should we be giving our contribution to the worldwide fight about problems much larger than ourselves? ykyp, i ask you, when you place your vote today, think carefully. where do your duties really lie? thank you. [applause] >> alec, thank you for that speech to conclude our formal debate proceedings. in the course of the five debates which have been heavily and impressively subscribed, i have been able to call 70 speakers from what we call the back benches. and every region has been represented, and of those 70, 35 have been men and 35 have been women. does that mean that there is total satisfaction and an

absence of complaint? of course it doesn't. it is never possible to please or satisfy everybody. i absolutely understand the sense of disappointment people might feel if they've yearned to speak and didn't have the chance, and i can say only come back for a subsequent occasion, and we'll try to accommodate you, and keep working at it, keep practicing, keep honing your skills, keep generating the passion and coming forward with the ideas and contributing to our proceedings. ..

>> come on back come on back on assignment. show yourself. [applause] >> if there are others i haven't, and i will get bad press, we'll probably get bad press from simon anyway, i am used to the. the other person is tony from the politics.com. come on, give him a big round of applause. [applause] >> i think that's really very good news indeed. the youth parliament will now vote for the main debating topic for the year ahead. those of you on my right should leave the chamber by the door

behind me and turn left into the i lobby behind you. those on my left should leave by the door at the far end and turn left into the no lobby behind you. in the lobby you be giving a ballot paper with a five debate choices. you should place a cross against the topic that you think should be the main u.k. wide be debating topic. for the year ahead. had to complete a ballot paper to the doorkeepers in the lobbies. afterwards, return to your place in the chamber. house of commons staff will be on hand to assist you. the division lobbies are now open. in order, order.

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> we are leaving this program. you can see in its entirety at c-span.org. heading live now over to the brookings institution here in the nation's capital for a discussion on iran's nuclear program. examining the dynamics inside the country in response from the international community. yesterday the u.s. joined with canada and britain applying more sanctions as iran continues to pursue a nuclear weapons program. we are expecting marks the second financial ticket advisor tom donilon. live coverage on c-span2. >> welcome to our program for today which is entitled iran's international pressure and

assessment of multilateral efforts to impede iran's nuclear program. which is a joint production of the sub on center at our center for the u.s. and europe. we are to lead to have you all here today. we're also delighted to see that united states, european union and others was willing to comply with a request, to announce that it sanctions the day before. if you go down the street to aei they will take the brookings controls this administration. we, of course, have done the opposite but it is nice every once in a while when he was government does comply with what works best for our timing. and, of course, we do have exquisite dining today. this is an included important issue. it is made even more so by the recent announcements. and our first panel is intended to cover the iran's side of this story. obviously, there are many sides to this story, but i think for all of us it does start with iran. iranians are forging ahead with their program, and we wanted to

start by getting a sense of the lay of the land. what the iranians are up to, what they're thinking is, what it might take to stop them, how things are working in tehran, which will ultimately lead us to conversations later on in the day about what it is that we and our allies might do about it all. we have a sensational panel to start things off this morning. you all have the bios in front of you so i'm not going to give you lengthy bios. but just to give you kind of the quick order of play, immediately to my left is doctor charles ferguson who of course is the president of the federation of the federation of american scientists. am going to ask charles to start things off by talking a little bit about what we know that the iranian program today. ibc this is a program that has evolved over time, and getting a sense of where the program is as best we understand it at any moment is both difficult and, of course, very important in understanding where we are and

what we might be able to do in the future. after charles we have kevan harris. heaven is the jennings randolph peace scholar at the u.s. institute of peace. we will turn to kevan to talk a little bit about the impact of sanctions themselves. obviously, the sanctions have been a critical element of western efforts to try to deter the iranian nuclear program. they have so far not yet succeeded in that. but certainly there are arguments on both sides as to whether they've succeeded in accomplishing other goals, whether they might succeed in the future, whether we are just around the corner from success. so we will ask kevan to bring us up-to-date on where things are and talk a little bit about the impact of sanctions on iran. and then finally on my far left, your far right, we will turn to doctor ray takeyh who i think all of you know is a senior fellow at the council on foreign relations and we'll ask me to peer inside the black box of the iranian leadership and talk a

little bit about what's going on there as best we understand it. the motives of the regime, division, the infighting, all of the stuff that captures our attention without actually ever been able to know what to make of it all. will ask ray to give us a sense of what we should make of it all. so with that let me open things up to charles. charles, tell us about where the program stands. >> thank you very much, ken. it's a great pleasure to be at brookings and to see so many people here in the audience, a lot of your colleagues, great turnout. this is such a hot issue. ken, maybe it was a bit of a freudian slip because we e-mailed the panelists yesterday, he called me craig ferguson. >> may be lack of sleep spent maybe thinking of the comedian craig ferguson because you try to find humor in the subject of the iranian nuclear issue. it's very hard to do because we know it's a very serious subject but i guess that there's humor, it's more of maybe a shakespearean farce comedy kind

of comedy of errors. that seems be a lot of missed opportunities to either engage with iran to try to put limits on their nuclear program, or trying to read what really the intentions of iran. so it seems like we keep kind of talking past each other, and i look forward to my two colleagues, since they're more of the political experts. to kick it off, some of the basics what we know from a technical standpoint, and we know that there's been a lot going on as reported in the latest iaea report that just came out a couple weeks ago. so what i'm going to do is to do a bit of good news bad news type of reporting to try to get you up to speed on most of the relevant points. so we know that iran continues to defy the u.n. security council and the iaea board of governors resolutions to suspend

certain activities big iranian enrichment activities in particular and there's also a growing concern about what iran is doing at the heavy water facilities at iraq and building and i are 40 research reactor. i'll touch upon that a little bit but the focus right is so is on the iranian enrichment program. the iaea board of governors and the u.n. security council also called on iran to apply additional protocol to its comprehensive safeguards, and what's called the modified code 3.1. i will get into those innovate in just a few minutes, but let's just cover what we know in terms of the latest news from the iea. we know that here's some badges, that iran continues to build up its stockpile of low enriched uranium, including 19.75% enriched uranium. that's close to the dividing line between low enriched uranium and highly enriched, the dividing line is 20% enrichment. even at 20% enrichment it's

going to take a few hundred kilos of that amount of material to have enough for one bomb. and iran so far, going to the iea has something like 80 kilograms enriched at that level. so there's still a way before they have a real breakout from that amount of material into either one bomb, bomb's worth of weapons grade material that they can further enrich. they have also amassed 4900 kilograms of about 3.5% low enriched uranium. if they went for broke and they completely converted that into weapons grade material, you might get three or four times worth out of that. i was a somewhat good news though, is still not enough ago to provide iran with a true breakout capability, although it is worrisome. i would say some other good news is that sanctions, export controls and covert actions have slowed down iran's nuclear

programs. of course, this is good news from the west standpoint, not iran's standpoint. i'm sure that's obvious. stuxnet, the computer virus that attacked some nuclear facilities appear we destroyed about 1000 of the iranian centrifuges, but these were replaced over time. so that was clearly a bit of a setback. right now the iran has something like 8000 centrifuges that are in operation and they continued to build up for these first generation centrifuges. so far the ones men in operation ivy's eye are one type models because the first generation centrifuges they got from the a.q. khan network, first got the know-how, how to build them from the a.q. khan network. some other bad news though is that despite the sanctions, iran is still proceeding with its nuclear program come although apparently at a slower pace. it still appears determined to pursue its right to nuclear

program, and as obvious to probably all of you, this program has become very much a nationalistic issue. so it's going to be very difficult for the leaders in iran to give it up, or at least put some specific controls on it. further bad news is iran is continue to proceed with developing more advanced centrifuge designs although that is tempered with good news. it appears they're having trouble developing many of the centrifuges because of problems of getting access to high quality materials to build these machines. some further bad news though is that, as i mentioned, they continued to defy the board of governors and the iea security council's resolutions security to apply more stricter safeguards in the habit of blowing. there's the issue of the additional protocol to the additional protocol requires states to go beyond just the declared facilities. require the inspectors were there in the undeclared facilities or materials going on with the state. and so far the iea has not been able to make that determination.

the modified code 3.1 i mentioned earlier, that's the iran's subsidiary arrangements to its safeguards agreement to modified code 3.1 sounds like jargon. so let's break down. basically what it says simply is that the state is required to let the iea know in advance design information about any facility it wants to construct. iran has instead been interpreting its safeguards agreements under the old interpretation from the 1970s and that it doesn't have to report the facility until it is within six months of introducing nuclear material new facility. a iea says that's not sufficient because safeguards work best when you have safeguards by design, which you can build and into the silly from start. and, of course, the best way to do that is to get advance design information and for the state to work cooperatively with the iea.

iran is also said it wants to build another 10 in enrichment facilities, and said that it may have selected five new sites for these facilities. so that's apparently some badges, but recent good news is the doctor said in october iran would probably not need further enrichment facilities for at least another two years. still want to get iran hasn't provided adequate information in that area. some other bad news, that ir-40 research reactor, is still being constructed and heavy water facility construction is still continuing and this once again is despite the u.n. security council resolution to suspend its activity. the good news though is that the iea has a counter -- but the bad news is doesn't have any confidence about the county for any undeclared facilities or materials. so, summing all this up and looking at what i think is probably the best news so far is

that iran's to benefit from staying inside the tree. iran has an interest in not stimulating its neighboring states from acquiring similar nuclear programs and provide breakout capabilities of the weapons programs. so i think what we need to do is to find ways to keep iran in that system and have it apply not just two additional protocol, but go beyond that in places where we have more confidence as to what's going on with this program. if iran says this is truly a peaceful program, it's clear in our interest to show that it is a peaceful program by becoming more transparent and getting proper access. so let me stop at that point, ken come and we could go back to other things later. >> thank you charles. i think we will come back to that. a terrific baseline. kevan, are the sanctions having an impact? >> okay, i want to thank, thanks for inviting by the way. it's nice to be on a panel with

charles and ray. i'm a sociologist. great workout shoes in the study of iran quite a bit so it's nice to be on the panel. i'm pressing on on the panel, i traveled to iran often for purposes of research. i want to talk about what's it like him was when it said the country what's recent changes. so first, it's clear now and it's also clear according to statements by politicians inside iran that sanctions are having an impact here not only the naming of particular enterprises and people which is the official policy of some of the sanctions that have recently and implemented, but also the outcome is what i like to call trickle-down sanctions. sanctions affect the ability of particular banks and large in prizes to procure foreign exchange and other goods on the international market, but the end result is it has an effect on small andean enterprise in iran. let's take for example, the auto

industry, the major to automobile producers and iran require lots of credit and capital goods and supplies to maintain operations. and it has become harder. the cost of business has gone. everybody knows that now. but the upstream and downstream producers of tires and car parts and seagulls, you name it, many of them are inside iran are also feeling the effect that raises unemployment to a certain extent, and also decreases wages and things like that. many of the labor protests in iran right now are due to nonpayment of wages to enter certain extent we can link that to sanctions, but not the only reason. so in that sense if one wanted to describe this post as a targeted one, the targeting is not as smart as we think. but, you know, talking to people in iran, i was just there in the spring, there's not a lot of people i didn't buy sanctions their biggest problem, both working-class people as well as managers and people in the middle class. i was talking to people who work

in the construction sector, who are building these high rises for the middle-class, all these high rises in northern tehran, and they serving in sanctions were affecting them because they couldn't get, you know, all the kind of construction supplies that building a high rise requires. but certainly that wasn't the only thing on their mind. there's a lot of other problems inside the economy that their consulate talking about. but politically there is another affect, and i wanted to discuss this a bit. because there's too consequences of the sanctions as they intensify its going to exacerbate this. first, the government has been privatizing to a certain extent many of the agencies and organizations that get targeted by sanctions. so there have been privatization of banks, state banks in the past year. this admittedly by the own account has been somewhat a result of sanctions, although they've been wants to privatize some of these things for a long time.

