WHEN the world’s most peaceful fighter against oppression, Aung San Suu Kyi turned 60 recently, she was alone and more isolated than ever before. Intensely guarded by the military rulers who have commanded her life for the past 15 years, reports from Yengoon say that she has had no contact with the diplomatic community for months, having been denied meetings with UN officials and rights groups as well.

Communication with other leaders of her party — National League for Democracy (NLD) — is also severed. So much so that even her personal physician has been restricted from meeting her. Her supporters comprise almost the entire social and political community of what was once called Burma, and say that these stringent measures are a desperate attempt by the military junta to render Suu Kyi politically, totally ineffective.

On the other hand, there is scepticism on the home front — where perhaps the regime’s tactics are paying off — as the silence from Suu Kyi and her isolated world reflect her helplessness. This status is compelling even some of her supporters to wonder what the ‘peaceful’ journey of protest has truly achieved.

Having been in captivity for a total of nine and a half years over the past 15 years, Suu Kyi is recognized as the only Nobel Peace Laureate who is a prisoner. Daughter of General Aung San — regarded as modern Burma’s founding father who was killed in 1947 — Suu Kyi has lived up to her father’s belief in freedom and democracy by persevering in her struggle for the lofty cause with equal dynamism but calmly and with pure advocacy of justice. The country’s name was changed to Myanmar by the military dictatorships which refused to hand over the political reins to Suu Kyi despite her overwhelming win in the 1990 elections in which she secured 83 per cent votes for her National League for Democracy. The junta in Myanmar is identified by the title; the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), though that has now been ‘softened’ (reportedly, on the advice of an American public relations company) and renamed as the State Peace and Development Council.

Since the 1990 elections, Suu Kyi has been fighting for the legitimate right to govern Myanmar and has continued her protests against the junta’s dictatorship, hence, spending the better part of her life in captivity. Amongst her supporters 1,300 political prisoners are languishing in Myanmar’s jails, including parliamentarians, writers, Buddhist monks and pro-democracy activists.

A UK Conservative MP, John Bercow, gave an impassioned speech in parliament recently, urging the British government to refer the Burmese military junta’s case to the International Criminal Court. Elaborating on the junta’s rule he described the acts of the dictatorship as, “all part of the cocktail of barbarity that has disfigured that beautiful but long-suffering part of the world.”

Citing the junta’s practices of rape as a weapon of war, extra-judicial killings, forced labour, the use of child soldiers and human minesweepers, besides the daily destruction of rural villages, he brought out the immense suffering of the common people of Myanmar. Detailing the events of the past 12 months, he said, “there have been continual attacks by the Myanmar army, with the ethnic nationals targeted, vilified, maimed, disfigured, raped and murdered on the deliberate say-so of the so-called State Peace and Development Council. The situation in Myanmar is not simply a matter of historical events about which there is a continuing argument. The crisis is real, the atrocities continue, the pain is now.”

It is difficult to say whether the MP’s speech will urge the UK government to move the ICC for the people of its former colony, but the international community truly needs to make the human rights abuse in Myanmar an immediate agenda. It seems rather unjust that while Iraq under Saddam Hussein was a serious matter of human suffering for world powers and allies like Pakistan, there is little outrage from the same coalition against terror when almost routinely, about a 100,000-strong army attacks defenceless villages in the country, where, incidentally there are no oil resources.

International human rights organizations have recorded wide-scale abuses that are continuing in Myanmar. Amnesty International, the United Nations, Human Rights Watch and even the United States State Department have documented the humanitarian crisis in that country. The latest report by Guy Horton, called, ‘Dying alive: a legal assessment of human rights violations in Myanmar’, which was presented as evidence in Washington, concludes, that in addition to crimes against humanity and war crimes, the Burmese government is guilty of attempted genocide.

A human rights researcher, Horton spent five years documenting these human rights violations and he claims to have film footage of several incidents cited in his report. Other reports which filtered in on the news blogs also refer to ‘circumstantial evidence’, suggesting that either a chemical or a poisoned-weapons attack on an army resistance camp in Karenni state was carried out. Independent medical examinations of residents of that camp have led to the conclusion that they have symptoms of what appears to be illness resulting from a chemical or poison weapons attack.

