Eurasia Security Watch: No. 176

SYRIA, NUKES, AND NORTH KOREA
Washington and Jerusalem spent seven months tight-lipped over last September’s unexpected Israeli air raid in Syria – until now, that is. That silence was finally broken when the Bush administration confirmed, through a detailed video presentation to Congress, long-held suspicions that the Israelis had indeed destroyed a covert Syrian nuclear facility in an air raid last year. Within the presentation came confirmation of a second lingering suspicion: that North Korea indeed had had a substantial hand in the facility, since its construction was nearly identical to one of Pyongyang’s own models.

The DPRK’s trail, however, did not stop there. The administration’s video presentation included an incriminating photo of the manager of North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear plant standing next to the director of Syria’s nuclear agency. Later, news reports revealed that as many as ten North Koreans were among those killed by the IAF airstrike in September. Meanwhile, Pyongyang’s interest in the whole operation, according to an administration official cited by the New York Times, was simple: “Cash.” (New York Times, April 25, 2008; Jerusalem Post, April 28, 2008.)

IN IRAQ, TWO STEPS FORWARD
The process of political reconciliation in Iraq is maintaining its forward, albeit uneven, pace with the announcement that the country’s largest Sunni political bloc, Tawafiq, will return to the government it has boycotted for the past year. The decision by Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki to launch a military crackdown on the militia of fellow Shi’ite Muqtada al-Sadr in the city of Basra last month seems to have galvanized Sunnis behind a prime minister they previously suspected of sectarian leanings. Recent laws granting amnesty to former fighters and releasing thousands of Sunnis from Iraqi jails has also helped the Prime Minister’s cause, concedes Adnan al-Duleimi, head of Tawafiq. (New York Times, April 24, 2008)

PIPELINES AND POLITICS IN CENTRAL ASIA
With the signing of a lucrative natural gas deal between Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan, Turkmenistan has made progress casting off the decades of isolation imposed by its deceased dictator, “Turkmenbashi.” The resource-rich Central Asian state, with some 8 trillion cubic meters of gas reserves, is slated to supply 3.2 billion cubic feet of that gas, per day, through the proposed pipeline. The U.S., a major backer of the project, has pushed for India’s inclusion in the four-country “TAPI” agreement, viewing the deal as a rival to the long-delayed Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline, which threatens to undermine Washington’s efforts to isolate Tehran. (Karachi Dawn, April 25, 2008)

PKK THREATENS WASHINGTON
Over the past year, the United States has abandoned its ambiguity toward the “Kurdish issue” in northern Iraq and sided decisively with Turkey, its NATO ally, against Ankara’s Kurdish nemesis, the PKK. Washington has since provided intelligence (and even, reportedly) direct military support to a Turkish military desperately working to weed the terrorist group out of Iraq’s Qandil Mountains. Now PJAK, the Iranian wing of the PKK, is vowing to “punish” the United States for its efforts, including employing terrorist tactics against America and its allies inside Iraq. Hinted Peritan Derseem, a senior PJAK official, “individual combatants might launch suicide operations inside Iraq and Turkey, and even against American interests.” (Kuwait Arab Times, May 6, 2008)

A EUROPE-AFGHAN RAILROAD IN THE WORKS?
Using existing, Soviet-era high-capacity railway tracks, NATO is looking to construct a land bridge through Central Asia to Afghanistan with which to supply Coalition forces now battling the Taliban. The train route – through Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan – holds the potential to dramatically reduce the cost of supplying the 50,000 Coalition troops now in-country, dropping the per-ton cost of transportation from roughly $14,000 to between $300 and $500. To that effect, NATO has held a series of negotiations with the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which is headed by Russia. As the benefits to the CSTO become clearer (including income from transit fees and raised leverage over NATO) and the threats from the Coalition’s failure clearer still (rising Islamic militancy and a ballooning drug trade), some analysts sense the security bloc may be warming to the proposed “Europe-Afghan railway.” (Eurasianet.org, May 5, 2008)