but also shipping and import export businesses and you name it. so there is this certain shell game going on with a privatize enterprises, and that allows them to maneuver into may be catches up. but on the other hand, there's a reason for the station, economic networks through the state because it becomes more difficult to interact with particular segments of the world economy, not all of them, but particular segment. the state has to monitor control things like foreign exchange, which they have been doing recently. and also they have been trying to reregulate particular segments of the economy. for example, taxation. they're trying to value-added tax and this has caused the protests that we've seen in the past year to two years. really overtax, not really over political issues. now, i want to say something that might shock people here though. this is not the military takeover of the economy that many people to work on iran proclaimed.

in fact, and i tend to work a bit on this subject, and i researched generally shows that this notion of a military takeover of the iranian economy is a myth. the state is heavily involved in the iranians economy, that's true. and many people in the second generation of bureaucrats and technocrats and politicians in iran are in the military because they thought in a war for 10 years, basically. but obut on the other hand, if e look at china, brazil, india, in the country the developing country, the military is involved, too. we need to be careful sometimes when looking at iran and expert to work on iran come to work on the ranch 147 the things that might seem to do their to our ron might be more general around the developing world. and certainly the irgc is more involved in the economy than it was five years ago, but it was involving the economy in the 1990s, especially also in the early '90s. so it's more of a general trend than a particular i think

outcome of recent years. and it is certain that it outcome of the sanctions policy. so i will leave it at that and we will talk more later spent terrific. that's a great start for us. there's some stuff i want to come back and dig into. thanks. ray, what do you have for iran for a? >> i will try to do it in seven minutes. >> you might have a couple minutes to spare. >> a few minutes to spare. the way i would describe iran position today internally and externally is an pass. i think there's a domestic impasse and obviously doesn't international impasse on the nuclear issue, but other issues as we'll. the domestic impasse take place i think at two levels. you are within the state institutions themselves, you know, the presidency against office of supreme leader, the parliament that wants to move, micromanaged the ministries, and so to some degree of

institutional obstacles to the efficient operation of the government. that particular impasse i don't think is particularly new, if you look at the history of the islamic republic. sometimes in the press and in other venues it is portrayed as this power struggle, but some of those power struggles are almost endemic to the way this particular system works. if you look back at president johnny's 10 years, if you look at the presence tenure and his conversations with the office of supreme leader, impeachment of his ministries, an apprehension of his allies, and in his famous letter when he complained about all these things. so that essentially takes place because in essence you have a legal system which has some gaping centers of power struggling against a supreme leader that wants to have a hedging of political power. and so long as these to coexist with each other, there's going to be some degree of tension. as i said, that's essentially

within the system. the second tension that one notices is within the state of society. there has been, in my judgment, the seventh of the organic bombs that link states to the population. particularly in the aftermath of the june 2009 election, that some of this was even obviously before that. it is today, and i think that can be said for the first time in the history of the islamic republic, were the large and substantial swath of the population no longer look at politics and participation and political affairs, elections, so forth, as a useful means of changing the system. that was in the case as early as 2009. in 2009, i think it can be credibly reported that some 80, 85% of the population

participate in the election. that in and of itself is an affirmation of the system because large number of people participated in the political process with deficiencies they recognize, but they nevertheless perceived it as an effective means of engendering their voices in deliberations of the government. that's unlikely to happen ever again given how that particular election worked and given the resistance of the system to reform or essentially broaden its contours. and so there isn't impasse taking place between the government that is resistance to the popular will and the popular will is increasing expressing itself in a little simmering conflict. that's a domestic impasse. there's an international impasse, and there's wide variety of motivations over the years as described to iran's nuclear program. the deterrence and power projection, and i realize there's a connection between the

two. increasingly, it is my belief that iran's nuclear program is driven by domestic political factors. and not necessary the domestic political factors people tend to other two, name as the program moves forward is it an indication scientific achievement, and, therefore, its demise a surge of national debt weeps to benefit. i don't believe that is too. i believe that in some sense the islamic republic can no longer anchored its legitimacy on popular perception or nationalism. this is a system that since its inception in 1979 cautiously defined itself in contrast to iran's history of nationalism. you know, pre-islamic period has taken them, monarchies, centuries of monarchy, or centuries of corruption and pillage and so forth. and it essentially, islamic

republic in its own self-definition and acknowledgment is a transnational phenomena, still. so i don't necessary believe that the program is you to reconnect with the population, if you accept that those organic bombs have been irreparably set. so, therefore, what is the domestic motivation for the program? i think if a few minutes of the islamic apparatus our political leadership, the program ironically enough offers you a pathway, paradoxically enough, halfway back to the global society and back to the global economy. you are unlikely to negotiate your way back to regaining economic contracts, commercial contracts, and your place in an international system that you had known it here but if you look at other cases of proliferation, whether it is india and pakistan and so forth, after a period of international pronunciation and international condemnation, and even

ostracization, the argument becomes that this country is too dangerous to be left alone to nurture its grievances. and, therefore, the best way to get in with the new reality, which is the iranian bomb is to reintegrate ironic into the regional system and international become an innocent committee as a means of imposing limits and restraints, and incentives for proper behavior. so i increasing i think if you look at it, the program makes sense, not to discount other factors, deterrence and projection of power, or perhaps even reconnect with large numbers of the disaffected body policy, but it makes particular sense as a pathway back to international legitimacy. that's a precarious, quite risky activity, but nevertheless it is one path open to the regime. if that is true then in order for the regime to get itself into that position, it must be

prepared to do three things. number one, endure a period of pronounced hardship, as claimed sanctions and so forth. number two, you require actually having a bomb in order to become part of the nuclear club and, therefore, back to the international club. and that essentially means that this program made in very real way may be beyond diplomatic mediation. the good news is that this is, this is a weapon that is designed to extract tributes from international concession as opposed to strictly weapons and endanger the neighborhood. anyway, i will stop there since my time has lapsed, but i think it's important to see the program, not only in domestic prisons but changing domestic prisons. >> that's great, ray. both insightful and provocative, as always. i want to take the prerogative of the chair to dig a little

deeper into each of these different issues. and then we'll open it up to the floor for questions. but this it is so much that we need to talk about. charles, the question i want to put to you is where you ended up with militarization. the iaea report has now put weaponization on the table, but what they said is a little confusing. help us sort it out. what does the iaea believe? and then if you want to flush that out a little bit with what the others out there think may be going on? i think that will help enrich it. kevan, for you, i know it was terrific, and it's always wonderful to get some real undergrad experience with what's going on in iran. while charles answered my first question to him, if you could be pondered and answer to the question, what might have an impact in iran? first, you know, we're going to have new sanctions in iran. there's some expectations the e.u., will these new sanctions, with the threat of central bank sanctions have an impact?

how do the oil sanctions played out in iran? is this something after that you think could have the kind of impact on iran, on iranian society that might change the calculus that ray has laid out? and then finally ray, for you, you got to the ultimate aims of where their foreign policy is and i think that's extreme important. but i would love to have you fill in the middle ground. we've seen a lot from the iranians in recent days, in recent weeks. there's his purported plot to kill joubert. we don't know if it is true but if it were true, that would say something about iranian thinking. the arrest of these various american spy rings is noteworthy. how they have been handling the iaea, the negotiations. how should we understand iranian foreign policy at this point in time, and put the envelope in the context especially in light of the longer-term thinking that you've already laid out. charles? >> ken, i think first let's just

remind ourselves what are the three pillars of a nuclear weapons program. and i think ray touched on this towards the end of his remarks about whether iran really wants to get a workable nuclear bomb to extract tribute. very interesting point. very provocative and we can take that out later, but what does a state need? they need that fissile material, and it can either be into forms. either highly enriched uranium, preferably weapons grade uranium that is enriched up to 90% or more in a certain isotope called iranian to 35, or plutonium, and preferably weapons grade plutonium for, what could come out of the reactor, still weapons usable but not weapons as i wrote that's not enough. a state also needs a warhead design, something that if you send a signal to compress that fissile material into the

supercritical mistake pashtun critical state, it will go kaboom. and we know that iran has done some work in that area and has been received some documents through the cannes network or other sources that can help it develop those designed to quickly the third element of a weapons program is a delivery vehicle. and preferably from iran's standpoint, probably ballistic missiles. because that is a very symbolic weapon, and i think what ray is getting at is that even if iran gets a nuclear bomb and get something that is a real weapon, they probably won't use it. they will use it for other political purposes. so i would argue, that ballistic missiles or the ideal weapon. i remember helen in 1980, she published this book with the title and missile in the. it kind of says it all.

so even if you don't want to use it as a weapon. so we know iran has been doing a lot of work on ballistic missiles, and devastated the united states and its allies to move ahead with deploying missile defense in the european theater. but iran still apparent in some ways away from developing the long range intercontinental ballistic missile capability so it can strike the states from such a weapon. it has a shorter range and medium-range ballistic missiles that could threaten states in greater middle eastern region, for sure. and the big question then is, so doesn't have that workable weapon design? so the iaea was asked to make that assessment. well, it's interesting that you had this debate going on now that does ie a actually had a mandate to investigate those kinds of activities. and so, professional daniel joined what a very interesting provocative piece and raised

pashtun recently i do know. there are those who say yes, and look, i'm not a lawyer. i'm not going to pretend to be your i met physical in geneva. i read article ii of in pt and i try to look at it from a plaintext point of view and that some kind of doublespeak. and i see that the last phrase of article ii it says that a non-nuclear weapons state shall not seek or receive assistance in nuclear weapons manufacture, manufacture of nuclear explosive device. so seek or receive assistance. so we know that iran has received such assistance. it received a document, 15 page document, showing how to make these iranian metal hemispheres. the basic nuclear weapon core of a nuclear weapon.

we know that it's been doing some of investigation in terms of electronic firing mechanisms, what are called explosive bridge wire techniques. and apparently it has gotten some assistance from a certain russian scientist. the question, he sang he is denying that he has any knowledge of nuclear weapons design. the was investigate these nano diamond technologies. but the question is does have an application to triggering a nuclear weapon? so there's all those issues to assess, and then there's the issue of is anything really new in the annex to the iea report? at ub through and it's about 15 pages of material, and you go through and have the same, not really, not a lot of new stuff in there, most of the things that are documented that we know well have been prior to 2004. and that is consistent with the national intelligence estimate, they came out in 2007, saying there are strong indications that iran's stock, sometimes by

the end of 2003 and there are some other activities that kind of work wrapping up going into 2004. and the iea report is very careful of saying there may be additional activities going on after 2004, but does not really clear evidence of such. so, maybe i will leave it there and we can circle back to it later. >> great. i think to leave it in an ambiguous spot. kevan? >> sounds like a list of nodes, unknowns. [laughter] >> so given that, how can we get iran to change its behavior is the question, question of the policy. first, i did oppose the situation right now in this country probably means there's going to be a ramping up of the unilateral or multilateral sanctions with maybe europe or some parts of europe on board. so what will happen as a result

of this? it will make it increasingly difficult as our is for the central bank to require foreign exchange. this is something they're been preparing for for quite a while. if you follow the business press in iran, they to discuss this a bit here and its cause a fuse runs already. but the result of this has been, you get the bad news in the american press but to respond to this by re-creating the tier to currency exchange system, formation system that they had for 20 years. they are very used to dealing with government intervention in a foreign exchange market to direct currency at the time they need it most, whether state sectors or industrial sectors. so, this reminds me of the early 19th century napoleonic blockade on the u.k. in the way. in the beginning, you know,

trans-revolutionary war, napoleon had convinced most of your because he had covered it all, to block u.k. and to, blockade the countries which was an ivan and yet bit by bit countries peeled off. i think portugal was first and the dutch. so that probably will happen. unless the traneighty can sustain a diplomatic effort with china, india, and also japan. which have all given signs that they're unwilling to go as far as the united states wants so there'll be a game between these groups. and, of course, china and india already have quite intense bilateral trade agreements with iran, and there have been of course china and india are getting a good deal these days from iran but that doesn't mean they do is going to go away, i think. they are not getting any signs that going to change that situation. but also what is the into logic of ramping up sanctions and

increasing, you know, to many people enter the country seem like punitive measures against the broad population? is it, as mark, and represent from a untested, mark kirk said he was but the nuclear option on central banks of the central bank of iran and sanction them. is a collapse of the economy as he just said. i really don't think that's going to happen. first of all iran is not iraq and the world is different in the 1990s where you could actually get a full global effort to blockade a country. iran as well embedded in particular networks that the sanctions have only increased as a result. but second, what causes, and this one might disagree a bit with ray because we look at those revolutionary states. they end up lasting a long time. china, algeria, cuba, they last a long time, even though it seems like the legitimacy has eroded. what causes these kind of states for the political elite to go here.

