.
In fact, two of you have recently threatened to use your nuclear
weapons against states without nuclear weapons. Is it any wonder some
states without such weapons believe what you have been saying for
years-that the best deterrent is having such weapons themselves? Our
parents taught us long ago not to trust people whose motto is "do as
I say, not do as I do". As you tell Iran to build the international
community's trust and uphold international law, you must also add to
confidence in the rule of law, not force. Give legal assurances to
countries without nuclear weapons that you will never use your nuclear
weapons against them.
In addition to this global power struggle, we cannot ignore the
regional power struggle in the Middle East. Iran and Israel have been
lobbing threats at each other. Other Middle Eastern countries do not
want a nuclear Iran, but also detest Israel's presumed nuclear weapon
status. The international community agrees the Middle East should be
free of weapons of mass destruction, and the UN General Assembly and
parties to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty have unanimously
supported this. Israel has said it will work towards this goal once the
Middle East peace process is complete.
Although the International Atomic Energy Agency Board resolution
reporting Iran to you recognizes that a solution to the Iran issue
would contribute to the goal of a Middle East without weapons of mass
destruction, you are not working through the peace process, and are not
including Israel. It is incredibly sad that you are using the threat of
violence instead of working for peace to achieve your goal. It is
frightening that the appearance of hypocrisy could truly divide the
world. The only solution is to fairly address the regional dimension by
addressing all nuclear programs equally, and finally putting real work
into a nuclear weapon free Middle East.
Listen to us: You cannot crush this threat with war. You cannot crush
this threat with violence. You cannot drop bombs from airplanes and
make this go away. The only answer is to do the hard work of peace.
Sincerely,
The Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
.
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