Iran is still probably five to 10 years away from gaining the ability to make nuclear fuel or nuclear bombs. But its programme is already sending nuclear ripples through West Asia.

While US officials were reaching a new nuclear agreement with India, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France signed a nuclear cooperation deal with Libya and agreed to help the UAE launch its own civilian nuclear programme.

Suddenly, after multiple energy crises over the 60 years of the nuclear age, these countries that control over one-fourth of the world’s oil supplies are investing in nuclear power programmes. This is not about energy; it is a nuclear hedge against Iran.

King Adbdullah of Jordan admitted, in an interview, when he said: “The rules have changed on the nuclear subject throughout the whole region. After this summer everybody’s going for nuclear programmes”. He was referring to the war in Lebanon last year between Israel and Hezbollah, perceived in the region as evidence of Iran’s growing clout. Other leaders are not as frank in public, but confide similar sentiments in private conversations.

Egypt and Turkey, two of Iran’s main rivals, have flirted with nuclear weapons programmes in the past and both have announced ambitious plans for the construction of new power reactors. Gamal Mubarak, son of the current Egyptian president and his likely successor, says the country will build four power reactors, with the first to be completed within the next 10 years. Turkey will build three new reactors, with the first, beginning later this year.

Not to be outdone, Saudi Arabia and the five other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council at the end of 2006 “commissioned a joint study on the use of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes”. Algeria and Russia quickly signed an agreement on nuclear development in January, with France, South Korea, China and the US also jockeying for nuclear sales to this oil state. Jordan announced that it too, wants nuclear power.

Finally, the Arab League has provided an overall umbrella for these initiatives when, at the end of its summit meeting in March, it “called on the Arab states to expand the use of peaceful nuclear technology in all domains serving continuous development”.

Instead of seeing this nuclear surge as a new market, the countries with nuclear technology to sell have a moral and strategic obligation to ensure that their business does not result in West Asia going from a region with one nuclear weapon state — Israel — to one with three, four, or five nuclear nations. If the existing territorial, ethnic, and political disputes continue unresolved, this is a recipe for nuclear war.

This means that nuclear technology states must be just as energetic in promoting the resolution of these conflicts as they are in promoting their products. It means building the unity of the US, Europe, Russia and the regional states to effectively contain the Iranian programme.

Finally, it means that engaging with Tehran is even more crucial to halt not only the Iranian nuclear programme, but those that will soon start to materialize around it.

NYT