Financial Times Editorial - Stick to diplomacy

Stick to diplomacy
Published: April 10 2006 03:00 | Last updated: April 10 2006 03:00. Copyroght by The Financial Times

At some point in the near futureZalmay Khalilzad, US ambassador in Baghdad, will meet Iranian diplomats to discuss stability in Iraq. Mr Khalilzad will studiously avoid discussing the issue that most threatens long-term peace in the Middle East - Iran's suspected nuclear weapons programme.

It is a sensible, although belated, step for Washington to engage Iran on Iraq if it is to have any chance of stemming the tide of increasingly vicious sectarianism. There can be little doubt that some of the Shiite militias in Iraq have received help from Tehran. Yet there can also be little doubt that Iran's game extends far beyond Iraq's troubled borders.

Ten days ago the United States and the other four permanent members of the UN security council agreed to a statement calling on Iran to put a halt to further uranium enrichment. Because of objections from Russia and China, it avoided reference to any consequences if Iran failed to comply within the 30 days it was given. It took Iran less than a day to dismiss it.

The next stage of diplomacy will be for the US - and its two security council allies, Britain and France - to push for a resolution that would threaten Iran with international sanctions. But unless Russia and China (which has been taking its cue from Moscow) can be persuaded to support the threat of sanctions, it stands little chance ofsuccess.

Last month diplomats in New York leaked a British proposal that would have offered Iran incentives - such as direct talks and possible civil nuclear assistance - to put an end to enrichment. These would be part of a broader package of strong disincentives for Iran to continue to ignore international opinion. The leak sank the initiative. It should be revived.

Of course there is still a chance this would be insufficient to persuade Russia to back a resolution that would emphasise the threat of sanctions. In which case, the US and its European allies would probably create a "coalition of the willing" to maintain pressure on Iran from outside the UN. But Iran could almost certainly live with a sanctions regime that did not include Russia and China, even assuming the Europeans could make such sanctions stick.

Meanwhile, since Washington continues to reject the merest hint of talking to Iran on anything other than Iraq, it should dig much deeper to find ways of bringing Russia on board. Russia might resist. And Iran may ultimately not prove susceptible to any diplomatic solution. But against the backdrop of a growing number of leaks - most recently in the New Yorker - on the Bush administration's plans for military strikes on Iran, failure to explore all the diplomatic options would drastically raise the probability of an eventual conflict. That would jeopardise any chance America has of restoring stability in Iraq.