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08 April 2011 By Tariq Alhomayed The danger of Iran in our region is not in any way
difficult to prove. In order to see evidence of
hostility, and the danger, we only need to look at
what Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said
yesterday with regards to the Gulf Cooperation Council
(GCC) states, specifically Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.
However, let us reflect on some of what Ahmadinejad
said yesterday in more detail, in order to show how
the Iranian threat is extremely alarming both for the
region and the wider world, and not only in terms of
political issues. In a press conference held in Tehran, Ahmadinejad
said that his country's nuclear plants were safer than
their counterparts in Japan, and that the events that
occurred in Japan's Fukushima nuclear facility would
never happen in Iran. Ahmadinejad justified this
viewpoint by saying: "the technology used in the
nuclear plants in Fukushima dates back fifty years,
but the technology used in Iranian nuclear plants is
completely up to date"! Could anything be more absurd?
The Iranian President says that Iran is more
advanced than Japan, in terms of the technology used
in its nuclear plants, yet everyone saw how Iran stood
helpless when faced with the "Stuxnet" worm virus – a
destructive computer program which is believed to have
disabled up to five Iranian centrifuges, and helped to
thwart Tehran in its quest to produce Iran's first
nuclear weapons. We saw the Iranians at the time form
a crisis committee, incorporating officials from all
concerned departments in order to combat the worm! This is not all of course, during the same press
conference Ahmadinejad added: "as far as I know, the
(Fukushima) incident was not caused by the earthquake,
but by the tsunami waves. We do not have tsunamis in
the Gulf, and therefore there is no cause for
concern"! Is this a rational argument, considering we
have seen a hurricane strike the Sultanate of Oman,
which is part of the Arab Gulf, and is situated
opposite Iran in terms of its coastal borders?
However, above all that, Tehran does not have the
required capacity to deal with an earthquake, for we
saw how the whole world rallied to help Iran after the
devastating earthquake which struck the country two
years ago. Therefore, Ahmadinejad's comments about what
happened in Japan alone are evidence of the danger of
Iran becoming a nuclear state. It is a danger for the
region, a danger for the Iranians themselves, and a
danger even to the global economy and its stability.
The threat of Iran relates not only to what it does in
the Arab world, from Iraq to Bahrain, Lebanon, Yemen
and elsewhere, but the dangers also lies in its way of
thinking, coupled with the weakness of its
capabilities. Tehran insists on possessing nuclear
energy, which it is fundamentally not equipped to deal
with in an emergency, and this matter is more serious
than the intentions of Iran itself. Thus, the Iranian threat stems not only from its
interference in the countries of the region, or its
promotion of sectarianism. Indeed, the Iranian threat
lies in the weakness of its potential combined with
the size of its delusion, and the gravity of its
intent. Iran doesn't only threaten the Middle East,
but it threatens the whole world as I said above.
Ahmadinejad's comments on Japan alone are evidence of
the size of the danger posed by the Tehran regime, and
its way of thinking.
Tariq Alhomayed is the Editor-in-Chief of Asharq Al-Awsat, the youngest
person to be appointed that position. He holds a BA degree in Media studies from
King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah, and has also completed his Introductory
courses towards a Master's degree from George Washington University in
Washington D.C. He is based in London. |