REP. HENRY HYDE (R-IL): The committee will be in order. The Committee on International Relations meets today on the United States policy toward Iran, next steps. Unlike our hearing last week on the Middle East peace process, this topic is one with respect to which good news is quite scarce. Except for the ongoing conflict in Iraq, the difficulties involved in our relationship with Iran are overshadowed, if at all, only by the acute problem caused by North Korea's apparent nuclear breakout.

The administration is currently reviewing its Iran policy, and it's reported is both reevaluating the conclusions of the intelligence community and updating its war planning. The broad outlines of our policy are likely to be unchanged. It is difficult to imagine how the United States can reconcile itself to this regime possessing nuclear weapons.

Either the regime will have to go -- that is, it will have to be replaced -- or its nature changed fundamentally, or the nuclear weapons will have to go. That is, nuclear weapons cannot come into Iran's possession with the regime unchanged. Courses of action designed to bring about either of these options are enormously complicated.

The United States has a wide range of policies in place designed to slow Iran's efforts to obtain nuclear weaponry and the means to deliver them. They have to some degree been effective, but time marches on and so does the Iranian program, however handicapped it has been.

The President has noted that we are relying upon others, because we've sanctioned ourselves out of influence with Iran, to send a message. We don't have much leverage with the Iranians right now, and we expect them to listen to those voices. Thus, we support the efforts of the so-called EU-3 in their negotiations with Iran.

On the other hand, we have justifiably been unwilling to commit to provide tremendous incentives for Iran in exchange for a return to responsible behavior on the nuclear front. Iran should expect no more than Libya received in return for its decision to abandon weapons of mass destruction. In fact, given Iran's record of active, recent gross misbehavior, Iran merits greater scrutiny and a tougher deal.

What is critical is that we and our European friends must arrive at a very clear understanding of the consequences for Iran if and when these negotiations end in failure, or if Iran once again fails to live up to its promises. These consequences have to be real and effective. They can't consist of a referral to a United Nations Security Council, which is sure to be deadlocked over the imposition of new multilateral sanctions.

We cannot ignore the depredations of this regime even if it stays below some nuclear threshold. Iran cannot expect a free pass from the civilized world. The problems we have with Iran's domestic and foreign misbehavior go to the very nature of the regime. The people of Iran, if they had a real say in its affairs, would presumably not wish to meddle abroad and be known for supporting terrorism.

Last week we heard testimony about the outrageous effects of Iranian-backed terrorist groups to disrupt the hard-won, tenuous cease-fire between Israel and the Palestinians. For those groups, and for their supporters in Teheran, it is a case of the worse, the better. Cooler heads may prevail for now, but unless Iran withdraws its support from Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, further violence on a large scale is inevitable.

As we were warned, these entities are not above targeting new Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Any hope we might have had from the reformist spirit which swept in President Khatami has been crushed, just as that spirit has been crushed.

The setbacks of the reform movement cannot mask the fact that the Iranian people want to be accepted in the world, and want the benefits that such acceptance brings, the better life for themselves that comes with unimpeded contact, investment, and trade.

Even more importantly, they want to live in a country that is capable of being accepted and deserves acceptance -- and that means an end to the repression, torture, and murder of innocent Iranians, which are perhaps the worst features of the regime, and the establishment of a system in which the people's will, and not an unelected cleric's, is supreme.

We need to find a way to facilitate an outlet for what I am confident is a desire for change within the Iranian people, but to do so in a way that does not offend them and become self-defeating, but is at the same time effective. This is similar to our task throughout the Middle East, but our task is particularly urgent in the case of Iran. There is no time to lose.

I now am pleased to recognize our distinguished colleague, Mr. Lantos, the ranking democratic member, for such opening comments as he may choose to make.

 

OPENING STATEMENT OF

TOM LANTOS
A Representative from California, and
Ranking Member, House International Relations Committee

 

LANTOS (D-CA): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Let me commend you for calling this important hearing. Mr. Chairman, Iran is on the verge of producing nuclear weapons. Unless the world intervenes urgently and effectively, Tehran will become the first active state sponsor of terrorism to acquire the ultimate weapon of terror.

For many years, Iran exploited a loophole in the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty and brazenly deceived the International Atomic Energy Agency and the entire international community about its nuclear plans. But despite Tehran's unstinting efforts to hide, to disguise, to eliminate and to manufacture evidence, the IAEA discovered that Tehran has acquired designs, equipment and facilities to produce nuclear weapons-grade uranium and plutonium, and has experimented with trigger materials for a nuclear bomb.

In fact, Mr. Chairman, since Iran has been mucking around in the same black market that sold Libya actual bomb blueprints, it is more than reasonable to be concerned that Tehran already may have an operable nuclear bomb design. According to our State Department, Iran is the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism, a dubious distinction Iran has held for years.

It funds numerous terrorist groups that murder and maim the innocent, including United States citizens. It's leading tool of terror, Hezbollah, has emerged as one of the most lethal forces in the West Bank and Gaza, to the protests of Palestinian and Israeli security officials alike.

Imagine, then, this terrorist state armed with nuclear arms, a nightmare for certain, somewhat like imagining Hezbollah or Hamas with nuclear arms. To whom would Iran provide the ultimate weapon or the recipe to further its radical aims.

Even if it did not put these destructive materials up for sale, a nuclear-armed Iran would terrorize and destabilize the entire Middle East. Some countries who are already threatened by Iran, such as Saudi Arabia, could rapidly pursue their own nuclear option. I feel Egypt, which has already been criticized by the IAEA for failure to declare nuclear facilities, might pursue nuclear arms as well.

All the non-nuclear and pre-nuclear states in the region would be cowed by Iran's demands, since, as we know, profession of nuclear arms is the ultimate in diplomatic leverage. And we would not be alone in having to pay obeisance to nuclear Iran. The United States, as well, would be significantly constrained in its regional policies. And if with Iran there to use the weapons, who with certainty could say that they would not?