With such realities on the ground, the questions being asked are, what would it take to alleviate the plight of the Burmese nationals? Has Suu Kyi’s peaceful resistance brought her country and her people any closer to a democratic system of governance? Some resistance groups have now only cynicism to offer. They are voicing their criticism of Suu Kyi’s peaceful resistance, saying, ‘it has done nothing but ruin the lives of many of her followers.’

David Steinberg, an expert on Myanmar at Georgetown University in Washington, comments on Suu Kyi, saying that she is, “the icon, the Joan of Arc... but, dangerously, she’s become too much of a one-person show, with her close entourage in their late 70s and 80s and the NLD unwilling or unable to make decisions.”

Though it is true that Aung San Suu Kyi alone has kept alive the fight for democracy against a vicious regime through sheer grit and resilience, her 60th birthday and her associates’ advanced age are making sceptics warn that there is little hope left of her bringing about a change in the face of a merciless military regime. They believe that her ‘Gandhi-like’ mode of protest has led her party nowhere.

In fact, Dr Zarni, founder of the Free Burma Coalition, in her article on Suu Kyi’s birthday states, “Among the dissidents both within the country and in exile, it is an open secret (if taboo to say) that the NLD has been in a revolutionary coma since its iconic general secretary was locked up.” But, despite such strong scepticism against the NLD’s policies or politics, it is also true that it is only because of Suu Kyi that Myanmar is getting international attention.

When protests at Burmese embassies around the world marked Suu Kyi’s 60th birthday and activists delivered 6,000 birthday cards at Rangoon’s mission in Washington, it was obvious that Aung San Suu Kyi still commands immense respect among her followers. She has shown the strength of character which makes her deserving of this respect.

But while she remains isolated from the outside world, the international community must go beyond the half-hearted attempts that the Asian nations, the European Union, the UN or the US have made for her release. While securing her release is one of the causes to be taken up, what is also necessary is to look into the actions already taken which include sanctions and clampdown by the world powers and assess their efficacy.

As analyzed by Dr Zarni, sanctions only end up affecting the common people. The generals get their share from the national budget anyway. In Myanmar, the people need the wheels of progress to turn for their benefit and that is what the West can give. Education and technology is the true revolution needed to run democracy today. Isolation from the international community has done no damage to the junta. Instead, it has retarded the economic growth of the common Burmese people.

A collective relief package by the entire western world in the form of information technology and subsequent progress can prove to be a crucial and much-needed weapon for the people of Myanmar, which will help them to be integrated in the decision making spheres. This is the evolutionary support that Suu Kyi’s people must be given. Asian trade is a powerful tool which can greatly aid Myanmar’s cause.

At present, a global campaign to, ‘Free Aung San Suu Kyi’ is on. Inspired by the 1988 “Mandela at 70” campaign to free Nelson Mandela from imprisonment in apartheid South Africa, a petition is being circulated in Myanmar calling for her unconditional release and the right to freedom of association for all political and ethnic groups in Myanmar. Signed so far reportedly by 300,000 supporters, it will eventually be submitted to the regime and the UN.

What is also needed at the same time is the moral pressure exerted by the nations of the world. If they could give an all out, ‘no questions asked’ support on the war on terror, surely the human grounds here are enough for those very same countries to join hands ‘in peace’ and offer a suffering nation relief and progress for its future.

PAKISTAN recorded 8.4 per cent growth in the GDP and the government hopes that the country will now be among the fastest growing economies of Asia. But growth requires energy, and high growth rates require high levels of consumption of cheap and abundant energy. It is therefore relevant to ask: what will propel the high GDP growth rate of seven to nine per cent a year and high export earnings?

Pakistan’s energy portfolio has been unbalanced for long and resembles more like that of an energy-rich Middle Eastern country than that of a developing country of Asia. While 70 per cent of Pakistan’s power generation comes from oil and gas, the fast developing Asian economies of China and India each uses oil and gas for under 40 per cent of their power generation needs. Again, whereas China and India each uses coal for 70 per cent of their power generation needs, Pakistan uses coal to generate only one per cent of its power generation requirements, despite sitting on one of the largest coal reserves in the world.

Such an unbalanced energy profile carries serious implications. A balanced energy portfolio would require that a fair balance be established among various sources of energy with no excessive reliance on any single source, especially one over whose availability, transportation and price the country has no control. With Pakistan’s transportation system almost entirely run on oil, and 50 per cent of its power generation also based on imported oil, it was clear for a long time that if any of the variables regarding oil imports went haywire, such a portfolio would cause severe damage to the economy and the well-being of the people.

