THE INTERNATIONAL Atomic Energy Agency reported this week that Iran has failed to answer questions about suspicious work on the design and testing of nuclear warheads, uranium conversion, and development of high-explosive detonators needed for a nuclear weapon. The IAEA is highly credible on these matters. It has steered clear of political bias, and the documentary evidence its inspectors showed to Iranian officials came from several different member states. Now Iran has an obligation to rectify what IAEA director Mohamed ElBaradei tactfully called a "confidence deficit."
The IAEA report is likely to cause confusion, because it appears to contradict a National Intelligence Estimate released in November. That estimate - a consensus among the US intelligence branches - "judged with high confidence" that Iran had halted weapons-design work in fall 2003. The IAEA report suggests that weaponization work continued beyond that time.
But for the purposes of US policy, it does not matter very much if Iran's weapons research and development did or did not persist after 2003. This is the easiest part of a military nuclear program to hide and the one that can be completed quickest. Even if Iran did halt weaponization in 2003, it could readily resume such work, and swiftly complete it - once Iranian researchers master the daunting challenge of enriching contaminant-free uranium gas in thousands of temperamental centrifuges spinning at extremely high speeds.
There is nothing in the IAEA report to justify a rush toward military action. On the contrary, the agency's steady insistence that Iran prove its nuclear program is meant exclusively for peaceful energy purposes ought to strengthen the case for unyielding enforcement of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and multinational diplomacy.
In polite yet pointed comments Wednesday, ElBaradei called on Iran to let the IAEA visit more sites, see more documents, and "provide assurance, not only that Iran's declared activities are for peaceful purposes but that there are no undeclared nuclear activities."
Iranian officials have insisted their nuclear program be addressed solely through the IAEA and not at the United Nations Security Council. But the IAEA chief left no distance between the agency's position and the council's requirement that Iran suspend uranium enrichment. Indeed, ElBaradei was emphatic in saying that because Iran ran a hidden nuclear program for almost two decades, it needs to assure the international community about "future intentions" for its nuclear program. And then he came as close as he could come to writing a policy prescription.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate called for "comprehensive negotiations that would lead to a durable solution." Such a solution would require that Iran resolve all doubts about its nuclear program. The recompense would be "a regional security arrangement" and a "normal trade relationship between Iran and the international community."
This is advice that should be heeded in Washington and in Tehran. And this week there were tantalizing signs that both sides might be edging toward just such a negotiation. Shortly after the five permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany agreed on a third round of UN sanctions on Iran, the European Union foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, said those same powers were discussing incentives that might attract Iran into just the sort of comprehensive negotiation ElBaradei invoked.
If such an avenue is to be followed, the pragmatists in Tehran and Washington will have to prevail over the extremists and hotheads. But it would be the soundest solution for the world's most perilous security threat.
