November 19, 2013
By Orde F. Kittrie – While US Secretary of State John Kerry pushes back hard against Senate threats to pass a new Iran sanctions bill, his negotiators are hopefully using that same Senate threat to extract a better deal from Tehran. Press reports make it clear that the interim...
November 14, 2013
By Egle Murauskaite and Michelle E. Dover – Tasked with the mission of destroying the Syrian government’s chemical weapons capability amidst civil conflict, the United Nations’ Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) faces an immense challenge. This is the first time international inspections and efforts to dismantle a country’s chemical weapons capability are taking place during an active conflict. To effectively protect its inspectors, the OPCW needs a management and support system for what is increasingly looking...
August 23, 2013
By Chen Kane and Egle Murauskite – Reports are coming out of Syria of missiles tipped with chemical weapons being fired into rebel controlled areas near Damascus, which, if confirmed, would be the most brutal incident so far. This adds significant complications for the United Nations (UN) team of inspectors, who arrived in Syria on August 18, tasked with the first “on the ground” investigation into the possible uses of chemical weapons. The inspectors were already facing a...
August 9, 2013
By Nilsu Goren, Aviv Melamud, Ibrahim Said Ibrahim, and Ariane Tabatabai – The Middle East has provided an arena for different weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs. Such weapons – nuclear, chemical, biological – are either being developed, acquired, stored, or contemplated throughout this highly-volatile and conflict-prone region. Most notably, there is the nuclear issue (Israel’s opaque nuclear posture and the controversial Iranian nuclear program), but the abundance of chemical and biological weapon programs throughout is arguably just as...
July 30, 2013
By Bilal Y. Saab – Political space is opening up in the Arab world. While it is particularly difficult to speak with any degree of confidence on the ultimate trajectory of the Arab uprisings (with all their local variants), the process of democratization that is sweeping the region is likely to have a significant impact on how Arab societies and their soon-to-be representative governments make and conduct foreign and defense policy in the future. One key area of concern...
June 24, 2013
By Ariane Tabatabai – Former chief nuclear negotiator Hassan Rouhani was elected last week as Iran’s seventh president, succeeding one of the most controversial figures in the history of the Islamic Republic, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Following the announcement of Rouhani’s election, the White House restated its readiness to hold bilateral talks with Tehran. Many Iranian and international observers welcomed Rouhani’s election as a new opportunity to build rapprochement with the Islamic Republic and ultimately solve the nuclear crisis. Others however argue that...
April 23, 2013
By Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova – In October 2011, Finland was designated as the host country for the 2012 Conference, and the Finnish Undersecretary of State Ambassador Jaakko Laajava was named as the Facilitator. In May 2012, the Facilitator reported on his work to the first PrepCom meeting. Despite conducting intensive consultations with states in the Middle East, as well as with the NPT depositaries and co-sponsors of the 1995 Resolution (Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States), Laajava indicated...
March 22, 2013
By Javier Serrat – At the March meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors (BoG), the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (UNSC) plus Germany (P5+1) – a group of countries which since 2006 negotiates with Iran on its nuclear program – underscored their expectation that current negotiations with Iran must produce “tangible results […] at an early stage”. As the six powers have grown impatient with Tehran’s tendency to stymie serious progress at the...
February 28, 2013
By Ariane Tabatabai – Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has reiterated a number of times that the use of nuclear weapons is prohibited under Islamic law. One declaration in particular has received a lot of attention and has become known as the fatwa (a fatwa is a religious edict, which, in Shiite jurisprudence, is traditionally issued by a mujtahid – a scholar who is competent to interpret sharia – to provide an answer to a religious question). Khamenei’s fatwa prohibiting ‘nuclear weapons’ has once again gained international...
February 7, 2013
By Egle Murauskaite – On January 30, 2013 at approximately 4:30 GMT (early dawn) four Israeli jets conducted a strike in Jamraya, Syria – that’s about the only thing that is known with certainty. As the story unfolds, a myriad of questions is raised about the attack; throughout this article I will point out the indicators to watch for, in an attempt to understand the intended target and purpose of this attack, as well as the reasons behind the rhetoric...
These are all weaknesses in th
Richard! Does Aussie Dave know
Postol's latest publication ab
Mr. Rubin, I am curious if you
Thank you Uzi. You have obviou
Bruce came back to CSTPV's 20t
Bruce came back to CSTPV's 20t
Thanks for publishing in detai
The 'deal' also leaves Israel
I think that Geneva Talks pose