But the chickens now seem to be finally coming home to roost. Several renowned investment and oil industry analysts now agree that the world oil production is nearing its peak levels, and the rising oil prices are expected to shoot through the roof and cross even $100 a barrel within a decade. Many analysts, including the International Energy Agency (IEA) — the energy arm of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) — are now predicting that the world oil production will peak at around 80 mbd (million barrels per day) by 2010, and then will start declining. Even the very optimistic estimates of the US Geological Survey expect world oil production to peak by 2020.

Without much squabbling about the exact year, the writing on the wall is clear: world oil production will peak very soon and the oil prices will be in the triple digits. Prices which were two dollars a barrel in 1960, and now are $60 a barrel, are expected to reach $100 a barrel and beyond within this decade. Of course, it would not always be a straight line increase. There will certainly be ups and downs along the way, but the rising trend will remain a fact of life in the coming years.

With its transportation almost entirely oil-based and about 50 per cent of power production also based on imported oil, this lopsided energy profile, by 2010, will require more than Pakistan’s entire current export earnings of $12 billion, just to pay its oil import bill.

What happened to all those rosy pictures of oil supplies rising till 2050 which induced complacency and increased dependence on oil imports? China’s continued high growth rates have been consuming so much energy that it has surpassed even ten-year old estimates of world oil consumption. If and when its oil consumption, which is way below the world average today, reaches even the average European level, Chinese economy alone would be consuming nearly 50 per cent of the world oil production.

With the US already consuming 20 per cent of world oil production in 2000, the two of them between themselves may be consuming about 75 per cent of the world oil production by the end of the decade. Where would other oil importing countries, especially Pakistan, find sources of supply sufficient for their needs?

The world oil production is losing its production elasticity. The world demand for oil in 2000 was 77 mbd (million barrels per day) and growing by about two mbd each year. It is expected to reach 100 mbd by 2010 and 120 mbd by 2020. As against this demand buildings, oil production would peak at around 80 mbd according to International Energy Agency of the OECD. The gap between the demand and supply is not expected to be bridged even by the attraction of high oil prices, because the world oil output from the known reserves would not have much room for an increase.

How is Pakistan’s economy to handle the seismic effects of a $100 a barrel prices and keep producing goods for the export markets at competitive prices? In addition to the financial burden on the economy and the people, the situation raises some new issues of the security of supplies. For, there will be intense competition from other oil importing, rich and powerful countries which would also be feverishly working to ensure the security of their supplies from the same inelastic pool of oil.

Whatever else may or may not be the reasons for the US strategy now unfolding in the Middle East and Central Asia, it would greatly help our understanding of the happenings around us, if we realize that securing oil supplies for our future growth would surely be on the top of the list.

Unfortunately, however, we have yet to see any strategy that will tell our industrial and domestic consumers how the government plans to secure the country’s energy interests in this very difficult scenario that is unfolding itself. Other alternative sources of energy have also their own limitations. Natural gas, like oil, is a dwindling resource, besides other limitations of costly infrastructure for storage, transportation and usage.

Nuclear energy has safety problems of its own. And while the world has stabilized the use of hydel power at less than seven per cent of the total energy portfolio, because of many water-related and environmental concerns, Pakistan has already stretched its use to 30 per cent of its energy portfolio. This leaves coal, which Pakistan has in abundance, as a safe, cheap and reliable source to meet the energy needs of the country for the foreseeable future.

Many countries, including the rich, developed and emerging economies, have adopted extensive programmes for increasing coal-based power into their energy portfolios. Oil-rich Indonesia is implementing a strategy to add 10,000 MWs of power from coal alone. And China is further increasing its coal-based power by a whopping 30,000 MWs. Even the rich, highly developed and environmentally conscious but coal-less Japan uses coal to generate 19 per cent of its power requirements. Even today, from all available information, Pakistan does not have even 10 MWs of additional coal-fired power generation facility presently under construction in the country, even though its coal-based power is a mere one per cent.

There is talk of development of some unconventional sources of energy in Pakistan. Forget the fancy ideas of wind, solar and hydrogen power that even the developed world is still experimenting with. These should no doubt be explored, but they are far away from offering real solutions to Pakistan’s energy problems.