Elements of Iran's senior leadership clearly showed the martyr complex that inspires suicide bombers in Iraq, Israel and elsewhere. Four years ago, in one of the most chilling and least-publicized statements of the 21st century, former Iranian president and current senior official, Ali Akbar Rafsanjani, issued an unprovoked warning that Iran would come out better than Israel in a nuclear exchange.

The ayatollahs of terror must not be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons. We must keep the pressure on Iran, as we did on Libya, to step off this most dangerous path.

Mr. Chairman, you will recall that you and I cosponsored the resolution last year condemning Iran's nuclear program and calling on our friends and allies to refrain from investing in Iran's oil and gas fields. Our legislation also set a new standard for allowing states access to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, but such states at a minimum might be violators of the nuclear proliferation treaty.

Iran, through repeated and flagrant violations of its international obligations, has forfeited any moral and ethical right to technology that can be misused to produce weapons-grade uranium and plutonium. Our resolution passed the House overwhelmingly, Mr. Chairman, and the Senate soon followed suit.

This session, I am cosponsoring legislation with the chairwoman of the Middle East and Central Asia Subcommittee, my good friend from Florida, Ms. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, which would clearly implement many of the elements of that resolution.

Mr. Chairman, in my view, it is well past time to isolate Iran economically and diplomatically. European and Asian governments must immediately suspend or terminate their existing Iranian investments if we are to have any hope whatsoever of convincing Iran to end its development of nuclear weapons permanently.

I am particularly concerned with recent developments in terms of China-Iran agreements in the energy field. For its part, the U.N. Security Council should require U.N. members to reject all investment in non-humanitarian trade with Iran until Tehran has verifiably given up its nuclear fuel and weapon material production capabilities. And it should further declare that Iran has forfeited all rights under the NPT to possess nuclear material production facilities of any kind.

Mr. Chairman, we simply cannot allow Iran to make a mockery of the international community's arms control regime. If we do, that regime itself will be a mockery. We must keep the pressure on our friends and allies who mistakenly believe that continued trade and investment will lure the ayatollahs away from their longstanding and relentless quest for nuclear weapons.

So those are the problems, Mr. Chairman. I'm looking forward to hearing from our witnesses today how we can solve this serious crisis in the manner most consistent with our national interests. I hope they might advise us as to how we can avail ourselves of diplomatic, economic and strategic opportunities to avert the imminent danger, the nightmare, that would irrevocably change our world for the worse.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

(UNKNOWN): Mr. Chairman?

I would seek recognition to make an opening statement, especially because the nature of these hearing is so relevant to two of the subcommittees of the full committee?

HYDE: Well, I'm confronted with the problem of opening up for opening statements for everyone if I do for you, and then we will not get to our witnesses. There'll be a vote at 11:30 -- I'm advised there will be a vote at 11:30, so I would solicit the gentleman's cooperation to put his statement in the record with other opening statements.

(UNKNOWN): I, of course, yield to the chairman. If he would allow me a minute, I'd take it, and if not, then ...

HYDE: You want a minute?

(UNKNOWN): I can do it in a minute.

HYDE: The gentleman is recognized for a minute.

(UNKNOWN): And only a minute.

Recently, a particular lobbying organization was accused of stealing a memorandum outlining our policy toward Iran. We know this to be false because we have no policy toward Iran. The prior administration had no policy either, but this is less excusable now that 9/11 has occurred and we know that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

We have had both administrations ignore the Iran Libya Sanctions Act and allow $33 billion and more to be invested in Iran, thus demonstrating to its people that they can have nuclear weapons and foreign investment. We have been wiling to send our soldiers to their deaths to deal with a nuclear weapons problem that was tiny compared to Iran. We are unwilling to inconvenience the world's corporations.

HYDE: I thank the gentleman. I will announce that anyone else who has an opening statement may put it in the record at this point in the record without objection.

Well, I welcome our witnesses to the committee this morning. First is Ambassador Palmer, who represented the United States in Hungary as the Communist system there was collapsing. His current work with the committee on the present danger advocates both opening diplomatic relations with Iran and stepping up anti-regime efforts, including advocacy of a war crimes tribunal directed against the Iranian regime's clerical leader.

Our second witness is Dr. Gary Sick, who will participate via videoconference from New York. He served on the National Security Council staff under Presidents Ford, Carter and Reagan. He was the principal White House aide for Iran during the Iranian revolution on the hostage crisis, and authored two books on U.S.-Iranian relations. He earned his Ph.D. in political science from Columbia, where he is a senior research scholar-adjunct professor of international affairs and former director of the Middle East Institute.

Our final witness is Henry B. Sokolski, who was the executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, a Washington-based nonprofit organization founded in 1994 to promote a better understanding of the strategic weapons proliferation issues for academics, policymakers and the media.

Thank all of you for agreeing to participate today. Your testimony will be inserted into the record in full. If you could present a five-minute, give or take, summary of your statement.

Ambassador Palmer, please proceed.

 

STATEMENT OF

AMBASSADOR MARK PALMER
Committee on the Present Danger

 

PALMER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I represent the Committee on the Present Danger, which has been revived by Secretary Schultz, Jim Woolsey and also under the leadership of Senators Lieberman and Kyl.

We chose as our first policy paper Iran, which I am presenting today, because there is a consensus in the Committee on the Present Danger that Iran presents the most fundamental threat to our interests and to stability in the region. Most specifically, we believe that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei personally represents that threat and that he personally is determined to develop nuclear weapons.

On the other hand, the committee believes that Iran's people are America's allies and that they want to free themselves from Khamenei's oppression, and they want Iran to join the community of prosperous democratic states. The centrality of the threat that Iran and Khamenei represent is very clear.

Both you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Lantos, have stated it, it is the number one state sponsor of terrorism. And in many other areas in addition to their development of weapons of mass destruction, they represent a very profound threat. But the opportunity we face is equally clear. The Iranian people in their elections of 1997, in 2001, and in repeated public demonstrations since then, including just in the last few weeks' demonstrations, show that the Iranian people want what all the people of the region want, which is freedom. And, therefore, we believe that the geostrategic situation, both within Iran and within the region is increasingly in the favor of freedom.