we spent a lot of time talking about ahmadinejad, the president and these kind of things, and most of the world, factionalisms is not allied but it's known. even the chinese army's party has asked. factionalism is normal, it's not on. looking at iran like it has factions, we need to squeeze it, doesn't seem like historically correct. what causes it leads to work together in countries like iran? it's not money, not resources. they just buy more over those things, it's all. it's fear. if you threaten, and we know this, if you threaten countries, all of a sudden they find a real big sense of starting to work together. so one policy, if you do want ahmadinejad and transit get along i would've threaten. than you might get along. and to do what? i don't know. but that would ensure that the factions would die them. we've seen this over the last few months. at high peaks have received

external threat, the discourse of unity rises and discourse of factionalism dies down. so i actually, raise point which is provocative, i think to the next obvious question that if the goal of the program is perceived as only path to legitimacy, and it seems like an alternative policy to provide a different path to international legitimacy for iran, our lease provide a more viable path to legitimacy, currently they don't perceive it as open and that might provide a give away. we spent a lot of resources on sanctions that we will be spending more resource both put and resource in the next year and perhaps for 10 years. we need to add up with a cost-benefit versus spending resources on diplomatic options. >> thank you. ray? >> i think your belligerent on content but patience and practice.

you see this play itself out. for iranian readership times, this is a temporal commodity. the terrorists incident is interesting in many respects. because what we've come to know about iran's terrorist portfolio, if you will, over the past 30 years, it has evolved. initially in the initial convulsions of the revolutionary period, iran's terrorist aspirations were global. not just assassination of dissidents in europe, but separatist movements in africa and so forth. that chapter winds down, and the in the recent years iran's terrorist portfolio has geographically contracted, but it has become more intense in the geography. that simply because there are opportunities made of able to it, in particular with iraq. where iranians have supported militias in violent groups and so forth. hezbollah, the level of

existence got on probably to some extent because of this competition with israel. hamas because it emerged as more of an autonomous palestinian actor, require some degree of iranian subsidies. so it was an intensification of the terrorism activity within a more circumscribed geographical sphere. if this incident is true, and i'm not challenging its veracity or credibility, it suggests two things. number one, that the previous red lines have been revisited, and in some cases the race. one of the red lines was that iran would not target americans. the other one survey would not target americans in the united states. that red line appears to have been revisited. the second one is that iran will meet pressure with pressure. that if the united states tries to mobilize pressure against it, for writing a voice, that it, too, has resources to retaliate.

one of the pieces of the pressure policy is it would deal with iranian compliance and concessions. if true, indicates that they're willing to have some sort, get into some sort of a escalatory dynamic. when you get into escalatory dynamic of this type, you are getting on pirates back and you cannot always pick the place of us now. but if these allegations are true and iran's attempt to assassinate a foreign dignitaries one muffin the white house, then we're in sort of a new escalatory confrontational posture. and it plays itself out you can see above and beyond the train of iraq, beyond afghanistan, and moving into a fairly unpredictable and difficult terrain. so it would suggest that this is a foreign policy that is becoming more acutely aggressive in terms of, in terms of its retaliatory denunciations. over all, i think iran's place in the regions is in the short

term perhaps it's advantage, not because of these moments, political transitions, but some do because international focus has switched to taking place in egypt, rehabilitation of tunisia, or in syria and so forth but in the long run if these particle transitions managed to succeed in starting a more responsive and accountable government, which is a big if, then i don't think iran can remain as autocratic stability in a region of popular empower and that will go down to suspension. >> thank you, ray. i think that that is a great start. before with a question, for those of you in the back standing, there are a number of seats in kind of the front, middle. i would welcome you to come on down and sit. hopefully it will be more comfortable than standing in the back. if you have questions, please put your hands up. what i would love to do exactly take several questions, put them to the panel comic if it had a

chance to respond to that so that we can have some free flow conversation. why don't we start with you? they should -- there should be a microphone coming around. >> and please identify yourself, even if i call on you by name. >> thank you very much for really a great panel so far but it seems that over the past decade, more during the negotiation or the attempt by the u.s. and the international community to deal at this times diplomatically with iran's nuclear program, i hate use the typical bargaining an analogy, but it seems we've been bargaining up the entire time rather than bargaining down. we've been making very, very clear to iran in numerous ways how invaluable their goods are while at the same time trying to pay as little as possible to get them. is there any way to deal with this problem? whether to just lower the temperature, say listen, we understand the reasons for what you are doing, but you're not going to get what you want. >> thank you.

>> thanks. i'm garrett mitchell and the right the mitchell report. i want to ask the question in two parts. the first is, if one could say that our level, the united states level of anxiety and concern about iran and israel's is a 10, or maybe it is a 12 initial and it is a 10 here, what's the panel's assessment of the level of intensity, general fear about the foreign policy intent that ray mentioned in other major countries? in other words, are there just two of us that lose sleep at night?

and are we making, are we making, not amount of of a molehill, but in other words, i'm trying to get some sense of whether the level of -- here in united states is sort of typical american overreaction to, you know, the new hitler of the year, of the decade, or whether, or whether the rest of the major countries aren't sleeping? and the second is, ray, coming to your point about their intent and that they cost the red line and that maybe there really might be, might be worse than we think. what is there in the game?

what do they gain if they knocked off a diplomat one block or one mile from the white house and crossed other red lines? what is the seeking and why would they risk more than a program? i would just like to get a sense of the reality picture here. >> hi. emily with "congressional quarterly." kevan, you mentioned briefly mark kirk legislation to sanction the central bank and whether or not we can realistically expect a collapse of the central bank of iran and we need to do a cost-benefit analysis our sanctions program. i was wondering if you can engage in that cost benefit analysis when it comes to targeting the central bank specifically. it looks like the sorts of amendments that are up could actually pass, and so what would

be the impact of sanctions that would target financial institutions doing business with the central bank of iran? >> i will add one, kevan on to that end when i hear the words collapse in other countries economy, my own experience with iraq immediately, do we want to cause the collapse of the iranian economy questcor that some of the positive for what we're trying to achieve? i would argue in the case of iraq it wasn't, but again iran is a different case. charles, start with you and just go right through and you can answer whichever parts are which of the questions you would like. >> i think i will stick with matt's point about bargaining and maybe i will take on what appears to be a somewhat narrower topic, but one that was a keen interest and still is, this issue of 20% enrichment activities. we go back to september 2009, when we had barack obama and

other, you know, sarkozy, i'm there's a britain, i missed another one. but i blanked. i'm joking. cameron, right. brown, right. sorry. >> you got a name spend at least i got the name. but the point was we appear to have for a period of time a real serious offer that we would do some kind of swap, that the west would provide nuclear fuel, just about 20% enriched level that is useful for the tehran research reactor which was originally provided by deny states, had been converted some years ago working with argentina to get to the 20% enriched level. this is a reactor that provides, produces medical, summit on the order of 800,000 or more iranians. so this is not any kind of

aspect of a weapons program. this is a device that is used for medical treatments your but -- treatments. we are trying to greatest bargain where we will only provide the material if iran would take out the equivalent amount of low enriched uranium. and two years ago it seemed like a pretty good deal because at that point it hadn't stock -- it hadn't stockpiled that much rain. the point was to get out at least eight bombs worth of material from iran to further delay. well, and getting rather collocated i will get into all the blow-by-blow. turkey and iran, got involved with iran, in 2010, and that kind of muddy the waters and so there were mixed messages sent back and forth. washington wasn't pleased with what brazil was trying to do, its role. and then the deal just fell apart.

and that gave iran an apparent greenlight to say look, the west is a series about this deal, we are going to forge ahead with 20% level. now we have gotten to the point just a couple months ago when i'm a danish and some of the iranian leaders saying this time we are sick. we really do need that material. and otherwise we're going to try to go ahead on our own to make the nuclear fuel rods, for that reactor. and they might be able to do it. they apparently are struggling. as you see the iea report it says they do have a fuel manufacturing plant. the point that is, here again we have another opportunity to create an opening, a positive opening in my view, and also that the of my colleague he was here in the audience, we wrote a piece about a month ago saying let's take ahmadinejad and other leaders as they work, we don't have much to lose here. we can say well you will office

20% material with no conditions. this is a humanitarian gesture on the part of the united states and the west, just like the united states helped iran in 2031 that was an earthquake nearby. this was a case where we didn't question whether iran was up to no good and said, these people were any, they were hurting, they were injured and would provide assistance. it's a similar situation now with his reactor. even though it is something nuclear it it really, my view is about an opportunity to really have to engagement, to have that open hand. instead what we've been hearing a lot is just finding ways for more and more sanctions. i don't see ways for the u.s. to really open up in terms of avenues of engagement that i think that is one way to do it. >> well, in one sense, the whole point is an attempt to prevent the collapse of the state. raynaud's this from his work. in fact, we know that iraq is

full of sunni and shia are now because of the collapse and we occupy the country. one of the wonderful things about iran is what a good of the fact that iran is turks and kurds and nomads because they never collapse. you only own about these things and catastrophes. i can tell you this, that the iranians had been there before. they never will be as isolated they believe as they were in the 1980s. during the 1980s, with the price of oil been quite low by the middle of the '80s, were able to survive although it was extremely constrained. they created a series of mechanisms to get by. and, of course, the country was forced into auto arche. at all kind of uncanny concert was at but it came as a result of isolation that wasn't planned by the revolution in 1989.

so the economy, compared to other economies in the developing world does have a high level of internal autonomy. it's nowhere near it was in the '80s, i mean, the current amendment, these kind of assumptions that targeting the central bank will lead to the collapse first of all, kind of sanctions that has impact on iraq were on a puzzle in the 1990s after a war was won against them. so if we think that sanctions that were, since the dover, change behavior, you have to but what came before the sanctions. so the kind of sanctions that lead to collapse or changes the behavior often, something was going on before them. where is the war in this case. is there going to be military and economic sanctions or something like the kirk amendment will push forward. i think i will leave it at that. >> question regarding whether other members of the

international community do this with the same degree of urgency, i think that's the first part of it. one of the interesting things that has happened over the past, really going back to 2005, is the way that europeans have kind of gradually accepted the argument of the united states. namely, if you recall, the european policy in the 1990s was something called critical dialogue where they will be critical of the united states and a dialogue with iran. [laughter] and essentially, a few of economic engagement as a means of tempering iranian motivations. i don't see that as being the policies of the european state and aftermath of you in resolution 192029, that july the european union announced sort of sanctions which were quite aggressive, quite robust. so there's been separates of the european iranian linkages. i think there is disagreement in

europe versus united states or elsewhere about the utility of the use of force, but not in terms of international isolation of iran and economic coercion of it as a pathway to its moderation. i can't really speak about the russian foreign policy and the chinese foreign policy because there are other people here who are far more qualified than i can do that. but it does seem to me that those states have to consider their relationship with iran in the larger conflicts of the relationship within a safe and larger conflicts with united system and to make the adjustments according the. they tried to have it both ways, have deepened their ties with iran, economically as the chinese have, while at the same time we negotiating their international resolutions as a means of putting some degree of blame on iran leverage and their commercial activities. but we will see how that policy plays out. ..

plausibility of the deterrence beyond the region and all for that argument, but i cannot really try to unpack that because that actually goes to a certain level of mental acuity which i'm not capable of. [laughter] >> at least not after your second cup of coffee. agreed. i want to remind everyone of course we are going to have a second panel that the doctor

fiona hill is going to be the counterpart from europe that will look specifically at this question of the europeans and their roles. six more questions. we will start down here and i will move back. >> documentary film maker. from listening to you it seems to me sanctions are not going to work or if they are going to work it is going to be very limited. yet u.s. political leadership is painting themselves into a corner. we will not permit an iranian bomb so it seems we are heading to one option of sanctions don't work it has to be something else, a war. so my question to you is to the iranians understand this and are they preparing for it? >> right over there.