Although there have been several pronouncements from the president downwards about meeting the rising energy needs of the country through extensive development of indigenous coal reserves, but five years down the road and one does not see any serious investment having actually been made in coal-based power generation in Pakistan.

As things stand, therefore, Pakistan will be entering the year 2010 practically with the same unbalanced energy portfolio that it had ten years ago. This time, however, the price of imported oil would be hovering around $100 a barrel and it would extract a heavy price from the industrial and agricultural sectors of the country.

A balanced energy portfolio must be built around the country’s enormous coal reserves which will enable Pakistan to successfully handle the upcoming energy crisis and ensure for itself the much needed source for long-term, cheap and abundant, energy supplies to sustain its development objectives. Without such a vision and a strategy to realize it, does anyone seriously believe that the high growth rates in GDP and exports earnings can be sustained on the back of a $100 a barrel oil import bill?

Email: smshah@alum.mit.edu

THE one reliable prediction you can make about any group of human beings is that one or two will have a proclivity to cut corners, accept a bribe or be ready to pursue a dishonourable means to achieve their end.

It comes with the territory of being human. Be sure there is always somebody ready to take the corrupt course of action. Certain financial reward today is, for some individuals, better than the uncertain reward of behaving properly and conforming to social norms.

Yet all round the world, adherence to the internal norms that hold back a drive to behave corruptly seem to be weakening. In the run-up to the G8 summit in Gleneagles, every commentator worth his or her salt has felt compelled to identify Africa as the hopeless centre of a corruption epidemic, challenging the case for debt relief made by Messrs Geldof and Brown. Generous western aid only gets spent on a private jet or Swiss bank account, runs the argument. Unless Africa can clean up its act, we should be wary of aid and debt relief.

But the conviction for fraud last week of Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz, former chiefs of US manufacturer Tyco International, was a salutary reminder that the West has its share of corruption.

In Britain, accountants BDO Stoy Hayward, in its annual FraudTrack Report, says that fraud — from identity theft to fiddling the books — doubled in 2004 and is rising exponentially.

No institution is safe. Last week, it emerged that the BBC’s Toby Grosvenor, who was in charge of the technical wizardry of the recent Dr Who series, is being investigated for the suspected theft of 330,000 pounds. Only last year, another BBC executive, Jeffrey Everard Taylor of BBC Worldwide, was imprisoned for 20 months in Hong Kong for accepting bribes to peddle particular companies’ toys.

FraudTrack says that the impulse for fraud is simple greed and desire for lavish lifestyles, and the British are just getting greedier. But are there really twice as many greedy people in Britain as there were just 12 months ago?

A more likely explanation lies in the progressive breakdown of the norms that hold the greedy back. Once employees start to believe they are paid too little in relation to those above them, the corruption seed is sown. They are no less deserving, no less needy of the good material things in life and if they behave corruptly, the old social pressures to behave well are felt less keenly. Who is going to shame them, especially if there are no victims? Presented with the opportunity, they go for the money.

Joyti De-Laurey, the secretary to three executives in Goldman Sachs who was imprisoned last year for seven years for stealing 4.4 million pounds, offers a window into the mindset of the corrupt. Paid less than 40,000 pounds a year, she was simply stunned by the money made by the men and women she worked for. They nor the firm would miss a mere million or two, she reasoned. And for some time they didn’t. She wrote to God pleading for more of ‘what was mine’ and for protection against her misdeeds. In her own mind, what she took was a reasonable return for her efficiency, small change beside the scale of reward her bosses made so effortlessly.

Joyti de-Laurey and Jeffrey Everard Taylor are presented as one-offs, bad apples of which Goldman Sachs and the BBC were the unlucky victims. I’m not so sure. Three preconditions need to exist for corruption to rise. The first is rapidly growing inequality that cannot be justified by merit, effort or performance and is, therefore, perceived to be the result of greed. The second is when an organisation’s relationships become anonymous and based only on transactions, justifying the belief that the crime is victimless. The third is a wider culture which does not encourage a sense of shame in relation to dishonesty while, at the same time, celebrating wealth and celebrity.

Goldman Sachs and the BBC qualify on all three counts. As it has tried to compete with the explosion of incomes in private television, the BBC has widened its pay differentials remarkably over the last five years. At the same time, the glue of shared values that held it together as a public-service broadcaster has weakened.