Assuming that democracy proceeds in Afghanistan in Iraq, we've now had elections in Palestine, we believe that both the geopolitical situation and the philosophical mood in the region is very much in favor, now, of democratization. We also believe, based on our experience -- you mentioned, Mr. Chairman, that I was our ambassador in Hungary during the period from 1986 to 1990 when the Communists were ousted -- we believe that opening up dictatorships and allying ourselves with the people of these countries is fundamental to the process of change.

We've seen most recently in Ukraine and Georgia, in Serbia, and earlier in Chile, Argentina, Indonesia, the Philippines, in many situations, people power simply works, and the committee believes profoundly that we need to be on the side of nonviolent regime change, and specifically regime change. We think that what our embassy demonstrated, for example, in support of Solidarity in Poland from the late 1970s onward demonstrates the importance of our being on the scene and not absent, as we are today.

We believe that Iran should be the highest single priority of this administration and of this Congress going ahead over the next four years, that it is critical that as has been referred to, that some gridlock in our policy be removed and that we move ahead vigorously with a creative, comprehensive and complex new approach to Iran. That requires first and foremost presidential leadership. It also requires, in our view, our willingness to reopen our embassy in Tehran if the regime is willing to allow that, which is in question.

We also very badly need a senior figure. Secretary Schultz suggested that, as was the case during the Cold War, the counselor of the State Department, which is the fifth-ranking position in the building, be devoted very largely, if not totally, to the question of Iran. We need somebody who can knock heads between the Pentagon, the CIA, the State Department and the White House to be sure that we have a creative and dynamic policy.

On nuclear weapons, we feel very, very strongly that Iran must get the message that they cannot have nuclear weapons and that in the end they attempt to do so that we will use force to deny them those weapons. In the meantime, the committee supports the efforts of the French, Germans and the British to attempt a diplomatic solution.

We are skeptical that that's going to work, but we think it's important for us to support it. Most importantly, the committee believes we must get behind the democrats and dissidents in Iran. We really see that as the solution, that there needs to be -- we've had an orange revolution, perhaps a green revolution now in Iran -- we need to find all the ways we can to support and encourage the Iranian people to stand up for their rights.

Specifically, we believe that cultural, academic and professional exchanges need to be established. There's an incredible absence of contact now between Iranian the Iranian body politic, the people of Iran, and their counterparts in this country. We believe very strongly that young Iranians are the change agents in that society, young women and young men, and that we need to help them to train in the techniques of nonviolent struggle, how tactically to organize in the underground and how eventually to take the streets and with sufficient numbers to remove the regime peacefully, as I mentioned earlier has been done now in so many places with such great effect. And yet the foreign policy establishment in this town and in this country seems to be unwilling to learn the lesson that that is the most powerful tool available to us.

We need also to work to undermine the pillars of support. Again, Ukraine demonstrates very clearly how effective it can be if we can get close to the police and military and security services of a country and to persuade them not to open fire when the critical moment comes.

In my personal experience, that is the most important single thing that we can do, and we can have and to some extent already do have counterpart relations between our military, the CIA, the FBI, DEA and others with Iranian security services, and in our view we should develop them further.

The Committee on the Present Danger also believes profoundly in the effectiveness of smart, targeted sanctions as opposed to blunderbuss broad sanctions that harm the Iranian people. We believe, as you mentioned, Mr. Chairman, that we should investigate Khamenei for crimes against humanity; that we should develop evidence that could be used an international tribunal; that an Interpol warrant should be sworn out for his arrest, as has been done in the case of Charles Taylor in Liberia; that delegitimizing people like Khamenei is at the center of getting rid of them and getting them, as Secretary Schultz has said, to go back to the mosque.

There are other smart sanctions in the area of finances that are very important to develop. This is a profoundly corrupt regime. They have taken over whole sectors of the Iranian economy. The Iranian people know they're corrupt, and we should design sanctions targeted at their assets.

We also should very substantially increase funding and the hours that we're on the air VOA Persian Service and our radio broadcasting there. And in the committee's view, we also should come up with the money for the independent broadcasters, radio and television, who are broadcasting in Farsi with very insufficient broadcast strength because they don't have the money to purchase adequate time on strong transponders.

We also believe, and this is partly based on my own personal experience, that dialogues with dictators work. President Reagan was a master at doing that with Gorbachev. I was present in the first meeting when he began that seduction, and it was, as we know, very effective. And we think that we should creatively explore how the Shia leadership can have a dialog with Mr. Khamenei, who is certainly not a senior religious figure. He is a classic dictator, and that he should be urged by the Shia leadership and others of the world community to go back to the mosque.

We also believe that it's important and legitimate for us to attempt to talk with the regime on the issues that matter most to us -- human rights, terrorism, nuclear weapons, regional stability. We have a big agenda, and we should not be afraid of talking with them about our concerns. Finally, Mr. Chairman, I want to make a pitch for a piece of legislation that Congressman Lantos and Congressman Wolf are taking a lead on, which is the Advance Democracy Act of 2005.

As a career foreign service officer, I think it's very important for the State Department to become an island of freedom around the world, to become more active in the freedom struggle, and the Advance Democracy Act, if passed by the Congress in its present form, would make a massive difference in our ability to bring these regimes down in our lifetime.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

HYDE: Thank you, Ambassador.

Professor Sick.

 

STATEMENT OF

DR. GARY SICK
Columbia University

 

SICK: Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, can you hear me all right?

HYDE: Yes, we can hear you.

SICK: Thank you very much for inviting me to testify on the subject of U.S.-Iran relations. It is a subject that has engaged me for more than a quarter of a century, and it has never been more important than it is today. I commend the committee for holding these hearings and identifying this issue.

I'm sorry that it was impossible for me to be with you today in person. I would like to thank the School of International and Public Affairs and the Middle East Institute at Columbia University who worked with your staff to give me the opportunity to join by videoconference.

American differences with Iran cluster around four major concerns -- Iran's support for groups that conduct terrorism, its opposition to U.S. and Israeli policies in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Iran's nuclear program and its domestic policies -- particularly its abuse of civil and human rights.

