The Wall Street Journal-20080119-Politics - Economics- Burns-s Exit Complicates Nuclear Negotiations
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Politics & Economics: Burns's Exit Complicates Nuclear Negotiations
WASHINGTON -- The surprise resignation of the Bush administration's point man on Iran and India, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns, injects more uncertainty into U.S. efforts to contain the spread of nuclear technologies.
In the coming weeks, Washington aims to cinch key objectives concerning both countries: a new round of United Nations sanctions against Tehran and a nuclear-cooperation pact with New Delhi. But those policy initiatives, particularly in the case of Iran, haven't generated international consensus, and U.S. and European diplomats say both initiatives, which were spearheaded by Mr. Burns, the undersecretary for political affairs, might ultimately falter.
President Bush named William Burns, U.S. ambassador to Moscow, to succeed Nicholas Burns beginning in April. (The two men aren't related.)
Nicholas Burns, who plans to leave the department at the end of March, is a career diplomat. Since Ms. Rice took the reins of the State Department in early 2005, Mr. Burns, 51 years old, has become one of her must trusted advisers.
In recent months, there have been increasing signs that Washington's strategies toward Iran and India aren't working. Mr. Burns has been particularly focused in recent weeks on pushing the U.N. Security Council to pass a third round of economic sanctions against Tehran aimed at forcing it to suspend its nuclear-development work. But many European and U.S. diplomats said it is increasingly unlikely that sanctions will be approved with any real bite -- especially since a recent U.S. intelligence report found that Tehran had scrapped its nuclear-weapons program in 2003.
The India issue has also tested Mr. Burns in recent months. Washington and New Delhi have agreed to allow the U.S. to share nuclear fuel and technologies with India in return for greater oversight of India's nuclear programs by the International Atomic Energy Agency and other international bodies. But communist and socialist parties, wary of a close alignment with Washington, are threatening to topple Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government if he ratifies the agreement.
New Delhi is negotiating a new safeguards agreement with the IAEA, which, once passed, could allow Mr. Singh to formally sign the nuclear pact in the next two to three months. But U.S. officials said they remain uncertain as to whether Mr. Singh will challenge his government's political partners.
