Iran's Bomb in the Context of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Possibility of a Nuclear Race in the Middle East.

A debate with Dr. Emily Landau, Senior Research Associate and Director of the Arms Control Program at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv, Israel

Sunday, 26 January 2014, 7:30 p.m.

Hilton Hotel Gendarmenmarkt

Mohrenstraße 30, 10117 Berlin

Event in English language

Click here for Video of Lecture

At the end of November 2013, after a struggle of over a decade, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany and the European Union reached an interim deal with Iran regarding the conflict  over  its nuclear program. The Geneva Joint Plan of Action (JPA) was well-received only by parts of the media. At the same time voices were heard that the agreement might be a bad deal, and could have adverse implications for the process leading to a comprehensive deal with Iran. Specific concerns focus on continued Iranian R&D on advance centrifuge technologies and the fear that too much sanctions relief – the only leverage that the international community has in this very difficult negotiation – will come before Iran has agreed to back away from its military aspirations. This could actually turn the Iranian nuclear option into a reality, which might also spur a nuclear arms race in the Middle East that would also affect Europe.

Does the Geneva accord have negative implications for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), with consequences for global security frameworks that are as of yet unforeseen? How might other countries in the Near and the Middle East, especially Turkey and Saudi Arabia, respond to Iran's nuclear weapons program?

What conclusions might be drawn from North Korea's acquisition of nuclear weapons (despite international efforts to stop it) with regard to the latest developments in the nuclear conflict with Iran? And what kind of security measures might be at hand to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction in the region?

We are pleased to invite you to discuss these and other issues with our guest Dr. Emily Landau from the Institute for National Security Studies (Israel).

Emily Landau is a senior research associate at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv, where she is also director of the Arms Control and Regional Security Project. She has published and lectured extensively on nuclear proliferation, arms control efforts, and regional security in the Middle East; international efforts to confront the proliferation challenges posed by Iran and North Korea; and developments in global nuclear arms control thinking in the post-Cold War world. Her current research focuses on regional dynamics and processes in the Middle East, and recent trends in global nuclear arms control thinking, including regarding the nuclear ambitions of determined proliferators.

She is author of Arms Control in the Middle East: Cooperative Security Dialogue and Regional Constraints (Sussex Academic Press, 2006). Among her recent publications are The Obama Vision and Nuclear Disarmament (co-editor, INSS, 2011) and Decade of Diplomacy: Negotiations with Iran and North Korea and the Future of Nuclear Non-Proliferation (author, INSS, 2012).

Dr. Landau currently teaches at the International School of the University of Haifa, at Tel Aviv University and in the Lauder School of Government at IDC, Herzliya. She is a frequent commentator to Israeli and leading international media on her topics of expertise, and an active participant in a range of Track II initiatives dealing with arms control and regional security in the Middle East.

A B'EMET event - Berlin Middle East Talks - the debate series of MFFB and Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, Germany (SPME).