Iran-Argentine fight - US role

PV Vivekanand

A MAJOR diplomatic battle is brewing, with Iran pitted against American-British pressure — with Israel playing the game from behind the scenes -- following Britain's arrest of a former Iranian ambasador pending possible extradition to Argentina to face murder charges.
It is not simply an open and shut affair for any party involved in the tussle over Argentina's effort to put on trial former ambasasdor Hade Soleimanpour, 47, and several other Iranians on charges that they were behind a 1994 bombing in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people and wounded over 200.
For the US and its allies, including Israel, it offers an opportunity to drive home their contentions that Iran is a sponsor of itnernational terrorism in what many see as a run-up towards toppling the theocratic regime in Tehran that has stood fast in its opposition to American plans in the Gulf.
For Iran, it is a matter of remaining firm against what it describes as a conspiracy to implicate it in a cooked-up conspiracy and subject it to international isolation and further diplomatic and economic sanctions.

Worst time for Iran

The arrest of Soleimanpour could not have come at a worse juncture in history for Iran, which is already reeling from American pressure over its alleged plans to develop nuclear weapons and support for "terrorist" groups.
It does not need much imagination to assume that the crisis over the British detention of Soleimanpour, an environmentalist student at Durham University, is no coincidence and could be part of an engineered effort to step up the presure on Iran.
Soleimanpur was arrested on Aug.19 after Argentine federal Judge Juan Jose Galeano sent a request to British authorities seeking his arrest in connection with the July 18, 1994, bombing at a Jewish community centre — the Asociacion Mutua Israelita Argentina (AMIA).
The Argentine arrest warrant said Soleimanpour, who was ambassador to Argentina at the time of the explosion, involved in the planning and commission of the bombing and that he provided information about the place and the timing of the attack.
Soleimanpour has been denied bail at a London court and remanded until Aug.29. He has been studying at Durham University in northeastern England since February 2002. His wife is a reputed biologist and the couple have two children.
Soleimanpour's wife and children were vacationing in Iran at the time of his arrest.
The extradition warrant for Soleimanpour was one of eight issued by Judge Galeano against Iranian citizens in August.
Similar warrants issued in March against four Iranian diplomats caused tension between Buenos Aires and Tehran, and resulted in the recall of the Iranian ambassador.

Allegations

Argentine and Jewish leaders blame the Iranian government of orchestrating the attack with help from members of Lebanon's Hizbollah group. Both have denied the charges many times in the past.
The purported motive for the bombing was cited as "Iranian hostility towards Jews" in general. Argentina, which has a 300-000 strong Jewish community, was chosen for the attack because Buenos Aires refusal to suppy nuclear material to Iran, says some versions of the bombing.
However, apart from hints and suggestions, no concrete evidence has been cited to prove the charge.
A 1992 bomb attack on the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires in which 29 people were killed also remains unsolved.

Iranian response

Predictably, Iran has hit back with vehemence to Soleimanpour's arrest. It has cut off all trade and cultural ties with Argentina but stopped short of severing diplomatic ties.
The Argentine charge d'affaires in Tehran has been informed his government would be held accountable for all the legal and political impacts of the ruling, reports in the Iranian press said.
Argentine losses in the tug-of-war is relatively little when compared with that of the UK, whose government says the arrest of Soleimanpour is judicial matter beyond its influence.
British-Iranian relations have generally been uneasy. However, signs of an improvement have appeared in recent years. .
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has visited the country four times in the last two years and there is growing co-operation between the two countries over Afghanistan and the war against drugs trade.

New investigation

Argentina had investigated the 1994 bombing and had all but closed the file two years ago.
A new investigation was launched early this year when an unidentified Iranian described as a defector and held in Germany alleged that former Argentine president Carlos S. Menem had accepted $10 million from the Iranian government to cover up the bombing.
Menem denied the accusation but was forced to admit he had a Swiss bank account that he previously had denied. It remains unknown at this point whether that account had received the purported $10 million hush money.
The investigation was given a boost when Nestor Kirchner became Argentina's president in May 25 and promised to declassify intelligence files about the attack and the subsequent nvestigation.
Soleimanpour had been interviewed by police in Britain three times and he had denied all charges.
Tehran has labelled the affair as politically motivated and orchestrated by Israel and its allies.
President Mohammed Khatami has demanded that Soleimanpour be released and the British government offer an apology for the arrest. He has vowed to take "strong action" if the demand was not met.
"The rulings lack judicial and legal basis and are merely politically motivated," said Hamid Reza Asefi, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman. "This measure was politically motivated under the influence of the Zionist regime," he said.
Another Iranian spokesman, Abdollah Ramezanzadeh, asserted that "a special wing in the US and Zionists are undoubtedly hard at work to distort Iran`s international image."
Diplomatic contacts are continuing between London and Tehran, but it is unlikely that the row be settled, given the signs that the US has shifted its gunsights to Iran following the ouster of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.
In strict legal terms, a British court has to study the "evidence" that Argentina says it has against Soleimanpour and rule whether he should be extradited. It could take several months before a verdict is issued.
In the meantime, Tehran could impose a boycott of British products and ban all dealings with London. That would have a serious impact on European-Iranian relations and play into the hands of the US.
US President George W Bush, who named Iran as part of an "axis of evil" along with Iraq and North Korea, has made no secret of his desire to see the theocratic regime in Tehran toppled.
No doubt the Bush administration would be seizing the opportunity offered by the Argentine affair to strengthen its argument that Iran under the present regime and set-up is a source of regional and international destabilisation.
So far, Iran, obviously mindful of the Iraq experience, has played a careful game and defended its nuclear programme saying it is intended for peaceful purposes.
It rejects American charges that it supports terror by emphatically pointing out that its backing for Palestinian resistance groups, Syria and Lebanon's Hizbollah is matter of principle since Israel is occupying Arab land.
The pressure on Tehran went a notch higher this week, with a report prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) seen to voost concerns that Iran's alleged failure to inform the agency of its atomic activities boosts fears that it wants nuclear weapons.
The IAEA report is reported to have found Iran in breach of its UN nuclear safeguards obligations and could lead to Iran declared as in "non-compliance" with its UN Safeguards Agreement.
A verdict of non-compliance means IAEA notification to the UN Security Council, which could impose economic sanctions.
Tehran insists it is co-operating fully with the IAEA. It said last week that it was was ready to sign up to snap inspections of its nuclear programme, but said it wanted prior clarification on "the preservation of its sovereignty."
Obviously, Iran is worried that snap IAEA inspections could be used for American spying on its military facilities and defence capablities.

In the final analysis, the US is trying to get Tehran over a barrell like it did with Iraq. Either way it turns, Iran would face American and international pressure to come clean on its nuclear programmes -- and its missile projects -- or face economic sanctions. But then, opening itself for nuclear inspections could mean exposing its military capabilities to the US and its allies.
Indeed, Tehran might not really be worried about limited UN sanctions since it has shown the world that it could survive despite international isolation; perhaps it might indeed be a better option that opening the door for its defensive capabilities to be advertised to the US while it is clear that Washington is bent upon regime change in Tehran.
However, Iran's real fear should be of being pushed into a corner with a combination external pressures, American incitement of Iranians to revolt against the regime and flexing military muscles across the border from Iraq and sanctions against its oil industry. These could be with a steady build-up of a negative image on the international scene -- like the Argentine affair — that could eventually be worked into endorsement of action for regime change in Tehran.