I've submitted an earlier article about Iran's connection with connection with terrorism, which has been circulated, and if appropriate can be entered into the record, although I do not regard myself as an expert on the Palestinian-Israeli issue, I would be happy to entertain questions.

But today I will focus on two critical issues, human rights and regional security issues, particularly on Iran's nuclear program. I have been a board member -- now emeritus -- of Human Rights Watch for more than a decade. I also chair the advisory committee of the Middle East and North Africa division of the organization. I'm not here as a spokesperson of Human Rights Watch, but my experience with that extraordinary organization has greatly influenced my views about the human rights situation in Iran.

Iran essentially has two governments: an elected government consisting of the president and his cabinet, the 290-member Majles or parliament, and much of the bureaucracy. There is also a government that essentially elects itself, consisting of the supreme leader, the security forces, the government broadcasting media, and the judiciary.

After Mohammad Khatami was elected in 1977 by an overwhelming 70 percent margin by the Iranian people, the clerics saw him as a threat to their entrenched position of power, and they began a systematic attack on the institutions and ideas that Khatami had fostered, using thuggish paramilitary organizations and the judicial system to close down meetings and newspapers and to jail and otherwise intimidate those who disagreed with them.

Although preponderance of political and security power is indisputably in the hands of the power structure that has dominated Iran since the revolution in 1979, the Iranian people have not been cowed into submission. Despite the jailings and torture and public attacks, courageous Iranians continue to speak out.

Admittedly, explicit criticism of clerical rule and the present Iranian government is risky, but it happens, nevertheless, and reformists persevere, and ordinary Iranians speak their mind, even to foreign visitors. It is for that kind of courage and perseverance that Shirin Ebadi, an Iranian woman lawyer and human rights activist, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last fall. The West must keep its spotlight on Iran and encourage the true voices of reform that are struggling to be heard.

As we all recall, Iran began its nuclear development long before the Iranian revolution. As it happens, I was personally present in 1977 when President Jimmy Carter agreed to sell the shah a U.S. nuclear reactor. The nuclear issue is one of the few areas where the so-called two nations rule does not apply. When it comes to Iran's right to have peaceful nuclear technology, Iranians are almost entirely united.

Virtually any government that one can imagine for Iran, from clerical to reformist to nationalist to monarchist, will insist on the right to pursue nuclear technology. As has already been discussed by the chairman and others, there is a fundamental flaw in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty. Article four states that it shall be, quote, "the unalienable right of all the parties to the treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination," end quote.

According to Mohammad El Baradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, some 40 countries or more now have the know-how to produce nuclear weapons, relying on that clause. Knowing what we know today about how quickly a nation can move from peaceful nuclear development to weaponization, we probably would never have drafted the treaty as we did. There is an NPT review conference coming up in May, and I suspect that this issue will be very much on the minds of many of the members who may be concerned about selective application of these provisions.

The available evidence, which I reviewed in my prepared statement, suggests that Iran wants to have an autonomous capability to move to a nuclear weapon if and when they conclude that their won security requires it. That is not a reassuring thought, but it does suggest that there is still some time and some negotiating room that needs to be explored.

At the moment, the E.U. negotiations are essentially the only game in town, but it is doubtful that the three E.U. nations, Britain, France and Germany, can close the deal. Both the president and Secretary of State Rice have indicated that this is problem that can be solved by diplomacy. But if it is to be solved in that manner, the United States will have to play a more direct role than in the past.

If negotiations fail, one alternative route is through the United Nations Security Council. That is at best a lengthy and uncertain process, and there is no assurance that it would result in sanctions being imposed on Iran.

The other option that has been widely discussed is a military attack. Its appeal is that it would almost certainly set back Iranian plans for at least several years. The disadvantages are immense. Very simply, it would require boots on the ground, and Iran is a country nearly four times the size of Iraq.

The Iranian people today are remarkably pro-American, partly as a negative reaction to their distaste for their own government and its anti-American propaganda. In my view, that would end with the first bombs. There is a very good chance that a U.S. military attack on Iran would be the one thing that would shut down the internal opposition and give the hard-line government the chance it wants to relinquish any pretext of democracy or concern for human rights.

Despite all of the efforts of the mullahs, Iran today has a vibrant civil society movement that is likely to make its influence felt in time, although perhaps more time than we would like. That movement, and all that it represents in the way of internally driven regime change, would almost certainly be the first casualty of an American attack.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

HYDE: Thank you, Professor.

And now, Mr. Sokolski.

 

STATEMENT OF

HENRY B. SOKOLSKI
Executive Director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center

 

SOKOLSKI: Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I want to thank you for allowing me to appear before you to today to examine how the U.S. should deal with the Iranian nuclear program. I come to this topic not as an Iranian expert. I have spent a fair amount of public and private money for the last two years to produce a report which you have copies of, but my first exposure to the Iranian issue came in 1990, when I began to fight to get people to recognize that their weapons program was underway, when I worked in the Pentagon as the deputy for nonproliferation policy.

I have a medal, which I'm a little ashamed of, because it was given to me for merely trying to get the U.S. government to stop presuming to approve nuclear dual-use exports to Iran. I managed to get the government to reverse that, but it took about two years of my bureaucratic life in the Pentagon to do that. We needed them to do a lot more than that.

This then brings me to the topic. In addressing the question of Iran's nuclear weapons program, most policy planners have focused on the extreme actions Iran might take against us or a friend after it acquired nuclear weapons. I think emphasizing severe contingencies like this, though, rarely fosters sound policy and more often blinds us to what's required to deal with much more probable and worrisome scenarios.

Iran might give its nuclear capabilities to terrorists, or strike Israel, or even the U.S., but these are not threats that Iranian officials are currently making loud and repeatedly, and with good cause. If they dared to take any of these steps, the risks to them, their continued rule and their people could easily be as great as they might ever be to us or our friends, and they know that.

More important, in focusing on these extreme scenarios, U.S. policy planners have been drawn to acute options such as bombing, invasion and various forms of appeasement that ultimately are only likely to make realization of the worst of what Iran might conceivably do with its nuclear capabilities more probable. Sadly, the debate over these extreme options has distracted us from dealing with the more probable threats presented by what is already a nuclear-ready Iran.