As for Goldman Sachs, the financial returns made by partners of modest talent for small risk go beyond the dreams of avarice as it has become a faceless profit-making machine. Both organisations operate in the same broader culture that celebrates individualism and wealth. Neither should be surprised that some of its frailer and greedier employees succumb to temptation.

Goldman Sachs is the arch high priest of the investment banker’s temple. It’s an industry, argues Philip Augar in his important new book, The Greed Merchants, which can offer such disproportionate rewards only because the markets in which investment banks operate are rigged. There is nothing illegal in what they do and how much profit they make; it is just that the commission structures and invisible cartels that support them should not be allowed, but no government is prepared to take them on.

But when individuals of only modest talent make extraordinary fortunes for no worthwhile purpose, the consequent impact on the environment in which they operate is devastating. Very few of the mergers to which investment bankers are midwives or assets that they manage outperform the average. In fact, most do indifferently. But they are rewarded as if they did perform well. It’s not just secretaries who are tempted to go on the take; the contagion spreads around the entire financial services sector.

City salaries have always been high. Now, they are absurd. In this atmosphere, the greedy, excluded from the feeding frenzy, fall prey to the temptation to break the rules and whether it’s hedge funds, tax-avoidance schemes, private equity or buy-to-let companies, there is plenty of opportunity.

New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer has revealed the depth of the scams in New York’s financial community; if he was unleashed in London, he would find no less fertile ground. Philip Augar argues that Wall Street and the City have become world benchmarks for personal earnings against which Asian plutocrats and African dictators alike compare themselves, at the same time offering examples of how to rig markets and salt corrupt cash away. I’m not sure that’s quite fair. China and India have as much homegrown corruption as Africa but there it’s independent of practice in the West but with similar roots.

They never had strong norms to guard against corruption but with rapidly rising internal inequality, the temptation to commit what seem victimless crimes has become harder to resist. For those at the top, looking at what happens in the West stiffens their readiness and ability to cheat.

Let’s not get too pious about African corruption; there’s more than enough in our own backyard — and checking it is just as ineffective.—Dawn/Observer Service

A STATEMENT issued recently by a number of important persons, associated with foreign affairs, has stressed the importance of a close Pakistan-Iran relationship and warned against divisions and misunderstandings created wittingly or unwittingly.

The signatories to the above statement include two former foreign ministers, one former information minister (now secretary-general of the ruling PML-Q), a former interior minister and a former foreign secretary.

Unlike the issues of social reform, clerical power, relations with the US, nuclear capability, inflation and unemployment, relations with Pakistan were not an issue in this election campaign in Iran. Therefore, the electoral victory of Ahmadinejad is not likely to change materially the present state of Pakistan-Iran ties — a relationship of neighbourly interaction in economic and other fields, at times marked by recurring suspicions and misgivings, in contrast to the close alliance and special relationship of yesteryear characterized by deep mutual reliance and trust.

While this discussion deals with the call contained in the statement by former foreign minister, Mr Agha Shahi and other dignitaries, for safeguarding and promoting Pakistan-Iran ties and is not a commentary on the election results. However, a brief summing up of the post-election scenario would be in order before returning to the main theme of Pakistan-Iran relations.

Representing a younger generation of hardliners, Mahmud Ahmedinejad, with his ultra-conservative image and his roots among the “pious poor”, seems to have significantly expanded his natural constituency, as the outcome of the election shows. While running closely with Hashmi Rafsanjani in the first round of elections (19 per cent plus against 20 per cent plus for Rafsanjani), his landslide victory in the run-off election reflects the twin pull of the religious right and the economic have-nots. The vote appears to have split broadly along class lines.

Beyond the above considerations, it would be premature at this stage to predict a likely rollback of the modest reforms that President Khatami had introduced, or to assume any significant hardening of Iran’s nuclear posture or the ruling out of any improvement of relations with the US. These vital issues transcend groups or personalities and are not amenable to easy choices. The one certainty that has emerged, however, is the continuing ability of the unelected religious leadership to influence the course of events and the growing consciousness of the economically under-privileged.

Notwithstanding the expected strong rhetoric from the newly elected president on the nuclear programme and relations with the US, a most important message in Ahmedinejad’s initial statement was the affirmation of “moderation, peace and coexistence” and his pledge that “no extremism will be acceptable to his government.” There is also indication that talks with the EU on Iran’s nuclear programme and wider cooperation will continue.