>> private citizen. as the status quo in the middle east now, as i understand, israel has probably 200 boosted bombs and the deployed some on submarines i think and the u.s. has about 60 much more powerful nuclear weapons stationed in eastern turkey. if those weapons are taken out of the mix we have a nuclear-free middle east and our pressure on iran would be perceived as an attempt to preserve the nuclear-free status quo. right now our pressure is perceived by the rest of the world as an effort to preserve the nuclear weapons monopoly of the u.s. and israel. why do we never hear in discussions like this any talk about the u.s. and israel -- israeli nuclear weapons in the middle east? it seems that's a factor that should be considered. >> the leedy just behind.

>> yes, thank you. jennifer matthews. i was wondering in the npt review conference last year the iranians rea agreed reluctantly to the final document which included a holding of a conference to prepare for middle east nuclear weapon-free or wmd-free zone is a part of the preparation is going on in vienna yesterday and today. the meeting about a nuclear-free zones and iran decided not to participate. so i'm wondering if any of you could shed light on that and what it might mean for the 2012 conference on the subject. if you can't i will ask this afternoon's panel, the next panel. >> we will take this one on the left. >> my question is we've heard some very interesting comments

about how challenging it is to affect policy in iran. but could you give us some ideas where are the opportunities that influence of the society that is not monolithic? what are the opportunities for the u.s. and others to actually make some impact? >> great. we will put it to the panel. take part or all of those. >> i think i will talk to her word and jennifer's point related in the larger region, how to deal with nuclear weapons in certain states and also a larger issue of weapons of mass destruction including chemical and biological weapons in the region, and the resolution coming out of the npt review conference which jennifer mentioned is their anything real? is it just something the u.s. said yeah, okay we just had to go along to have that in terms of the review conference we had to agree to this but we are not

really serious about it. i feel we should take it seriously. i think that howard raises ann present point here. often we don't really talk about israel or weapons in the region, and it's a great opportunity for us. one thing i'm thinking in my think tank is looking to get experts together and assess what are the options? how can you deal with the challenging issues of verification? how can you deal with the challenging issues of the security concerns in various states? and not to make excuses for why israel got the bomb went never confirmed, but it's of course could secret in the middle east or one of the worst kept secrets. the point is that they felt the need that when they felt that program they were under existential threat and the question is are they still wonder existential threat?

those bombs would provide a capability they still need, and we have to realize that nuclear weapons possession is still rather limited in terms of what a state can achieve. we looked at what israel did in terms of going into lebanon back in 2006. you know, they possessed nuclear weapons that prevent israel from suffering a defeat in that conflict. it's possessing nuclear weapons doesn't help resolve the palestinian issue, doesn't help resolve the ongoing crisis. and so, you know, the state possessed nuclear weapons like libya, which fortunately did not and gave up their nascent program he was developing in 2003. in the possession of nuclear weapons wouldn't have stopped arab spring uprising and toppling of the regime. we have to realize even though nuclear weapons seem to be kind of glorified put on a pedestal they are still rather limited on what they can do.

>> okay. for questions was my limit. >> i think the first thing the united states policymakers and iran should actually do is listen to the opinions coming from those people who are involved in democratic opposition with iran and the consensus among the majority of them is that sanctions, policy wouldn't be harmful to the internal dynamics of society and the country. and it's not -- we look from here and it is a black box over the last 30 years there have been changes inside iran and there will continue to be changes coming in by part of this youth generation at the tail end. i'm not going to tell my age. this generation has had an impact. it's not monolithic. it's not a whole youth that acts in tandem but we can hang out with them. they are quite educated in the country no matter what happens will not be the cement ten, 15, 20 years. so the logic of the economic

squeeze, if they aren't publicly when to change the law are we expecting the arab iranian peopo rise up, this doesn't happen in history. you don't squeeze a country and people get concerned about the daily bread and overthrow the state. in fact i was reading a book by stephen, a princeton professor about the breakdown of the soviet union called uncivil society, an interesting account of the breakdown of the union. they were squeezed by reagan and the pope. it happened because 1980 to all the opposition dissidents in the soviet union were here in the u.s. getting awards and there was no opposition inside the soviet union. and then there was a modicum of space that opened up in the community by the 80's, and then the internal dynamics of the eletes had space and gorbachev, who was basically sort of a 1960's radical on the right, was able to counter the

conservatives and the soviet state, and that allowed for the solution of the soviet union. so internal dynamics are important. it's not something we can push from here and expect to get the geometry of the international relations to work out. >> i'm familiar with that book and accept the thesis you have to discount solidarity and so forth and the entire range of the post-helsinki. you discount that and i think incorrectly. his better book is armageddon if you are curious about that. let me just say to the question that was posed regarding the hypocrisy of the american fence on the nuclear issue because of the issues have been dealt with. it's an important argument, because i hear a lot. i hear a lot particularly from not just the iranians but others. i think that the iranian nuclear infractions have to be

recognized as infractions and of themselves. iran is a signatory to the npt, and therefore, it increased certain obligations. and if it's in violation of those obligations at the iaea inspection arm of the united nations suggests, then there has to be some degree of penalties. those penalties cannot be mitigated or disregarded because there is an undeclared is really capability or united states has certain repository as well. i think the case of the united states would be much better. you're right. if it actually moves to the 00 optioned what actually reduces its nuclear weapons in the negotiations with the russian counterparts and so forth. and you're right, it will give greater credibility to the american case, but the fact that these things are not happening at the pace that one would like to see that doesn't necessarily mean that the iranian instructions are not really a

significant. >> six more questions. the gentleman right there in the center. >> i'm an intern -- >> can you hold the microphone up. >> my question is what have we learned from the economic sanctions we put on north korea, and why haven't we apply that knowledge to iran? and also you never answered by a's question in front about are the sanctions towards the war in iran? thank you. >> there's also a question further back. >> thank you. retired state department. i want to go back to what kenneth asked and that is how do you influence the internal dynamics within iran to make

them sort of choose the path of legitimacy of responding positively to what the iaea wants them to do as opposed to the path of legitimacy that ray mentioned that might actually take them to the bomb? it seems inconceivable frankly that after ten, 12, 15 years of iran professing the program is only peaceful, then to somehow think that going for the obama is the way to get international legitimacy. >> there's a question on here we will take that next. >> thank you. from the national iran american council and i have a question for kevin. you mentioned in passing how regarding sanctions how iran is known better than sanctions increase. could you assume you're

connected to the black market? could you speak on that more, please? >> why don't we start with ray. >> i think -- whether i think the question is twice the is a diplomatic path to i think the resolution of the difference in the united states and i am not quite sure there's an of these diplomatic path. if you want to look in diplomacy as making small increment will gains perhaps negotiating which is not likely to happen or some sort of a negotiated restraint on iran's nuclear program as well as the management strategy of having sanctions were sabotaged slow down the program, perhaps diplomacy injects some sort of a restrained as a means of something happening inside iran that will cause the change in the regime oriented. this is a regime ironically enough is quite vulnerable,

economic vulnerabilities are perhaps the most obvious and perhaps the least relevant in the sense this is a political leadership that can match whether haphazardly and also its indifference to the economic penalties that are inflicted on the larger population. >> has vulnerabilities in the sense it is increasing the isolated international community and that may have some impact on this domestic political scene. it has other vulnerabilities. it has a largesse as ken was mentioning the population is an intelligent population. it is an educated population. it is an incongruity between islamic public and the iranian nation. you know, the iranian populists are soldiers, quite sophisticated, intelligent, i would say largely secular in terms of their orientation because they had to live under the religious order. and international in terms of the perspective cosmopolitan in terms of their habits. they grew by a government that is none of the above.

that in and of itself as a difficult to see how the islamic republic can forever precariously glide over the larger and deeper currents of the persian national history and tradition because i think they are at first to one another. so it has domestic vulnerabilities that can be exploited in terms of assistance to various opposition groups and so forth and so on. one of the thesis that has emerged is we cannot assist the opposition because they didn't ask for it. if you look at the history of how the united states has related to opposition moments you go back to assistance to french, italian, political parties in the 1940's. i don't remember them asking for it, but it's a confluence of interest. you look at the establishment of the cold war, something called the congress for cultural freedom which was essentially trying to mobilize the anti-soviet western intellectuals. i don't know arthur schlesinger

and at home george kennan asking for. it was established. and you see in the soviet era the post-helsinki society groups, solidarity and so forth. there is a confluence of interest between the united states and the iranian opposition. the question is how do you connected those dots has opposed to shield one behind the notion whether they can ask for it. so that's another area of vulnerability that can be exploited. >> i have to agree with the question certainly inside iran when the perceived threat is highest they do fear war and the population fears war in 2006 and the earlier peak of the war talk and i would say every other person i asked had some kind of fear, not sure what was going to happen, some uncertainty. so it does have an effect like it would have an effect anywhere. that went down for a while.

now i've been reading the news recently and everybody's talking about they really believe that it's on the table, but certainly in the population people tend to sometimes believe that. so, yeah. they think it's a possibility, but they don't think it's likely currently. i appreciate ray's comment. i want to slightly disagree with him on the fusion of internationalism and the islamic republicanism and the revolutionary ideology. i think the use of, you know, pre-islamic nationalism as constructed by the power of the marquee markey was used by the republic as early as 1990 the head international conference is about perhaps when johnny signed this book see to the elite

changes. i'm not saying they believe this, but the right in iran, the new right is rather crafty and ray discussed this previously. they utilize symbols of pre-islamic nationalism like juggling and i'm not saying anybody is getting reviewed by this, but it's not the state adapt. we are in analyzing it. we should. the state of that sand changes and the society about stand changes, and there's not always the huge gap between them. it's like one of the reasons that arguably the green movement failed to a certain extent. i was there. i saw it. they did not win the battle of nationalism. it was into the society or the state. it was one particular vision of the nation versus another one. one-sided didn't have a gun, that's true but in a lot of

cases the oversight has begun. so there is a clash of nationalism in the iran, and it is ongoing and will continue to go forward. the question is what can the u.s. do to help one and not the other? and this is an important question. it's not one that has an easy answer. >> regimes come and go and physics is eternal. [laughter] what i mean by that -- and we have to go back to sort of a back to the future strategy. we've got to go back to 1946, soon after the dawn of the nuclear age, soon after the manhattan project delivered the two types of atomic bombs that the united states used against japan to help in the the war in the pacific and some of the founders in my organization were involved in that activity, and they formed as information scientists to advocate for international control of these

technologies. you go back to the report in 1946 as those political leaders names on it that really is robert oppenheimer, the scientific director of nuclear physicist who was the lead drafter coming and he and those that wrote to the report realized from the physics and engineering standpoint a system of national ownership and control of nuclear technologies is open for failure. it's almost bound to fail. there's only so much we can do to try to monitor and safeguard such a program, and ray is absolutely right. sanctions can help the way and by some time that they are not going to put a halt to the program. there's a question about lessons learned from sanctions on north korea. well, you know, north korea the have plutonium, they apparently now have the iranian enrichment