These threats deserve our attention because of the lower risk they pose for Iran make them more likely that Iran will actually acts on them, as it becomes ever more nuclear ready, and also because we and our friends actually could neutralize most of these threats if we chose to.

Finally, hedging against these more probable dangers would significantly reduce the military and political advantages Iran might otherwise realize if it actually overtly acquired nuclear weapons. So what are these more probable threats?

The first are actions Iran has already taken or threatened to take against the U.S. or its friends. This is not hypothesis. We know about them actually having done these things and/or they have repeatedly and explicitly threatened to do them.

They include mining international waterways; threatening closure of the straits; supporting and planning terrorist action against Israel, Lebanon, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, U.S. forces in the Gulf and targets even within the U.S.; demanding chairmanship of OPEC to manipulate the price of oil; extorting neighbors and other customers to invest in Iran on terms acceptable to Tehran.

As explained in my center's report, all these possible threats can be mitigated significantly through a variety of measures. They include addressing oil and gas production and transportation vulnerabilities in the Gulf while the price of oil is sky high and there is spare cash to do these fixes, which include completing several pipelines that would make it possible to send much more oil without going through the Gulf to ports that don't lie within the coast of the Gulf. In addition, hardening facilities. Also, diplomatically besting Iran in talks over freedom of passage in the Gulf, something they actually care about, encouraging Israel to take the lead in establishing a new, higher standard for regional de- nuclearization, and promoting tighter border and exports controls and key forms of defense cooperation in the region.

I will not focus on those for today's testimony. Instead, I'd like to focus on a second category of dangers which I know much more about, and they relate to nuclear proliferation more generally. Iran has repeatedly threatened to withdraw from the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty if it fails to get what it wants from the European Union or the IAEA. If it were to withdraw, and like North Korea, not be held for its previous violations of its NPT obligations, a legal precedent would be set that other would-be bomb makers would sorely be tempted to follow.

Iran is also insisting, and this is something I hope we can get into in Q&A, that it has a right under the NPT to make nuclear fuel, and thereby come within days of having all it needs to make nuclear weapons. So far, our only rejoinder from the U.S. government has been to argue that if a country violates the NPTs on acquiring nuclear weapons, or it's NPT nuclear safeguards obligations, it forfeits the right to peaceful nuclear energy.

Unfortunately, as we sadly no, too few other nations yet believe Iran has violated the NPT. More important, there is nothing to prevent other would-be bomb makers from openly declaring their nuclear activities rather than trying to hide them, as Iran illicitly did.

In this case, under the current popular view of the NPT, these states will be viewed as being able to produce the very nuclear bomb- usable fuels Iran is trying to make, and they would be viewed as being compliant with the treaty.

Let me emphasize, I think that's wrongheaded and a mistaken view of the treaty, but I do know this. This is not a world anyone should welcome. Up until North Korea's announcement last week, the world had no more than about seven declared nuclear weapon states. You'll notice in the testimony there's a chart which shows you the happy situation we now live in.

It's not that bad. It's not great. But it doesn't look that bad, and it's manageable, I think, compared to where we're headed if we don't change course. That's the second picture, this one here. You don't want to be there.

That is real trouble. That's what I call the nuclear 1914 chart. That's what prompted the establishment of the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty back in 1958. They were worried about this. We need to start worrying about this as well, and the reason why is this is even worse than Iran getting nuclear weapons.

What then must we do to prevent going to that future proliferated world? Three things. First, we need to penalize states that violate the NPT and then try to withdraw. My center took a leadership role in convincing the French government of this. Now the French government has taken this position. I guess we need to back the French government. It sounds odd, but I think they're right.

Two years ago, the IAEA reported to Pyongyang that they were in noncompliance, and they reported this to the United Nations Security Council. Whether North Korea rejoins the six-party talks or not, and we're all in favor of them joining the talks, I don't think that's relevant to the key thing here. The U.S. should work with others to take action on that report. It's been sitting there for two years.

Anything less will only tell Tehran and other would-be bomb makers to follow Pyongyang's example. As I've mentioned, France and even the IAEA director general have already gone on record in support of taking this sort of action. I think we need to start working vigorously with them, and I would not think that you would find yourself in trouble if you went towards this in a country-neutral way.

Two, ascertain what nuclear technology U.S. officials believe is peaceful and under what conditions. The current U.S. position regarding what nuclear activities are peaceful and permitted under the NPT is at best vague. At worst, this view is identical to Iran.

This is producing contentious internal debates within the State Department. I think Congress, both houses and the Senate and obviously in the House, should seek clarification of this matter through hearings. The NPT and its negotiating history clearly do not support any per se rule regarding access to all that's needed to make nuclear weapons, as Iran claims. The U.S. and its partners, however, can hardly counter Tehran's claims if they are not clear on this point themselves.

Finally, and more generally, we need to develop a 10- to 15-year strategy to counter what a nuclear-ready Iran is most likely to try to do. And I'd like to remind everyone that it wasn't until Mordechai Vanunu revealed photos of Israeli nuclear weapons from 15 years after Israel deployed its first nuclear bomb that the world was finally convinced of Israel's weapons status.

It has taken nearly as long to persuade the world that North Korea is nuclear armed, and I understand that the South Korean unification minister is still not convinced.

With hard work and any luck, we may have this much time, or more, to keep Iran from making its nuclear weapons status known. Tehran clearly does not yet have nuclear weapons. We must make sure that we do all that we can to eliminate whatever advantages Iran might gain from acquiring them in hopes that the regime will change to one that is far less hostile.

This means working backwards, not from the worst of what Iran might do, but rather from what harmful action it has already done or it has clearly threatened to do. In this regard, my center's own report and its recommendations are a start. I'm certain the executive can produce much better. Congress should demand no less.

Thank you very much.

HYDE: Thank you very much, Mr. Sokolski.

We'll now take questions from members, and I would implore the members to be succinct so we can get as many people participating in this process. And, first, Mr. Lantos.

LANTOS: Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to thank all three of our distinguished witnesses, and I have very brief questions.