Since the early years of Pakistan, the affinity of geopolitical interests between the two neighbours has been mutually recognized. Hedged in, as Pakistan is, by an adversarial India, an unstable and turbulent Afghanistan and the Russian Federation, which has not given up its reservations about Pakistan, Iran is its only secure land link to the outside world.

The disclosure by Iranian sources of the unfortunate role of Pakistani (and other) middle-men in the context of Iran’s nuclear programme and the resultant damage to Pakistan’s standing in the outside world (particularly the US) had evoked, understandably, an angry response from the Pakistan leadership. A recent statement about Iran’s anxiety to acquire nuclear military capability, attributed to Pakistan’s president, has subsequently been denied by President Musharraf.

The deterioration in Pakistan-Iran relations during the 1990s resulted from their conflicting interests in Afghanistan and divergent postures in relation to the Taliban, as also from rivalry over economic opportunities in Central Asia and the rise of sectarian terrorism in Pakistan. The strong Iranian reservations about the Taliban were exploited by India as a means of policy convergence with Tehran on Afghanistan. The end of Pakistan’s support for the Taliban eliminated a major source of Pakistan’s friction with Iran.

For Iran’s part, the importance of political and economic cooperation with major Asian states, especially with a country of India’s size and importance, was enhanced during the mid-1990s by the US drive to isolate Iran economically and by Iran’s need to look for economic partners beyond the Gulf.

The growth of fundamentalism in Pakistan during the Zia period and increasing sectarian terrorism had created doubts in the Iranian mind about the availability of a congenial environment for promoting Pakistan-Iran relations. Deterrent and effective measures against sectarian terrorists would not only safeguard Pakistan’s vital interests in domestic stability and economic development but also remove suspicions and tensions in relation with Iran.

It is important to note, however, that the significant political and economic inroads made in Iran by India during the period of Pakistan’s estrangement with Iran will continue to act as a limiting factor on those aspects of Pakistan-Iran relations, political or economic, which impinge directly on India.

In the sphere of Pakistan-Iran economic cooperation, the various proposals for joint ventures and related projects ought to be approached as an integrated package, taking into account the interests of both countries and avoiding footdragging as in the past, over various projects on grounds of perceived comparative gains or costs.

Now, for the first time in recent years, with the end of the Taliban era, Pakistan and Iran share, both an affinity of security interests in the region as well as a complementarity of bilateral and regional interests in economic cooperation.

Keeping in view their respective interests and policies vis-a-vis Central Asia and Afghanistan, it should not be beyond the diplomatic ingenuity of Pakistan and Iran to work out a common meeting ground. The potential for economic cooperation with the Central Asian states and the prospects of transit routes involving export of oil and gas are strong enough to permit productive collaboration, as long as regional states do not become a cat’s-paw of outside powers. The on-going progress with regard to the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline, in spite of US opposition, is an instance of commonality of interests.

Perhaps no country is as well placed as Pakistan with regard to the use of its good offices in promoting understanding and normal relationship between the US and Iran. With both of these states Pakistan has a close relationship in vital political, security and economic spheres. While Pakistan’s diplomacy has many achievements to its credit — in the establishment of Sino-US relations and efforts to promote Gulf-Iran harmony, it has not been as effective in lessening US-Iran tensions and the resultant dangers to the region.

It is important for the world to take note of Iran’s security concerns. Its security environment has darkened ominously since 9/11 with US forces operating in its neighbourhood — in Afghanistan and Iraq. With the occupation of these two countries, Iran has become the prime target of neo-conservative elements and Zionist lobbies. Since the Iranian revolution, a number of groups, many with questionable political agendas, have influenced the shaping of US policies on Iran, thus creating political hurdles in the way of a rapprochement.

Since 80 per cent of Iranians favour a rapprochement with the US, Washington should take note of this positive factor by ending talk of regime change, which only serves to harden the stance of the leadership and other political elements in Tehran. Easing of US economic sanctions would also be an important step towards reconciliation with Iran. On the issue of nuclear development for peaceful purposes, Tehran should avoid giving any excuse to its antagonists by resuming enrichment of uranium in the current tense environment, notwithstanding the strong Iranian feelings about the achievement of a self-reliant nuclear fuel cycle capability.

The writer is a former ambassador.