program. it's a relatively small program that they've been able to weather the storm of sanctions. a very poor country. there's been times when sanctions have dhaka and north korea's detention, especially when the u.s. targeted the banking, kim jong il said one shipment might be at risk, so i might pay attention for a period of time. so there is a role for sanctions, but it's not going to be any kind of cure all. but the future we have to get back to the lesson from the report that we need to find a way to have more international control on these dangerous nuclear technologies and enrichment processing. a very tough thing to do. we've been -- it's been kind of deja vu looking at the controls it seems every fight for ten years there is a whole nother awakening and euphoria of reports and studies on this coming and we do have some

semblance as international controls on some enrichment facilities we see here in the united states there is a consortium, the rank of consortium, the plant in mexico, les facilities and a symbol of using black box technology. the united states doesn't get access to that technology and the enrichment there is of international ownership. a similar thing is going to be happening in idaho at the facility that aruba wants to build. so i think that there are examples where we can try to -- and this has been mentioned before to iran, not the first to say this. there's a lot of great work being done at harvard and other places looking at ways that you could have multilateral ownership and control of facilities in iran and still have enrichment but have a greater confidence of what they are doing can be detected if there's a breakout of the weapons program. >> there was a question about the black market. i'm sorry i didn't answer that. actually interesting. one of the arguments is that

sanctions increases smuggling and the activity which may or may not be referring to the military networks. it's been going on for a long time in iran in fact like 90% of the cell phones that enter iran are coming from the states by the way as here. 90% don't grow accustomed. they don't pay the tariff went into the border meaning they are coming into the mechanisms something like 50% of the clothing in iran used to have a textile industry and does not any longer is smuggled said the huge smuggling problem in iran is like 20% of the gdp. don't quote me on that, but the question is the result of sanctions? no it is a result of the porous borders of the country and when i said in that it is indeed the world economy, right, it used to be the pivot of history, central asia. so it is embedded in these networks of trade that it's very difficult for anyone to totally

close off. so any policy will squeeze the balloon of the toothpaste and a lousy but the balloon, squeeze the balloon with water and gets bigger somewhere else. >> let's take one last round of questions. right there. >> thank you. bloomberg news. i wonder if you can address a little bit of the debate over the time lines that we are looking at at this point based on the information in the iaea report and whatever the latest developments are. what sort of milestones are coming up in the next year to two years, how far away from the development of iran's nuclear program, and if any of you can also address the question of what do you sink at this point is the minimum that the united

states and its allies may in partners and process offer iran that iran may find acceptable to pare its nuclear efforts? >> thank you. george washington university. my question how sure do we have china will change its state rather than play iran nuclear weapons for its big card given to the status of u.s. relationship after president obama just claimed that return to the asian pacific origin? and my second question is i really think that iran is kind of the country and just appeared to me that iran makes a kind of

security dilemma and the radical list speaking maybe we can only offer -- mabey the proper way to get out of the dilemma is to let it go and others claim some kind of sabotage to get it out of the security -- dial lineup. so what is your comment? thank you. >> we will just take one more from greg in the front and we will have comments from the panelists. >> i just wondered if we could get a comment on what you think about the efficacy of assassinating iranian scientist both may be from charles on whether or not that can slow down the program and also ray about the effect of the iranian people and the iranian government increasing their

willingness to make a deal to constrain their nuclear program. >> why don't you start us off again. >> on the issue of china, reluctant to offer any sort of advice and institution. we are going to have a full panel on that. i think assassinations that have taken place are shortsighted and counterproductive because it assumes that iranians scientific padre is a limited number of people and this is an institute -- this is a government that since 1990 and the aftermath of the war invested quite considerably in the scientific apparatus and the scientific apparatus has made significant gains. if you look at it by the metrics of how many ph.d. they produce in physics and chemistry

chemistry is the crown jewel of the science. theoretical physics they are quite advanced because it doesn't require the technological apparatus. the number internationally recognized the journals have gone up, so this is a large scientific community, and not all scientists are situated in the university laboratories but also in the industry in the united states and i don't think we know the full scope of the industrial application of the iranian scientific community and the relationship between industry and laboratories of universities because, charles can speak about how you make a successful scientific community. so easily won, too, three or four scientists getting killed is not going to reverse the scientific knowledge this country has accumulated. it may even create a spirit accord with the remaining scientific community.

and in that particular sense i don't think it is productive and it's more limited as any utility. i forget the other question but anyway i will stop here. >> i forget the other question, too. >> that's not a pathway to is a disarmament to reproductive, you know, carrots this is the question. well, so the new minister in yerevan is there another burly fellow and he used to be head of the revolutionary guard corps of engineers of you will and i just saw him give an interview for english and he looks like a true revolutionary patriot, he is unshaven like myself, note tie though. he had just given a speech yesterday were two days ago in the society on iran about the

need for investment in the country's oil and gas sector. this is a country that is under invested and the debate now among the elite and iran he says the country is $100 billion so this is the obvious care at. the as much as they say that they detest the west they really like us and they want our investment. they don't want a chinese investment. the always complained about how they take the second read chinese capital and things like that even though they are using the thus telephones so that's the obvious care -- carrot for being able to exploit its resources in a way that is more productive than it is now. that is what is on their mind, and that should be discussed much more openly in the policy communities here. >> charles. stack the question about the

time lines and maybe i will just add a few words about the issue of targeting assassinating the irony and scientists and then the time lines. i agree with ray pluggable but more than that. i see this as what was morally wrong and counterproductive what ray is singing in other ways as well. we should be tracking to learn lessons from the time of the cold war and the root of your duties of the cold war in the 1950's when there is the movement that got started and there was an exchange of views among the soviet and american scientists to try to find ways of having a dialogue and trying to find peaceful resolutions in some of these issues. there has been some of that out reach from the u.s. national academy of sciences. they've done a lot of great work in that area. more needs to be done. so just wanted to get that out in the open. in terms of time lines i think there's a number of things we need to pay attention to in

terms of how this proceeds going forward. there have been various assessments as to how far iran is from breaking out and making the nuclear weapons. i've seen an assessment of six months and i've heard a senior u.s. government officials say, he's someone who is concerned, it's been about a year or maybe longer. but what does that really mean? i mentioned in my opening remarks that according to the iea eaa rock stockpiled kilos of this enriched material so if they went for broke and they did a cycling and tried to convert that to the weapons material that might be three or four bombs worth of material. is that enough? probably not, but i don't know. somehow we have to do meld of my mind and ray's mine and ken's mind and other experts to find out what is the intention and this interplay between the intention and the capability.

we do go to iran is continuing to unmask more and more material and we need to pay attention to the other enrichment activities at the 20% level. will they go beyond what is required to refuel the research reactor? that would be an interesting signal if they surpass that point then that is an indication that there is something more probably going on than just getting enough material to fuel that reactor. we need to then look at how they are proceeding and actually manufacturing the fuel for that reactor. they may run into technical difficulty with that. if they run into technical road blocks and continue to enrich at that level, that's another signal i think as to the possible intentions. we also need to look at how they are proceeding with the ballistic missile program. are they making advances in terms of long-range missile capabilities, true and heard missile capabilities.

that plays into this debate going on in the u.s. nato russia context as the missile defense. that is larger implications as to where we go with the next round of nuclear arms reductions with the russians so there's a lot at play in the various time lines and the activities. >> i don't know that we have solved the iranian nuclear program but i think we have helped map out a little bit more and the incredible mazar of complexities that make up the issue from the iranian side and the ambiguity left on the table was the exact perfect starting place for the next panel which will begin at 10:45. we have refreshments outside. please take a break. before you do so please join me in thanking this terrific panel. [applause]

[inaudible conversations] you heard the moderator mentioned the discussion on sanctions the u.s. announcing more sanctions yesterday against the iranian petrochemical industry, and the u.k. according to the associated press saying they are going to cut financial ties with iranian brank banks and the u.k., all u.k. financial institutions will cease business relationships and transactions with all iranian banks. that discussion coming up next. to let you know about the schedule lacrosse the cs benet works on c-span2 812:15 eastern president obama will be talking about jobs plan traveling to manchester new hampshire

we will take you back why of to the brookings institution here in washington and their discussion on the iranian nuclear program. they will focus on sanctions coming up but we did want to show part of the earlier conversation focusing in on why international community regime. >> absolutely. kevin? >> at sounds like a list of the unknown unknowns. [laughter] >> given that, how can we get iran to change its behavior is the question of the policy. first the baltics is the situation right now in this country and probably means there's going to be a ramping up of unilateral or multilateral sanctions with maybe europe or some parts of europe on board. so what will happen as a result

of this it will make it increasingly difficult as it already is for the bank to require foreign exchange. this is something they've been preparing for for quite awhile. if you follow the business price in iran, they do discuss this and it's caused a few runs already, but the result of this has been -- and you get the bad news in the american press, but they respond to this by recreating the tiered currency exchange system, foreign exchange system that they have for 20 years. so they are very used to dealing with government intervention in the foreign-exchange market to direct currency to the secretary they needed the most other state sectors or industrial sectors. so, this reminds me of the early century block on the u.k. in a way.

the beginning of the war, the napoleon convince most of europe to block the u.k. and block, blockaded the country's and bit by bit the country's peeled off. so that probably will happen unless the united states can sustain a diplomatic effort with china, india, and also japan which have all given signs that they've been unwilling to go as far as the united states wants. and of course china and india already have quite intense bilateral trade agreements with iran, and there have been of course china making the good deal these days from iran but that doesn't mean the deal is going to go away i think and they are not getting signs they are going to change the situation. but also, what is the reigning

of sanctions and increasing, you know, what many people inside the country seem like punitive measures against the broader population. is it -- as mark kirk it represent from my district, says wants to put the nuclear option on the central bank of iran and sanctioned them is it the collapse of the economy? you know, i really don't think that's going to happen. iran is not iraq and it is different in the 1990's where you actually could get a full effort to blockade a country. iran is embedded in the particular networks of the sanctions have only increased as a result. but second, what causes -- i might disagree with ray because if we look at the post revolutionary states they could have ended up lasting a long time to get china, al cuba, although it seems like legitimacy has eroded. so what causes these kind of states for their political elite to go here?

we spend a lot of time talking about mahmoud ahmadinejad and verses the president and these kind of things. but incoming you know, most of the world, it is not the old lawyer but it's normal. the communist party has sanctions. so factionalism is normal. it's not odd, and looking at it as it has factionalism is going to collapse and we need to squeeze it doesn't seem like historic ackley -- historic lea. we need to work together in countries like iran. it's not money or resources the just fight more over those things. it's fear. if you threaten -- if you threaten countries all of a sudden they find a reason to start working together. so, one policy if you do want more ahmadinejad and hammami to get along i would threaten them and then they might get along and to do what? i don't know what that would be the sectionalism and we've seen this by the way. we've seen at the last few months at the high peaks of the

external threat the discourse of unity rises and the discourse of the sectionalism dies down. so actually ray's point which is provocative to i think the next obvious question that is the goal of the program is the perceived have in the national legitimacy and it seems like an alternative policy to provide a different path of international legitimacy for iran ordered least provide a more viable path for legitimacy that command the they don't perceive as open and that might provide different ways. so we spend a lot of resources on sanctions and we are going to be spending more resources on the political and economic sanctions in the next year or four to ten years. we need to ask what is the cost benefit of that spending resources on diplomatic options. >> thank you, kevin. >> i think that iran and foreign policy may be belligerent and intent but his patience and practice and tactics and you see

this plea itself out. this is for the iranian leadership time is a temporal commodity. the incident is interesting in many respects because what we've come to know about iran's terrorist portfolio if you will over the past 30 years that has evolved. initially in the initial convulsions of the revolutionary period, iran's terrorist aspirations more global, not just assassination of dissidents in europe, but the movements in africa and so forth. that chapter winds down, and then in the more recent years the terrorism portfolio has geographically contract it but it had become more intense in that geography. that's simply because of the opportunities made available to it and particularly with iraq where the iranians had supported militia in the violent groups and so forth.