Ambassador Palmer, you represented the United States in Hungary with extraordinary effectiveness and distinction, but I am concerned that your Hungarian experience has made you overly optimistic. While you were there during the reign of a quote, unquote "Communist" regime, the country for all practical purposes was wide open. It was wide open to American officials, tourists, musical groups, theatrical performances. There was an incredible degree of cultural, political, economic interchange between Hungary and the United States and the rest of the West.

With respect to Iran, we see the exact opposite, and it's not our fault. I have attempted very forcefully to obtain a visa to visit Iran on numerous occasions with the help of U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. And Secretary General Annan failed in his attempt to attain a visa permit to visit.

So I think it is unrealistic to argue whether the Hungarian case or the Reagan-Gorbachev case, the Khrushchev case, whatever. These are entirely different situations, and the Iranian regime has displayed a degree of unwillingness to interact with members of Congress, which is almost unprecedented.

Even North Korea, as you well know, has granted visas to individuals such as myself. I had three days of extremely meaningful discussions last month with North Korea's top leadership, but Iran appears to be totally closed to repeated attempts by several members of the House and the Senate to open up a dialog, and I'd be grateful if you could comment on this.

PALMER: Well, I think you're definitely right, the situations are different. But one could look at them also in the context of stages of development of openness. What's remarkable for me about Iran is how much the Iranian people know about what's going on not only inside Iran, but in the world. They're very connected.

The number of satellite dishes, for example, has gone way up in recent years, and I think there are opportunities which we have not fully exploited. I mentioned telecommunications. We're grossly underfunding our efforts at communicating via satellite.

LANTOS: We've mentioned (ph) that, and the chairman has been the leader in attempting to strengthen our programs.

PALMER: When the librarian of congress, when Jim Billington was recently in Tehran, the highest-level American government official in 25 years to visit, it was clear to him -- I spoke with him afterwards -- that there is huge interest in Iran in having communications.

LANTOS: Sure.

PALMER: And having exchanges, but you're absolutely right, we have to push hard. And Khamenei, he sees us as a fundamental threat, so he's not going to do this easily, but I think there is more room than we're currently doing. American NGOs, for example, are currently prevented by law from engaging in activities inside Iran. I think that should be corrected.

My organization, Freedom House, should be present in Iran, as we are present in other hard dictatorships, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, many very tough places, Freedom House has an office. We don't have an office in Tehran, we ought to ...

LANTOS: Do you think the current Iranian power structure would allow you to open an office?

PALMER: Not easily, but I think with some pushing, maybe.

LANTOS: I have one more quick question, if I may, Mr. Chairman, that I'd like all three of the distinguished witnesses to respond briefly, because it's a very simple question. The Iranians claim that they're pursuing their nuclear programs for peaceful purposes.

Do you believe that for a moment, Ambassador Palmer?

PALMER: No, the Committee on the Present Danger and I personally believe that is not the real reason that they have this nuclear program.

LANTOS: Dr. Sick?

SICK: I think they have an economic reason that they want to. They started this under the shah, but I couldn't agree more that the real concern is that the danger will be that it will turn into a nuclear weapon.

Regardless, it can have both a peaceful use and go right up to the edge, and I think that is, for instance, what Mr. Sokolski talked about, and I agree with him very much, that having an Iran that is very, very close to having a nuclear weapon is a very dangerous situation.

LANTOS: Dr. Sokolski, do you believe for a moment that this is pursuit of an economic goal, or is it a pursuit of a military weapon goal?

SOKOLSKI: I don't believe it at all.

LANTOS: What don't you believe?

SOKOLSKI: That they are pursuing this for economic reasons. I haven't for 15 years.

LANTOS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

HYDE: Mr. Leach.

LEACH: Thank you. I'd like to talk principally to you, Dr. Sick. First, let me say, I read with great interest your testimony in full and listened to you this morning, and I'm in large agreement with everything you said. But it's intriguing to me, I've devoted a lot of hours of my life to your work, and by that, I mean I was a member of a committee that was established in the early '80s, maybe the only committee in the history of the United States Congress established to prove or disprove the theses of a book, your book.

The committee was chaired by Lee Hamilton, and as you know the committee unanimously came to the conclusion that your theses that the Reagan campaign of 1980 had illegally intervened on an international negotiation was false. And so it's with some awkwardness that I find myself in complete agreement with you today, but frankly profound disagreement with your theses of 1981 or '82.

But I would like to ask you about that timeframe because I think it's very interesting.

Excuse me? OK. It was a formal committee of the United States Congress, established, chaired by Mr. Hamilton. In any regard, at that timeframe, one had a feeling that the Iranian people were deeply disillusioned with the United States, partly because we were in some ways on the other side of the freedom issue. That is, we were too close to a shah who was not by definition a democrat.

Today, I have the sense that one of our strengths in dealing with Iran, if we don't blow it, is that there is better will or goodwill in the Iranian people than we might suspect, and that there is a prospect -- we can talk ourselves into enmity with great ease, and that the challenge is how do you build on the goodwill that exists and to bring our two peoples closer together.

Ambassador Palmer suggested more professional exchanges. You have suggested some other types of carrot approaches as contrasted exclusively with the hammer approaches. And I'm wondering if you would care to comment on the contrasts for the times and the capacity to build in a positive way rather than simply talking ourselves into a spiral of enmity.

SICK: I'm sorry, I guess my microphone is now on?

LEACH: Yes.

SICK: The point that you make that there is a reservoir of goodwill in Iran is simply a fact, and it's something that we shouldn't dismiss. We tend to look at all the bad things about Iran, and I share those. There are no shortage of bad things, but I think we do ourselves an injustice if we dismiss out of hand the kind of strength that we have there. There are some good things going on. Some of those involve NGOs.

For instance, for three years, we had an Iranian professor from Tehran University who came to Columbia at my invitation and my sponsorship and actually taught classes, discussed with students, met with students about what was going on. This was at a time of huge turmoil in Iran, and I think our students really gained enormously from that. I very much shared the concern of Mr. Lantos that the Iranians have not been willing to agree to a visit by the U.S. Congress.

