Saying ‘No’ to Iranian Oil Only to Please America

Prakash Karat

“An assessment of whether India is fully and actively participating in United States and international efforts to dissuade, isolate, and, if necessary, sanction and contain Iran for its efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction, including a nuclear weapons capability (including the capability to enrich uranium or reprocess nuclear fuel), and the means to deliver weapons of mass destruction, including a description of the specific measures that India has taken in this regard”

(Section 104g(2)E(i) of the Henry Hyde Act of 2006 regarding the Annual Implementation & Compliance Report to be submitted by the US president to the congress)

    India has been getting 12 per cent of its crude oil imports from Iran. This amounts to around 400,000 barrels per day. These supplies may stop in August since India has not made payments for oil shipments for the past few months and around $ 5 billion are due to the Iranian oil companies.

    Iran has indicated that it may be forced to stop supplying oil if no arrangements for the payments are made. How has such a situation come about? The Indian government has succumbed to US pressures to curtail its trading and commercial links with Iran. In July 2010, the United States imposed wide ranging sanctions against Iran aimed at scuttling its oil and gas industries. These sanctions went much beyond the June 2010 UN Security Council sanctions which were adopted through Resolution 1929. The United States along with the European Union has placed prohibitive restrictions on banking and foreign exchange transactions with Iranian banks and financial institutions.

SUCCUMBING TO US PRESSURE

    India is abiding by the illegal and unilateral sanctions imposed by the US and the European Union and not just the UN Security Council sanctions. Under pressure of these sanctions, the Reserve Bank of India in December 2010 disallowed all trade related payments with Iran through the Asian Clearing Union (ACU). This mechanism was being used for a long time to make payments to Iran. Once this was stopped, the problem arose of how to make the payments. Subsequently, the Iranian and Indian governments agreed that payments for the oil imports can be made through an account with the German Central Bank, the Bundesbank. The Bundesbank would transfer the money to the European-Iranian Trade Bank (EIH) based in Hamburg. This bank was not subject to sanctions.

    However, after a few weeks under pressure from the United States and Israel, the German government stopped these transactions. Since then, the Iranians have continued to supply oil but India has not made payments.

    Iran has been the second largest supplier of crude oil to India after Saudi Arabia. The UPA government is now engaged in finding out how to arrange for alternative sources of oil imports rather than ensuring that oil trade with Iran continues. The United States is asking India to source its oil imports from Saudi Arabia as against Iran.

HYDE ACT DIKTAT

    Ever since the Indo-US nuclear deal, the traditional relations with Iran have been endangered. The United States had made it clear that the nuclear deal entails acceptance of India making its foreign policy congruent to that of the United States. Further the Hyde Act which allowed nuclear cooperation with India clearly states that the president of the United States should annually provide an assessment report to the US congress on how India is cooperating with the United States to sanction and isolate Iran. The Left parties had strongly opposed this infringement of national sovereignty and the abridgement of India’s foreign policy to suit US interests.

    Within weeks of the Indo-US joint statement signed by President Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in July 2005, India voted for a resolution against Iran in the IAEA in September while the Non-Aligned group of countries either voted against or abstained. This vote against Iran was repeated in February 2006. These facts were appreciatively mentioned by the US government when the Hyde Act was discussed in the US Congress.

GAS PIPELINE SCUTTLED

    The next target was the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline. India was warned publicly many times by America not to proceed with the gas pipeline project with Iran. India has complied, though it still formally does not admit to having abandoned the project. After waiting for more than two years, Iran and Pakistan decided to go ahead with the project. Iran is now laying the pipeline up to the Pakistan border. India decided to go for the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline project at the behest of the United States. The earlier 25-year agreement to buy liquefied natural gas from Iran fell through after India voted in the IAEA. Step by step, the Indian commercial projects in Iran are being abandoned. Reliance has stopped gasoline exports to Iran worth $ 280 million due to the US threat.

    Finally, the major component of trade with Iran which is the oil imports is now on the verge of being scuttled.

APPEAL TO US

    Incidentally, a curious news report appeared during the visit of the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton to India, last week. A US official accompanying Clinton during her stay in Chennai was quoted as saying that a solution to the seven month long payments issue between India and Iran on the crude oil imports “is in sight”. He said that the US treasury is working with Indian officials on the issue. This reveals that India has approached Big Brother to find a way out. The responsibility for sabotaging oil supplies from Iran lies with the United States. Oil supply as such has not been brought under any sanctions whatsoever. Yet India, instead of standing up to such illegal measures is beseeching the US for permission to import oil from Iran.