hezbollah, the rubble of assistance gone on probably to some extent because of the confrontation with israel. hamas because of the merger of the more autonomous palestinian actor requiring some degree of the iranian subsidies of it was an intensification of that terrorism activity within a more circumscribed geographical sphere. >> if this incident is true, and i am not challenging this veracity or credibility, it suggests two things. number one, the previous red lines have been revisited and in some cases the race. one of the red lines was that iran would not target americans and the other was would not target americans in the united states. that red line appears to have been revisited. the second one is that iran will meet pressure with pressure. that the united states tries to mobilize pressure against of this for an idea of ways that it, too, has the resources to

retaliate. one of the pieces of the pressure policies that would yield the compliance and concessions. it indicates they are willing to have some sort of a -- get into some sort of an escalator or dynamic and when you get into this you are giving up high respect. you cannot always pick the place and dismount. but if these allegations are true and elon attempt to assassinate a foreign dignitary 1 mile from the white house, then we are in a new sort of fiscal victoria posture and it plays itself out you can see it moving beyond the terrain of iraq, beyond afghanistan, and moving into a fairly unpredictable and difficult terrain. so it would suggest that this is a foreign policy that is becoming more acutely aggressive in terms of its -- in terms of its retaliatory denunciations'. overall i think that iran's

place in the region is in the short term perhaps some extent it is advantaged not because of these movements political transitions or aspiring to emulate but simply because the international focus with which to take in place in egypt the rehabilitation of to nisha or serious and so forth. in the long run if these political transitions manage to succeed in establishing a more responsive and accountable government, which is the bigger, then i don't think iran can remain the oasis of the stability in the region of the popular in power meant coming and that what be down. >> thank you, ray. >> the discussion this morning at the brookings institution at washington. we are going to take you back live now expecting them to get underway continuing the discussion of the international unity on the iran sanctions and the continue national security adviser tom donilon will speak at the u.s. joined britain and canada yesterday with more iran

sanctions that followed a report by the international atomic energy agency showing iran continues to pursue the nuclear weapons program the u.k. announcing yesterday its financial ties in the u.s. well in the technical industry [inaudible conversations]

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[inaudible conversations] this is the brookings institution. we are waiting for the discussion to resume on iran's nuclear program the focus on sanctions in the next panel. "the washington times" writes this morning senator mark kirker of illinois offered an amendment, which would include -- which would expand sanctions to include foreign financial transactions that institutions that conduct transactions to the central bank of iran, and he says senator kirk says the proposal will come up for discussion in the senate after

thanksgiving. this after a report recently by the international atomic energy agency showing that iran continues to pursue a nuclear weapons program. the associated press writes this morning that satellite surveillance has shown an increase in activity at an iranian site suspected secret work on nuclear programs, officials telling the ap. they say that one of the officials cite intelligence from his country saying it appeared to iran is trying to cover its tracks by amortizing the site and we're moving evidence of nuclear research and development. that is reporting from the associated press. [inaudible conversations]

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to some of the people who have made this and some of the research that surrounded this event possible. the carnegie corporation of new york that provided some funding looking at the way the united states and its allies and other countries are dealing with global challenges. obviously being iran being one of those rising power issues. and also something that we've got from the mcarthur foundation for worldcom arms nonproliferation and iran is one of the critical issues for this. there's something i wanted to mention that immediately after this session we're going to break for a buffet lunch. seeing there are so many of us, i want to avoid a stampede to the door. and lunch is also a very important thing. if lunch for some reason happens proliferated sufficiently to use the pun of the moment there's a cafeteria which, of course, isn't free but in any case for those who can't beat the stampede there's always the

brooks cafeteria and they are doing a survey in there i will make a plug for continuing brooks cafeteria service. we also -- because we're having tom and the national key speaker, there will be a little reshuffling for security and he will have a few people with him and we'll need to move some seating to the front sorry to people who are currently sitting in the front and that will happen during the lunch and because of security considerations, we all need to be back in our chairs for mr. donilyn coming back in. i want to say that in advance because i know everyone will have a sandwich on meyer mind at the end of the session. now, the purpose of this session is to cover many of the issues that were already raised by some of you in the audience, which is really what has been the role of the united states, allies and other partners in dealing with the situation of iran? we already had questions about the role of europe, the european

union and some of the individual countries of europe and their interactions with iran. we already had some comments on how the role of europe and the european union has shifted. and we have with us today the deputy head of the delegation of the european union here in washington, dc, to help us think through some of these issues. francois had a distinguished career in the french foreign ministry. he was the head of the french delegation before he took up his current position with the european union. and in that capacity he's also, in fact, worked directly on the issue of iran. he was french ambassador to the geneva conference on disarmament and nonproliferation issues in the mid-2000s where he was, in fact, involved directly in negotiations with iran at geneva and he's also worked on disarmament issues to u.n.

secretary-gener secretary-gener secretary-general banki moon. and we also had questions about russia and whether russia will continue to play its role in the sanctions issue. of course, russia has played a very popular role in iran with the russian involvement in the bush-era nuclear reactor, which has a focal point of contention and in the run-up to the most recent sanctions resolution and the big question of whether russia would also send advanced air defense capability to iran the s-300 missile system which would have enabled iran to potentially fend off any account of military action against its nuclear program. and to talk about the russian aspects of this, we have john parker with us. john is currently a senior researcher at the national defense university and the national institute tore strategic studies but he has a

long and distinguished career at the state department. he being a senior analyst and director and deputy director of various research programs at the states inr and the intelligence and research bureau and john is also the author quite recently of a book on russia-iranian relations that's taken a look at the depth of the relationship between russia and iran and touched upon some of the issues that we're looking at today so john is well positioned to be able to talk about some of the questions raised in the audience about russia and last but not certainly least we have sun yun who is a visitor here at the program, the center for east asian and capacity studies here at brooks. yun is from china and most recently was working at the international crisis group in beijing. she's an expert on chinese

national security decision-making. that's some of the work she's working on here at brooks and clearly she has on the ground expertise on china and can hopefully address some of the issues that were already raised about china's role, china's attitudes toward the sanctions regime and also whether china may use as a question from george washington university suggesting whether china might use the iran cashed given some of the broader security thinking going on in china now in response to developments in the south china seas or in south asian or east asian and these are the kinds of things that yun has been studying for a while time. we'll start with a brief overview from our panelists and we will turn it over to you for questions and answers so perhaps you can pick up on some of the issues that was already raised. francois thank you so much for joining us. >> i -- >> we will break away momentarily from this brooks institution discussion to take you to the u.s. senate.

they're meeting in a brief pro forma session and we'll be back to the discussion as soon as the senate gavels out.

the presiding officer: the senate will come to order. the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c., november 22, 2011. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable mark r. warner, a senator from the commonwealth of virginia, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: daniel k. inouye, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until 10:00 a.m. on friday, november 25, 2011. have a happy >> senators are meeting every three days during the

thanksgiving recess to prevent the president from making recess appointments. legislative work will resume on monday at 1 eastern when senators will continue debate and they will have a vote on the judicial nomination. that will be live on c-span2. and we're going to take you back now to the brookings institution in washington for their continued discussion on the iranian nuclear program and international sanctions. >> have taking a number of measures ranging from travel to approving technical assistance to technical transfer for oil of gasification, added a number of bunks and of people privity to travel. and what i want to insist on that the u.s. not only not what the u.n. was obliging us to do but those showing a number of much other anybody including the united states. so, you know, when you want to

act, you can act and you have no example between yesterday and this morning, the british prime minister about the iranian central bank, of french republic about oil states have taken very radical positions which goes far but on a national basis. so when you want to act, you can always propose or even implement measures which goes very far on a national basis and this is consistent with international law and so we should not be too much paralyzed by international laws. the last element of substance in my view is to -- once you build a case and present the case you have to check out options. what are the best options? and here i will express to you the convictions i forced since eight times that there is no better way than the present one.

strengthening sanctions making every year, every month the cost of this nuclear program which is illicit because -- and you know it's not perfect. it is because it has no over goal of military run because there's no civil conceivable goal of this program. so it is illicit. we have to maintain the point. and we have to make the cost of this illicit program more and more expensive for iran for the iranian nation, for the iranian people, i don't know for the iranian leaders because it's a very difficult question but at some point iran, which is a good nation will realize that its best interest is to cooperate with international community instead of choosing as i think some european leaders said

yesterday and this morning going its own path, to choose isolation. at one point we want to make sure that is to avoid isolation and if you look at the other options because there are obviously other options and some have to remain on the table just for the sake of being there, but that said, if you look at using them, you will see a correct assessment will make no other option. i think -- you have also to choose the option which is the most -- not only available but the most commonly seen as the only one possible. on procedure, very quickly. you know that maintaining a committee is difficult. it has involved historically in-depth regular contact to each month initially have reflection

and what we call the e.u. three, that's the france, u.k. and germany and u.s. and some initiatives came from u.s. treasury, some initiative came from france and some initiatives came from london and sometimes from berlin and then usually they are discussed within the eu3 and delivered in the u.s. in sort of core graphic which varies also not only for -- is not completely specific in bending the timing but to ensure there are a unity of views which is emerging at the table but at the same time you can't do that only within from a big discussion with russia and with china because if you discuss without them or if you solidify the u.s. and three position and china you are

likely to have a strong position. so we get the feeling where we are going, but associating very early china and russia ideology right from scratch. sometimes that's exactly right from scratch because when you have an idea coming out you discuss it but solidifying them and getting it and discussing it in the p5 context. and we've eu authorities because the eu three discussion involve the presence of the representative of the u.n. and as you know, this process has a eu three to discuss with great authority because the need is to always keep the two track approach which is one track which is sanctions and making

the price of this nuclear program every day higher but on the other hand, demonstrating to iran that we would choose to cooperate with international community but all would be there for open. and this is also demonstration which has to be done periodically. sometimes it's very difficult to do because you don't -- you think that you are -- but you should always know that you are not reminding it to iran but reminding it to the rest of the world and keeping the rest of the world aligned with the sanctions that its demonstration is regularly remade. and it should be not be seen as a proof of weaknesses but it should be taken for what it is. one of the schools we have to keep international unity if i may. if i may in conclusion just add 'cause i think -- i think there

are some methods of contact and negotiation which could still be used additionally to get slightly more efficiency to the system which we could bill slightly more efficiently the other things but obviously time-consuming but i think there are some -- sometimes i feel a number of european countries while not participating are frustrated not being associated and i think we should keep that in mind. and maybe make some provision to discuss with them not only bilaterally but as a group. and i think the international community are also of the main states we discussed with them. we discuss with some important players in nigeria, egypt, africa, whatever. but when you are, for example,

peru or thailand you would also like to be associated as we have seen in malaysia, for example, malaysia for folks you know has the worst part of the story and the certain point it would have been good to be able to talk a bit earlier with malaysia. so there are things still the best we can do to enlarge and widen the consensus in what we're doing but i'm pretty sure we shall continue working on that. thank you. >> thank you very much, francois. john, your thoughts on the russian perspective. >> thanks, fiona. and also thank you very much for inviting us to participate in this panel and for your very gracious introduction. there are already been questions on russia that were raised on the first panel. i may take a couple minutes longer to answer them and go beyond my seven to eight minutes. i always have to start out with a disclaimer, i am a u.s.

