WORLD ROUNDUPAs Iran Picks a President, a Nuclear Shift | Trump’s Return Would Transform Europe | Pakistan Unveils New Counterterrorism Plan, and more
· As Iran Picks a President, a Nuclear Shift: Open Talk About Building the Bomb
Iran has expanded its most sensitive nuclear production site in recent weeks. And for the first time, some leaders are dropping their insistence that the nuclear program is for peaceful purposes
· Ecuador Ends Visa-Free Entry for Chinese Nationals
Over the past few years, Ecuador has been the starting point for many of the thousands of Chinese citizens who have decided to try to reach the southern U.S. border
· Vietnam Confronts China with Island Building in South China Sea
Vietnam has ramped up its building of islands in the disputed South China Sea to bolster its position in relation to China
· Trump Eyes Bigger Trade War in Second Term
The former president’s past tariffs raised prices for consumers and businesses, economists say. His next plan could tax 10 times as many imports
· Trump’s Return Would Transform Europe
Without Washington’s embrace, the continent could revert to an anarchic and illiberal past
· Pakistan Unveils New Counterterrorism Plan
The timing of the announcement suggests that China could play a role in the strategy
As Iran Picks a President, a Nuclear Shift: Open Talk About Building the Bomb (David E. Sanger and Farnaz Fassihi, New York Times)
In 2015, President Donald J. Trump abandoned the 2015 nuclear accord with Iran. He argued that the re-imposition of sanctions would break the Iranian regime and predicted that the country would beg for a new deal.
Trump was wrong on both counts. The Iranians slowly began reactivating the plants. They removed some cameras and barred some inspectors. And they began enriching to 60 percent purity — putting the country far closer to bomb fuel than when the U.S, began the secret negotiations for the accord 11 years ago.
With the rest of the world distracted by wars in Gaza and Ukraine, Iran has moved closer than ever to the ability to produce several nuclear weapons, dramatically bolstering the speed at which it can produce nuclear fuel in recent weeks inside a facility buried so deep that it is all but impervious to bunker-busting bombs.
The sharp technological upgrade goes hand in hand with another worrisome change: For the first time, some members of Iran’s ruling elite are dropping the country’s decades-old insistence that its nuclear program is entirely for peaceful purposes. Instead, they are publicly beginning to embrace the logic of possessing the bomb, arguing that recent missile exchanges with Israel underscore the need for a far more powerful deterrent.
In interviews with a dozen American, European, Iranian and Israeli officials and with outside experts, the cumulative effect of this surge appears clear: Iran has cemented its role as a “threshold” nuclear state, walking right up to the line of building a weapon without stepping over it.
American officials are divided on the question of whether Iran is preparing to take that final step or whether it will determine it is safer — and more effective — to stay just on the cusp of a weapons capability, without openly abandoning the last of its commitments as a signer of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
