By Adrian Hamilton
The Independent
"For those who remember the days of Nikita Kruschev and Fidel Castro, there was something wonderfully retro about the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty summit in New York this week. There was Iran's President Ahmadinejad, all smiles and stubble, haranguing the West in general and the US and Israel in particular for their sins. And there were the British, US and French delegations, walking out, all clenched buttocks and po faces, as he gathered momentum.
Ahmadinejad loved it, course. There is nothing a would-be voice of the developing world hungers for more than tweaking the tails of western powers in an international meeting....
Instead we are doing the opposite, trying to corner and beat the country into submission through sanctions which will only reinforce the position of the government. The problem Iran poses is an internal not an external one.
On that score its President is right. The NPT isn't working. It's too lop-sided, too riddled with hypocrisy and exception. As for the Middle East, the US and Britain are in the peculiar position of arguing that peace can only be maintained by preserving the nuclear hegemony of a country, Israel, which has deliberately not signed up to the NPT and beating up on a country, Iran, which has.
If Obama really wants to make a new start, he should start with a fresh approach."
The Independent
"For those who remember the days of Nikita Kruschev and Fidel Castro, there was something wonderfully retro about the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty summit in New York this week. There was Iran's President Ahmadinejad, all smiles and stubble, haranguing the West in general and the US and Israel in particular for their sins. And there were the British, US and French delegations, walking out, all clenched buttocks and po faces, as he gathered momentum.
Ahmadinejad loved it, course. There is nothing a would-be voice of the developing world hungers for more than tweaking the tails of western powers in an international meeting....
Instead we are doing the opposite, trying to corner and beat the country into submission through sanctions which will only reinforce the position of the government. The problem Iran poses is an internal not an external one.
On that score its President is right. The NPT isn't working. It's too lop-sided, too riddled with hypocrisy and exception. As for the Middle East, the US and Britain are in the peculiar position of arguing that peace can only be maintained by preserving the nuclear hegemony of a country, Israel, which has deliberately not signed up to the NPT and beating up on a country, Iran, which has.
If Obama really wants to make a new start, he should start with a fresh approach."
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