government employee but my comments this morning are my own. they don't represent the views of the national defense university or the department of defense or even the u.s. government. also, what i'm trying to do this morning is not trying to debate the russian position but lay it out to you as objectively as i can so you understand where russia is coming from and what the potentials are. so to move forward with russia in a unified way this process dealing with the iranian nuclear issue. so as i see it, from moscow's perspective, international unity on iran has just gone through a rough patch that was both unnecessary and not of moscow's own making. but is still salvable. moscow was quite comfortable with this situation that had developed since the security council adopted resolution 1929

and june 2010. 1929's tough sanctions which moscow added to with its breaking of the f-300 contract had gotten iran's attention. after that, moscow's no new sanctions stand which foreign minister first pronounced in february of this year and moscow's, quote-unquote, step-by-step approach which was rolled out in july and that moscow claimed to have coordinated with its p-5 plus 1 partners allowed moscow to do several things at one time. one, maintain the pressure of resolution 1929's sanctions on iran. two, take the lead within the p-5 plus 1 and step-by-step overtures to iran. and three, repair moscow's own bilateral relations with tehran badly frayed since resolution

1929 and the f-300 decision. so against this background moscow's furious reaction to the early release and the furious spin given the november 8th iaea point but it reflected genuine annoyance and anger. moscow saw the call for more sanctions in the after math of the alleged plot -- iranian plot against saudi ambassador in washington. in the aftermath of the chatter in israel over military strike against iran's nuclear program and in the aftermath of the iaea report itself and its unusual kind of premature disclosure, i don't think it was ever put out as early as it was this time.

and in confronting russia in either support more security council resolutions now or assume countenance on an israeli strike on iran. now, just to be clear, on moscow's view of the iranian threat, although the russian foreign ministry accused the iaea report -- what it said juggling with information in order to create an impression that the iranian nuclear program allegedly as a military component, the russian leadership and most russian experts have no illusions on this score. in july 2010, for example, president medvedev clearly stated that it is obvious that iran is coming close to the possession of potential that could in principle be used to

create nuclear weapons. just last friday russian defense minister told the press that russia wants to continue leafing the kabbalah radar and intends to upgrade it. enhancing the capacity of kabbalah is useful and very important, in particular given the iranian missile program. and the same day materials prepared for a report by the chief of general staff reportedly included the buildup of iran's nuclear potential among developments that could draw russia's arm forces into a future conflict. nonetheless, from what i can tell, most russian experts do not believe that the most recent iaea report presents serious new grounds for imposing another

round of sanctions against iran at this time. they did not have to be persuaded that iran has been engaged in a nuclear program for some years. but they believe it will take more than several years for iran to be truly nuclear capable. on boa, a representative from the oriental institute in moscow gave as good a guesstimate as any. he said it would be five to seven years -- take five to seven years for iran to marry a workable warhead with a capable missile as long as there weren't any outside interference and of course there is always interference. one expert believes that iran will probably stop dealing with the iaea only when it has overcome all technical problems and has all the inputs necessary to produce a bomb and a delivery

vehicle. in the meantime, the view of most russian experts that continuing iaea control of iran's nuclear program however imperfect this control is more important than how much uranium iran continues to enrich and that it is, therefore, crucial for the international community not to do anything precipitous that might cause iran to bolt from the iaea and put an end to any chance for a

any chapter 7 article 42 threat of force. and russia has been consistent on this point over the years. and the subsequent resolutions on iran have all been bounded by the original resolutions noninvocation of article 42. nevertheless, russia really has

very little confidence to keeping article 42 out of security council resolutions on iran will in the end restrain especially israel if it decides to go ahead and strike iran. and to moscow's frustration and i would say regret, russia's help in the security council has not detoured russia is continuing to move ahead with its missile programs. now, on a different point in criticizing the iaea's latest report, foreign minister labrov claims some movement by iran toward the iaea in recent weeks and criticized the iaea report for not mentioning it. but the history of iranian maneuvering suggests that this is just another instance of iran flashing enough leg to encourage moscow to fend off pressure from the u.s. and the other p5+1 powers. nevertheless, moscow can now tell tehran we saved you this

time from another round of security council sanctions but you have to move or we will not be inclined to do so again next march. moscow has already criticized the difficult international sanctions the united states and its allies are implementing this year are -- and that these so-called unilateral sanctions up the ante on iran and many iranian countries add to the pressure by not deciding to do any business with iran that might run afoul with these unilateral western sanctions. moreover, some long time russian observers of iran have concluded that sanctions, in fact, are having some impact will not necessarily directly on iran's nuclear program and though iran still has a lot of work-around options that it can explore. on sanctions finally, moscow's

no new sanctions mantra, given moscow's record over the years that they will have no confidence that russia will not vote for another round of sanctions if iran continues to frustrate iaea inspectors. and especially if there are further surprise revelations of iranian work toward enrichment and weaponization. now, will putin's return to the presidency next year change russia's policy towards iran in general and on the nuclear issue in particular? probably not. it was on putin's first watch that russia from 2002 to 2006 backed the many iaea investigations of the iranian nuclear enrichment program that russia in 2006 voted for referral of the issue by the iaea to the security council and that russia that same year supported the first of six

separate security council resolutions on the iranian nuclear issue. as a dominant partner in russia's tandem since 2008, putin has supported moscow's tougher stance of iran since the advent of the reset between the obama and the medvedev administration. and from all accounts, putin has grown to really distrust mahmoud ahmadinejad and this is what remains in place whoever replaces mahmoud ahmadinejad in 2013. nevertheless, the brought for tougher sanctions in the f-300 contracts is not necessarily irreversible. russian experts say moscow may tilt back in a serious strain in

u.s.-russian reset relations. however, the record suggest to me that any rollback the russian support for sanctions will depend on mostly whether iran decides to cooperate more fully with the iaea in clarifying iran's nuclear enrichment program and moving toward verifiable restraint and even suspension. on the significance of economic ties, although some observers assert that they will always draw russia back towards iran, bilateral trade has always been anemic relative to the size of these two partners. china's trade with iran is ten times larger than that of russia's trade with iran and russia's trade with iran is not much larger than russia's trade with israel, a much smaller country. everything else being equal, the united states and russia's european partners will always be more important to russia than

iran. one last caution, however, and then i'll stop. moscow-iran policy accents will always different between washington's and other western capitals even if the intersect on some major security points as they do now. historically, engagement has always been moscow's default setting for dealing with tehran especially on regional issues. right now the arab spring has pushed forward challenges and opportunities to the positions of both countries in the middle east. and in south asia, the impending american withdrawal from afghanistan has raised the prospect that russia and iran may again have to partner closely in resisting the taliban threats to their equities in their region as they did pre-911. thank you. >> thank you very much, john. that was an interesting point about the trade but it's also a much larger economic power than

russia is. i how much trade is a factor in the relationship between china-iran and perhaps you could touch on that as well as those were the questions already presented from the audience and thank you again for joining us. >> thank you so much for having me. i'm going to focus on the china position on the is us-iran nuclear issue. i will cover the iran issue and on china's reluctance on multilateral sanctions and then i'm going to talk about how is china going to change its position on the multilateral sanctions from the united nations. so first of all, china's option the iranian nuclear issue has unchanged for many years. the recent tension over the nuclear issue with the -- with the official position from the last round, from 2009 to early 2010, you would discover that china's position and official statements have remained almost

identical. so first of all, on the nuclear development itself, china opposes nuclear proliferation and disapproves of the development of nuclear weapons for any middle east countries including iran. and second, on the resolution, china strongly opposes a military option and this reluctance to accept new sanction regime from the united nations. so from beijing's points of view china hopes the nuclear crisis could be settled through diplomatic dialog and negotiation and this is always the case. there are plenty of analysis on why china is fixated on this issue like the most compelling as fiona and john just mentioned is that china has a vested interest in its economics relationship with iran. especially on the energy. according to the data from chinese general administration of customs, in the first half -- first six months of this year,

iran was the third largest exporter of crude oil to china contributing to about 10% to china's total import. and china's energy stakes in iran has been on an increase this year. for example, the total volume of oil import from iran during this point in time increased by 49%. and the import continued by 17%. as from the energy resources china is very keen on spending and diversifying as the relations of iran focusing on the export of chinese machineries, cars, oil tanks and infrastructure projects in iran. so in 2010, the total bilateral trade approach was $30 billion u.s. which is 40% increase from the previous year. so from these figures china's reluctance to support harsh multilateral sanctions is easy to understand.

sanctions over the oil and petrochemistrys in iran will have a direct impact over china's thirst for energy and energy is a key element to fuel a much-needed domestic economic growth to build the legitimacy and to re-enforce the legitimacy of chinese government. financial sanctions to isolate iranian banks and financial institutions will further damage china's existing treaty relations with iran. and china's rejection of tough sanctions on iran is, therefore, based on a calculation of its own national interest. so would china ever change its position on another round of another u.s. sanctions? the answer is certainly positive. otherwise, we will not have seen china support of the previous rounds of u.n. sanction resolution. china's position for u.n. sanctions depends on primarily three factors. first of all, and most importantly, china's attitude towards sanctions is determining the likelihood of a military

conflict as a result of iran's nuclear program. when china says the united states and iran will not pacify, there will be a u.n. sanction resolution. also u.n. sanctions might also limit china's economic relations with iran a war in the middle east would be worst. things would not only strap china's oil import from the whole region but also will drive out the price of the international price for oil and damage china's broader economic and security interest in the region. this perception is reinforced by the case of libya earlier this year. however, at this current state despite the hawkish rhetoric from israel and other rumors about an impending military confrontation, china is yet to believe that a war a imminent.

chinese interests do not think israel would launch an attack on iran without the u.s. and finishing out the withdrawals from afghanistan and iraq. and more specifically, they also identify that u.s. is still having major differences with some of the european countries and arab allies over a war against iran. therefore, several senior analysts in china including a prominent professor from china's national defense university commented publicly last week that in the near term the likelihood of a war is rather low. so without the imminent danger of a war, china's position u.n. sanctions depend on the extent on the unilateral sanctions that the u.s. is waiting to pursue in how they might affect china's economic interest in the country. this for china is strictly a

cost benefit analysis. currently, china sees two types of possible sanctions the u.s. might adopt that will affect china. one is the financial institutions and the other is iran's petrochemistry. for china's task here is to determining whether the cost to china by this unilateral sanctions will exceed the cost of the multilateral sanction which china will have a role in determining the specifics. the two issues on the top of beijing's list are restrictions of business operations of chinese banks in the u.s. as a result of the u.s. sanctions. and the restrictions over chinese oil companies and their collaborations with and the united states. the complication is in the u.s. calculation. even the extensiveness and the magnitude of u.s.-china relations and china's overall economic importance for the united states. it would be extremely difficult

to carve out an implement, a sanction regime that would sufficiently and relationships of the bilateral nations. this, of course, is a cost benefit analysis that washington will have to make. certainly another factor that impacts china's response is russia's position. china sees isolation in the security council as something to be strictly avoided. although it usually abstains from u.s. security council that they don't like they will use the veto if russia backs the lack of foundation even their common interest in nonintervention and limiting american unilateralism the positions of russia and china have traditionally been mutually complementary. seven vetos on the security council, four were cast together with russia.