    The import of oil and gas from Iran which is beneficial for India is being sacrificed at the altar of the United States’ goal to isolate Iran and to establish its hegemony over West Asia. It is shocking that the Indian government goes along with the United States’ project which is against its own national interests while close allies of the United States like Japan and South Korea continue to import oil from Iran and have worked out arrangements to make payments despite the US and EU sanctions. Turkey is another country in the NATO which has entered into new contracts in the oil sector with Iran. China has stepped up its oil imports from Iran. Its imports in June registered an increase of 53.2 per cent year on year.

BOUND BY NUCLEAR DEAL

    Bound by the iron fetters of the nuclear deal, which is the centre-piece of the strategic alliance with the United States, the Manmohan Singh government is doing everything to ensure that as per the Hyde Act adopted by the US congress, India is seen to be fully cooperating with the US to isolate and sanction Iran for developing nuclear technology that includes “the capability to enrich uranium or reprocess nuclear fuel”. As per the Hyde Act, the US president has to give his annual certification to the US congress that “India is fully and actively participating in United States and international efforts to dissuade, isolate and if necessary, sanction and contain Iran”.

    India can get its crude oil requirements from other countries. But what cannot be retrieved by this craven and servile attitude to the United States is the country’s self respect and damage to national interests.

Left Launches Campaign Against UPA

Left Launces Nation-wide Campaign Against Manmohan-led UPA Government from Today

New Delhi, July 14, 2008: Launching a nationwide campaign against the UPA government clubbing the nuclear deal and price rise, the Left parties on Monday accused the ruling combine of “failing” to address the problems of the ‘aam aadmi’ due to its “obsession” with the agreement.

The Left parties said they could not agree to the country becoming a “junior partner” to the US and withdrew support to the government as it moved ahead with the deal when the country was faced with price rise and inflation.

Attacking the government for moving ahead with the deal when in “minority”, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat took a potshot at the ruling party, saying ‘Congress ka Haath, America ke Saath’.

Karat said the Left will work to defeat the government on the trust vote and expects that more parties will join them in the struggle against the deal.

“The popularity of President George W Bush in US is 20-25 per cent. He is the President of a minority. We have a Prime Minister who is heading a minority government. A minority President and minority Prime Minister are trying to hook this country to US hegemony,” the senior CPI(M) leader said.

Claiming that the government and Congress want to fulfil their promise to Bush, he said, “it is their primary aim and not tackling inflation or price rise…The deal and price rise were the issues on which we withdrew support.“

“We were tolerating them (UPA) because we did not want BJP and other communal forces to come to power,” he said.

In an apparent reference to Congress tie-up with Samajwadi Party, Karat said there is a party which is now supporting the government, but shared the dais with the Left sometime ago in opposing the deal.

Attacking the UPA for its “refusal” to take appropriate steps to tackle inflation and price rise, Karat claimed that the nuclear deal would be used by the US to “pressurise” the country to open up for MNCs, which would have a “detrimental” effect on India.

“This government took a shameful step when it voted against Iran (in the IAEA),” Karat said noting that the country would have to surrender its foreign policy and toe American line on international affairs if it went ahead with the deal.

On voting against the government along with BJP during the trust vote, Karat said that Congress has no right to point fingers at the Left saying it [congress] had “conspired” to topple secular governments of V P Singh, H D Deve Gowda and I K Gujral in the 1990s and voted along with the saffron party.

CPI general secretary A B Bardhan in his address, said, “We have never said that we are voting with BJP. We have talked to other parties, not to BJP. If the other parties want to talk to us, we cannot push them out. We are voting against the UPA because of its policies.”

“If the BJP wants to vote against (UPA), they have a right to do so. Those who voted along with BJP are now teaching us. We will continue to fight communal forces,” he said.

He wondered whether India was acting under “US pressure” not to go ahead with the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline. The campaign has been launched to explain to the people the reasons for withdrawing support besides “explaining the UPA’s pro-American and anti-people policies which are resulting in price rise and other problems”.

In the course of the campaign, the Left will also place before the people alternatives to meet energy requirements for development and for putting an end to economic policies which are “harmful to farmers, rural poor, workers and other sections”.

Plans are afoot to field top leaders, who will criss-cross the country, to attend public meetings and rallies organised in major towns in all states.

Meetings will be organised at all major centres, as well as in towns and villages. Pamphlets and handbills will be published.

The campaign plank will be anti-imperialism and defence of the country’s sovereignty, anti-communalism, secular domestic polity and protection and improvement of common people’s livelihood against attacks of big business, a senior Left leader said.