Iran's Former Nuclear Negotiator Gives 'Ten Reasons Iran Doesn't Want the Bomb'

A former spokesman for Iran's nuclear negotiators gives "Ten Reasons Iran Doesn't Want the Bomb" and writes that the West should stop its ineffective sanctions against Iran and pursue a "genuine solution."

Seyed Hossein Mousavian, now a research scholar at Princeton, made his case in an article published Tuesday in the foreign policy journal National Interest.

Mousavian writes that an Iranian pursuit of a nuclear bomb would offer no long-term advantage to the nation, but would instead "trigger a regional nuclear arms race, bringing Egypt, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia into the fold sooner or later."

It would also further isolate Iran, according to Mousavian, and "would give the Israelis ample ammunition to rally the United States and the international community on a perceived existential threat to its existence for creating another war in the Middle East."

Mousavian also charges that accusations Iran would use a nuclear bomb against Israel or the US make "no rational sense, since any provocation by Iran against two states that possess thousands and hundreds of nuclear weapons respectively would result in Iran's total annihilation."

He concludes:

Tehran would only accept a deal in which the P5+1 recognizes Iran's legitimate rights of enrichment under the NPT and gradually lifts the sanctions. In return, to assuage Western worries, Iran would operationalize Ayatollah Khamenei's fatwa banning nuclear arms, implement the Additional Protocol and the Subsidiary Arrangements (Code 3.1), and cooperate with the IAEA to resolve technical ambiguities and its worries about possible military dimensions. It would also export its enriched uranium stockpile beyond domestic consumption or convert it to fuel rods, cap enrichment at 5 percent, and establish a multilateral consortium for enrichment in Iran.