this was a study that includes the 2007 in al-zimbabwe and 2008. most recently, syria last month. and before the u.s. security council resolution in 1929 was passed last year, beijing's position to the sanction only began to shift after russia agreed to cooperate with the west. so these factors determine that any change through china's current rejection of another round of u.n. sanctions would not happen fast. for china there's ample grund for more diplomatic talks regardless of their outcomes and their results. the iaea resolution last friday did not refer the issue to u.n. security council. and to support diplomatic solutions. but for now china sees the priority is for iran to cooperate with iaea just like russia's position to clarify concerns raised in the iaea report and the most likely from the chinese point of view iran

will cooperate with iaea but to a certain extent to cope with the international pressure. but on the other hand, for china, russia's criticism of the iaea report was extremely harsh indicating a change of position from moscow nor be easy or fast. a senior chinese analyst from the china academy of social sciences over the weekend, the situation will have to brew faster or intensify more before china would make any change to its position and this would not have happened overnight. lastly, i'm going to talk a little bit about china's position on the iran's nuclear program. people might question china's commitment to a nuclear nonproliferation. even if it's a very calculated response in its national interest. to be fair, china is sincere when it says it opposes nuclear proliferation. as a nuclear power, china

doesn't want to see its privileged status diluted by more members into the nuclear club. and chinese analysts also made the comments such as smaller powers are not as powers as steep powers in the nuclear development. however, it is also true that beijing has competing interests coming to the issue of iran and nonproliferation is probably one of them. they don't see iran's nuclear program constituting a direct to china's national security. this is why china would like to consider iran nuclear and i shall there's a broader framework of u.s.-china relations. and use china advantageous position as a policy leverage against united states. many officials and analysts in china are convinced of iran's nuclear ambition and they're quite sympathetic about it given the iran security concerns and the national pride issue. however, they do make a clear

distinction between nuclear ambition and nuclear capacity. they believe iran has come close to producing its own nuclear bomb or developing a reliable development system. as for china's perception of the western intentions on iran, china is deeply suspicious. their comment basically if the west is truly committed to a nuclear nonproliferation, then why haven't they done anything about israel's nuclear weapon and this is just a double standard. and why does the united states enter a nuclear deal with india? neither israel nor india has even signed an mpt so at least iran is a signatory country. so the natural conclusion here is the west allows its friends to have nuclear weapons but not its enemies hence, the proposals are often viewed with a lot of

suspicion in beijing that they're ultimately aimed at regime change not necessarily nonproliferation. the suspicion of the west including the united states goes deeper and broader than just nonproliferation and iran. some chinese analysts commented that u.s. cooking up the iran nuclear issue at a sensitive time only because obama administration needs some achievement on iran for his re-election campaign. and some even link the current tension on iran to the desire of washington to boost its arm sales in middle eastern countries to rescue its domestic economy. and there are some more extremists in china who are believers of american conspiracy and they argue that this current tension over iran is basically a u.s. plot to sabotage chinese economy by heating up the tension and driving up oil price. so these are pretty much the

views of beijing. i look forward to the discussion and any feedback you might have. thank you. >> yes. well, thank you very much. there seems to be quite a bit of parallel thinking in terms of cunning plots on the part of the u.s. in both china and in russia. so, you know, i think we can see quite a bit of similarity way in the way both of these countries factor in the iran issue into their overall relations over the u.s. but i wonder how much they pay attention -- i know russia certainly pays quite a lot of attention to the views of the european and to the european countries. so china is not a factor at all of the thinking of other states in the fact that the european union has been much more forward-leaning in the last several years on the issue of iran. does that get their attention at all? or is that somewhat disregard.

does china think at all about european when it's factoring in iran? >> china certainly thinks about the position from european union and the european countries on the issue of iran but i wouldn't say it's constitute a primary concern of china's position so china would like to coordinate with u.k., france and germany because they are all members of the p5+1. coordinate on positions in engaging iran. but it's not a primary focus of foreign policy on this issue. >> i mean, that's quite a contrast, though, with russia because certainly in the run-up to 1929, the russians' attention was grabbed by the fact by germany not just the fact that the eu was pushing very hard on the sanctions and, of course, there's a lot more trade with germany for russia than there is with iran. >> yeah. and now i think again russia plays it both ways. it criticizes the so-called

unilateral nonsecurity council sanctions as illegal and unnecessary. at the same time, i think when it draws tehran close, look at what you're facing, there's nothing we can do about that. and then thirdly, russian companies are not forced by the russian government to contravene please areas and various bilateral groups et cetera having all these discussions over deals. but these discussions just go on for years. and just are rarely consummated by actual deals. and some of the oil companies say flat out, yeah, we would like to do business in iran, but, you know, we don't want to run into trouble contravening

sanctions. >> how can europe deal with china in this context? and there's the political dialog going on with russia here but having heard what yun said, what are your reactions to this? >> i very much agree with what both have said. but there's another angle to that which is europe is not security main program for china. china is not a security program for the time being. it's a main aspect and it's maybe because europe is seen as less problematic for russia and china but it has been chosen to be the representative of the p5+1 to iran. by mistake that is not had i been or -- hillary clinton or

mr. are lavrov who have been chosen to do that program. we have to be faithful to this aspect when the committee was created. and in terms of security we are not so much a factor in terms of economy, nevertheless, the economic relation between europe and -- not only iran but also the economic environment of iran are the most important. so, you know, here you have also an element because economic sanctions taken by more important when sanction taken by any event when it regards the effect of impact of the economy. so all in all, i think we are different players. we have different cards to play.

>> that's a very good point. let me send it over now to the audience. we'll take a quick round of questions for you. yes. the gentleman from the iranian -- yes, the mic is coming down here. thank you. >> hi. i'm from the national iranian-american council. this question is mr. -- is for mr. francois. you were talking about the tightening of the international committee and that's the only practical method to move forward and you talked about other options on the table. can you talk about these other options and why they're bankrupt? thank you. >> yes. let's go and take another question. yes, at the very back. the lady in the back row here. thank you. >> hello.

thank you -- i thank you to the panelists for your insights. i would like to have a quick question on north korea which is a very heavily sanctioned country. the new multilateral sanctions on iran -- i'd like to hear how it's going to impact the sanctions of north korea and especially when there are a lot of news media report on the nuclear cooperation between iran and north korea. also i'd like to ask if -- what will the impact of iranian sanctions on north korea especially with russia and china focusing on their efforts on iran like will it shift the focus? like will it undermine the gravity of the situation in north korea in its nuclear program? or will it help focus on the international committee's focus

on the issues? >> thanks. that's a very good question. the lady over here in the red sweater over at the back. >> thank you. i'm from basic, british american security council. as you know, the obama administration and even the israelis frame the iranian problem as a global problem. and one in which they say requires global solutions. now i understand obviously the impact of the eu on the iranian community. but the fact is that this latest round is unilateral. so i'm just wondering to what extent it might be a problem going forward with the perception that it's the west versus iran rather than the whole world? >> that's a very good question here. perhaps, francois, you could begin by responding to this question about the global dimension that you yourself and

your presentation had mentioned the need to engage with the countries malaysia is one country you had put forward and you had talked about some of the ways in which european countries are not included in the e3 will want to have more of a role here and our colleague from basic it was a perception is it a western but rather a u.s. and european endeavor could be be very much to the principles you laid out about presenting in keeping the unity? >> yes. maybe i shall start with this question then i shall go to the other question. i very much agree with what you said from basic. there is a risk. but going -- and that's a limitation and the risk of going for western sanction unilaterally that not that it's seen as illegal because they are not illegal.

they are national. they are not -- it's not trying to impose a embargo by forces. they are just things in the framework of national legislation. but that could indeed fuel with feeling that it's the west who leads the offensive and that then they can stay safely on the side and that's what we're to avoid. we have to keep a balance between both the need of taking new measures and keeping the rest of the world engaged. there is an element which goes also a bit of the timing of the sanctions which was the first question raised. if you look of the timing, you see that it takes more and more time between each u.n. security council to achieve.

to your interpose aid and interpose intent. if we were pessimistic and believing in the law, we would say the next sanction will be on 2013 at the u.n. level which is consistent with both the initial reactions of both russia and china. that said, the only -- the only consequence i draw from it is that we have to be continually engaging with the rest of international community, not going too far on the national -- of a national sanction front because it demobilizes the other, trying to fuel the kind of reflection that you are alluding to in beijing, what is is the cost of national sanction for me compared to the cost of sanctions -- u.n. sanction which is more universal and we have to make the calculation and the calculation is in many case not so easy to make because there are great advantages to our

universal cover. so i think this is a true concern we have to keep in mind. on your question about the other options, i think there are two other options which are to remain on the table. one i briefly describe which is to keep -- to show to the rest of the world that the door remains open for iran, would iran wish to essentially re-engage. as i said, it has to remain on the table but it has to remain on the table mostly for reasons of principle because we don't believe. i think iran today is really akin to sincerely engage at this stage. the other option is a military option which ask for a bit of symmetry and remain on the table which is in my personal view which is it's very difficult to mobilize really on the international community and particularly russia and china if the perception is not on the table. if not, it means we are not serious and we are not taking

iran negotiation for what it is, which is one of the major challenge for the international community given the situation of iran in the world and the way this program is conducted. it doesn't mean necessarily either that we believe there is a image that probability of the deception to be used. if you look at the options you will see there are several reasons not to use it at this stati stage and it could be more counterproductive to use it at this stage and it's difficult at this year because if you want to be credible you have to also make the point that it could be used and to explain why. so here also the balance is difficult to draw between keeping it on the table just for the sake of keeping it or keeping it on the table and making it a useful tool and then

you have to continue working on it. so i think we have to continue working on it and it should not be on the table only for demonstration purpose because it has to be there and as a credible tool and as an element of deference and use it where it's useful and it's a bit of the same logic which should appear here to this military option. it should be maintained credible and use is a deterrence tool and don't quote me on it because this is a real personal view of mine. there are many aspects on that and i don't pretend to know because i'm not a military specialist on that. but those are basically the two reasons, but in my view have to be made on the table because if

you want -- if i just stick so how do you maintain it, is having these two opposite options and on the military option it's technically helped to build international unity. i will not go further than that because i would go out of my subject and it's not up to me to say. but i would say both have proven useful to keep international -- >> well, this is the ultimate question, though, for purposes of both china and russia. clearly, this is a factor decision-making as both of you have pointed out about the last resolution. there was me credibility the last time around and there might be a strike on the part of israel. i mean, russia must engage with the israelis directly on this. it was the scald visit to netanyahu to moscow and it wasn't so secret because the russians leaked it where there was a discussion behind the scenes that got the russians attention. and the saudis got the russians attention. that there might be larger consequences so that they

stepped up. this time around, the russians don't seem to believe it. and as is said neither do the chinese so the option on the table looks like, you know, something they can take a leave and as francois is discussing, it's extraordinary difficult than to make that credible. so we seem to have something of a major deterrence dilemma here and not one that is really playing in a very productive way into this discussion. ..

and difficult issues playing into china and russia's calculations about the broad non-proliferation question and what do you think about this? >> sure. i'm pretty sure i remember striking comments from a chinese analyst on the linkage between that iran nuclear issue. the first comment on the remember from beijing was north korea already has nuclear weapons, and the international community didn't start a war with north korea, why would we fight a war against iran, who doesn't even have nuclear weapons today? does that explain part of the reluctance or the refusal for china as a position to words against the military option. the second comment i remember quite well is some of the

chinese analysts believe that from north korea you can develop the capacity. once it has the bomb there's no way that you can avoid the accusation but if you develop the capacity and do not have the nuclear test than you can enjoy a pretty big room for maneuver. and certainly north korea is more important for china because north korea is on china's border and after the provocations' over last year china and north korea have been were relatively well-behaved this year. so far it is there has not been provocation -- >> [inaudible] [laughter] >> probably. and next year will be the centennial of kim il-sung and

they are going to declare north korea to be a strong and prosperous nation, china sees north korea might have a very large likelihood of adopting economic reform approach and would readily open up, some china concern with north korea has decreased this year. >> so it's actually more positive potentially. >> what about from the russian perspective? >> i think from the russian perspective north korea is in a different stage, more advanced stage and so it presents different problems and then go to the iranian issue. there is still hope that we can prevail upon iran not to go fully to the weaponization my guess and there's still time from the russian perspective. the point that keeps getting

forgotten in terms of what sparks international unity is what is revealed that new that iran is engaged in, and there always are surprises coming and i have to expect that we are going to have more surprises as we go down the road, and that iran itself will spark this international unity unless it furiously back petals and really does start cooperating with the iaea. >> you mentioned in your presentation that the russians were not pleased by the fact they have not gotten much out of the relationship and displeased by the fact -- >> lead to 1929. the other thing that we forget is the