Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action

Lord Lamont of Lerwick Excerpts

Thursday 7th April 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Lamont of Lerwick (Con)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests as chairman of the British Iranian Chamber of Commerce and the Government’s trade envoy to Iran.

From the start, I acknowledge absolutely some of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Polak, about the concern that people have about Iran’s role in the region, its human rights record and the threat to Israel. I acknowledge those concerns; none the less, I wish to argue in favour of the JCPOA.

One of the criticisms is that it covered only the nuclear issue and did not cover Iran’s role in the region or its support for organisations such as Hezbollah. Despite the powerful case made by my noble friend Lord Polak, I think it would be a big mistake to reject a new JCPOA on those grounds alone. An effective nuclear agreement is well worth having on its own. It was extremely complicated and difficult to negotiate as it was, without getting wound up in other issues. Nuclear proliferation is not a trivial matter. We have seen with Russia how the West’s ability to respond is constrained by the fact that Russia is a nuclear power. Imagine how difficult it would be to deal with Iran and the Middle East if Iran was a nuclear power. Iran feels that it was cheated over the JCPOA. It kept to the agreement but President Trump, for no good reason, decided to tear it up. Iran seeks the restoration of what was agreed before, but not implemented, and it will not accept the sudden imposition of extra conditions.

My noble friend Lord Polak asked how sanctions can be lifted when we are maintaining sanctions against Russia. The sanctions that are being lifted—if I am wrong about this the Minister will correct me—precisely apply to the nuclear programme. They were applied to deter Iran from its nuclear programme. If Iran comes into compliance with the JCPOA, we surely want to build on a relationship with it and discuss other issues. It seems only reasonable that we should lift the sanctions that specifically applied in relation to the nuclear programme. There are lots of other sanctions that will remain. The proscription of the IRGC as a terrorist organisation is a bit of a side-track because there are so many sanctions on it already.

If the JCPOA were implemented, what would it mean? It would mean that advanced centrifuges would be demolished, stockpiles of uranium would be diminished and shipped out of the country and there would be even more inspections than there are now. Imagine the situation in which the JCPOA is not concluded. Iran will continue enriching, perhaps to weapons grade. It may chuck out the inspectors. It might withdraw from the non-proliferation treaty; we forget that Iran is a signatory to that. This would leave America with an appalling dilemma of whether to ignore what Iran was doing or to take military action against it.

My noble friend Lord Polak is right that there is a need to address the regional issues in the Gulf, but that needs to be done on a multilateral basis. He referred to missiles. We cannot call for the ending of Iran’s missiles without looking at those of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Israel—which has the Jericho missile, which has a much longer range than any other country’s missiles. If we are to move on to discussing these issues, that needs to be built on the confidence that will have come from implementing the JCPOA. Iran has its own security concerns. They need to be recognised and taken into account in any multilateral negotiations. Above all, Iran’s biggest fear is invasion. It suffered an invasion from Iraq, its neighbouring Arab country, and lost more lives than we lost in the Second World War.

Henry Kissinger said that Iran has to decide whether it is a cause or a country. That is right, but he went on to say that, in principle, the US should be open and prepared to reach a geopolitical understanding and develop a compatible system of regional order with Iran. It has to take into account Iran’s concerns, but I agree that eventually there should be talks and negotiations on these wider issues.