I have been involved in some groups that were working on that specific issue, and I would support anything that we can do to make that happen. I do think, however, that we're missing a huge opportunity with the Iranian people, part of which -- because of the sanctions that we have imposed, organizations -- foundations, active organizations, from the United States are not permitted to go into Iran. And I would go further than Ambassador Palmer and say that a lot of such activities would in fact be welcomed and could in fact make a foothold. And that that is something if it's only a matter of giving a blanket agreement on the part of the Treasury Department to let genuine NGOs go into Iran, it's a challenge that I would like to see the Iranians faced with.

At the moment, they don't have to worry about such things, and I would like to see them take it more seriously. I think there are things that we in fact can do that are going to -- we have certain good things going on for us that we ought to maximize.

HYDE: Mr. Sherman.

SHERMAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's been said that we should rely on regime change to deal with this issue. That would justify doing business with usual with the regime, not inconveniencing the U.S. subsidiary corporations, like Halliburton, doing business there. We wouldn't have to confront our foreign oil companies and actually enforce the Iran Libya Sanctions Act. And I would point out that at best this is a long-term solution to a short-term problem.

It may be a completely ineffective solution, and at worst it could bring us the Congo with nukes, because there's no assurance that regime change will be as peaceful as it was when the shah fell, or when Moscow changed hands. And I'll get to a question, but just a couple more observations, and I'll stick within the five minutes.

Iran is more dangerous than North Korea because it is ambitious to affect world events. It is the number one state sponsor of terrorism, and there are elements in that regime that may adopt the philosophy of the suicide bomber, and those extreme elements may take control of either the government or the nukes as things develop.

The president has said that we have done everything possible to sanction Iran. He has simply misstated the facts. We import $150 million worth of goods from Iran, non-oil from Iran. We subsidize the World Bank and allow it to subsidize Iran, and as I mentioned before, we have $33 billion of investment in the Iranian oil fields that we wink and nod at in violation of the whole purpose of the Iran Libya Sanctions Act.

I commend the bill introduced by the gentlewoman from Florida who should be here to hear my praise. Her Iran Freedom Support Act, and I will be reintroducing my Iran Freedom and Democracy Support Act to try to deal with some of these issues.

Mr. Sokolski, I want to commend you for noting that there is simply no economic reason for Iran to be developing this nuclear power plant, since at the present time, and correct me if I'm wrong, they flare natural gas. And if natural gas is free, then electricity can be created cheaply and cleanly.

How difficult would it be if Iran had an A-bomb for them to then go forward and create an H-bomb, and how difficult would it be to smuggle either of those bombs across our border, knowing that there are bales of marijuana the size of a nuclear bomb. And perhaps you could comment, or perhaps you shouldn't comment, on whether there is any technology that would allow us to detect through radiation a nuclear weapon that was encased in lead from a mile away, because I know that we can't detect a bale of marijuana from a mile away, and I know some rather -- put it like this, people who are not at the level of rocket scientists have been able to bring marijuana across our border in big bales.

So, first, how long from an A-bomb to an H-bomb, and second, if we can't stop marijuana coming in from some not-so-bright people, how would we stop Iran from smuggling a nuclear weapon into one of our cities?

SOKOLSKI: I can see so many takers.

LEACH: No, no, the question is directed to you.

SOKOLSKI: Oh, it was directed to me?

LEACH: Yes, mentioned your name. That's why they're not jumping in. They really want to.

SOKOLSKI: First, it's bad enough, you want worse. A fission bomb is plenty large. The idea that they'd want to go to thermonuclear would assume that they did not have a compact design. I think, as was raised by some opening statements, it's quite likely that the design they have is sufficiently compact for missile delivery.

They could boost. There have been some reports of some Indian assistance, potentially, associated with attraction of helium 3 and tritium from some of the facilities they're planning to build. I don't think thermonuclear weapons are around the corner.

Let me take one moment, though, to highlight something that I think would be useful for the committee to consider. I don't know how much leverage one has in putting off the exports to Iran, but you should know that about 80% of the imports that Iran takes in are related to heavy machinery, and they come from only three nations, for the most part -- Germany, France and Italy.

They need this machinery to function. After about a year of not having this action to this kind of importation, their economy would be in big trouble. Also, almost all of their distillates are refined outside of Iran. I think you need to focus more on that.

LEACH: Could you address the smuggling issue, or is that an issue we shouldn't get into?

SOKOLSKI: Well, I think I'd like to talk to you privately about that ...

LEACH: I look forward to it.

SOKOLSKI: ... if that's OK. I do have the answer, but I think you're right.

HYDE: The gentleman's time has expired in any event.

Mr. Paul.

PAUL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My question is directed to the panel, but in particular to Dr. Sick. My question deals with overall policy, how it applies to Iran. We more or less have followed a policy of confrontation. It was certainly demonstrated with Iraq. We were told we should fear a mushroom cloud, and we confronted them militarily, and we lost 1,500 men and women, and 10,000 casualties, so I think this is very serious. But I was delighted to hear that the panel did express some caution about why a military confrontation isn't a first solution, and that we should be very cautious about that.

But, in the past, we've had a policy of containment. Actually, it worked rather well when you think of the thousands of nuclear weapons that the Soviets had. We have eight nations, now, that have nuclear weapons. The Pakistanis had nuclear weapons when they were close allies with the Taliban, and I'm sure they're still friendly with the Taliban, so we have other problems. And this idea that all of a sudden that we have this urgency I think worries me a bit.

Also, I would like some of you to address the subject of possibly our overall policy has a little to do with our problems. In 1953, the Iranians had democracy. They had democratically elected Mohammad Mosadeqq, and we were responsible for getting rid of him, and it was mentioned even in the hearings today that we were responsible for selling the first nuclear reactor.

So, in many ways, this is a reaction to some of the things we've done in the past, so I think that makes an argument for the case that maybe we should be less interventionist in our policy, and maybe we would have less problems in the future. But our policies today I think too often gives an encouragement to get the weapon.

I mean, we are not about to mess around militarily with North Korea because of the great danger, so this says to some of these nations, look, if we don't want to be pushed around, what we need is a nuclear weapon. So, actually, our policies are giving an incentive for some of these countries to go and get a nuclear weapon, and I see this as something that we should be much more cautious about.

And also, the fact that we commit acts which in some quarters would be considered an act of war, when we fly over the airspace of a sovereign nation, no matter how well motivated this is, this is dangerous stuff. And most people know that we have been flying over Iran, and I just think that we're looking for trouble, and I was wondering if any of you would comment on those remarks?

Dr. Sick.

SICK: Thank you. Let me just remind you of a few basic things, which as I say, there's not very much good news to report, but we might as well look at the ones that exist. Iran today is a signatory of the NPT. It has signed the additional protocols and it's implementing them. There are inspectors in place from the IAEA, and there have been for the last two years, pretty steadily.

And we have seen from Mohammad Baradei just yesterday that they do not have evidence that Iran is going toward the weaponization part. It is still on the non-weaponization part. Iran has suspended its enrichment capabilities while they're in the course of talking to the Europeans, and even the leader, Khamenei, has actually issued a formal fatwa, a religious declaration, it prohibits the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons.

Now, none of that is a guarantee that Iran will not go toward a nuclear weapon, and I don't think that we should assume that it is. It does give us something to work with, however, and it seems to me that we should grasp that possibility and use it.

As far as Iran's overall position, one of the things that they've been most interested in is for instance in something very benign, in joining the World Trade Organization. We have been standing in their way and preventing them from doing that because of our overall confrontation policy.

I would argue that probably joining the WTO is the greatest blow that could in fact be delivered to the mullahs and the way they run the government. It would demand more transparency, it would demand them to change the laws. It would take some of the control out of their hands, and it would begin to attack some of these issues of corruption and misuse, abuse, of power that are there. Iran is anxious to do it, and I think this is the sort of win-win thing that really ought to be reexamined. It's worth looking at again to think about whether that's what we want to do.

HYDE: Mr. Ackerman?

ACKERMAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Where I come from in New York, every time there's a murder, which thankfully is fewer and fewer each year, there seems to be a half a dozen people that show up at police stations to confess to crimes that they neither committed nor know anything out except they knew there was a murder.

We invaded Iraq under President Bush's doctrine, which basically said that we cannot allow rogue nations to develop or begin developing a program for nuclear weapons. That reads from the other side, the rogue nations' side, hey, if we have nuclear weapons, the United States isn't going to know what to do about going to war with us because we already have it developed.

So whether or not some of these rogue states have it or not, I'm surprised that more haven't confessed to having it. And this is a game that's pretty dangerous, because we don't know who's telling the truth right now, but there is a report in today's -- I think it's the "Washington Post," IAEA disputes claims on Iran's arms, which basically says -- Mohammad El Baradei says that within the past six months there's been absolutely no evidence has been discovered that they do have anything like an ongoing program. So I think this further confuses the issue.

A question for Mr. Palmer. In your statement, you say we must make clear that we will not accept Iran's possession of a nuclear weapon, and we must be willing to reinforce that. What does that mean? What do we have to be willing to do?

PALMER: We believe, the committee believes, that we have to be willing to use force and to remove the danger if that's necessary.

ACKERMAN: You want a war with Iran?

PALMER: Toward Iran, yes.

ACKERMAN: OK, does anyone else think that's a good idea?

Mr. Sokolski?

SOKOLSKI: There's an old Chinese adage that diplomacy without the threat of force is worse than laughable, so I think we're all willing to subscribe to that principle. And in practice, I think what we need to be thinking about is the use of force, but not in the way it has been described to date, which is like an invasion or bombing, which you don't want to do, I don't think.

This is a large nation, much bigger than Iraq. We are very busy, we have to succeed in Iraq. It seems to me where you want to be focusing if you're thinking about contingency planning is someplace where we have not focused enough, and very distant contingency, to be sure, but more close in than bombing or invading, and that has to do with containment navally, and freedom of the seas being reinforced.

ACKERMAN: If we want to do something such as a blockade that I think you're suggesting right now.

SOKOLSKI: Not right now. I would not suggest that right.

ACKERMAN: Well, whenever. Next Thursday. But whatever your timetable is for blockading this little part of the world, one would suspect you might need the cooperation of the great navies of the world.

SOKOLSKI: Absolutely, absolutely.

ACKERMAN: Do you think we're going to be able to get the rest of the world to first believe us, that there is a country in the Middle East that's developing nuclear weapons, based on our track record, and then get them then to enter into this potentially dangerous situation?

SOKOLSKI: The work ahead, sir, the work ahead. You've pinpointed the problem, but that doesn't argue for walking away from them. I think you have hit a ...

ACKERMAN: I didn't suggest walking away from it. Let's discuss it.

SOKOLSKI: Well, that's the reason why I think your question is appropriate, and why we need to focus in on these points. By the way, the IAEA is not chartered or equipped to look for nuclear weapons, so what Mr. El Baradei thinks about this is interesting, but not this positive. He's looking for authority and capability to do the very thing he claims he can't find, but the charter explicitly states that they are to look only at declared facilities with regard to civil activities and accounting for material, not design.

ACKERMAN: And I have a question for Mr. Sick.

Mr. Sick, you've heard Mr. Sokolski claim that the NPT does not provide signatories with access to the nuclear fuel cycle. Your statement says exactly the opposite. Would you explain why you believe such access is provided by the NPT, and then maybe Mr. Sokolski after that can respond.

SICK: As I mentioned in my statement, there are something like 30 or 40 countries who, using that particular statement in the NPT, have actually moved toward production of nuclear materials, and who actually are very close to being able to make a nuclear bomb, if they decided to do it. So it's not that Iran is an exception to this rule. Iran is, in fact, the recipient of the benefits of that.

I'm not in favor of that. I think in fact the treaty was badly drafted, but when it was drafted we did not realize how quickly countries could move from peaceful use to nuclear, and I think that's a major concern that really has to be addressed. I do think it has to be addressed in the terms of the NPT, because it's not just Iran and it's not just the United States, but it's many, many of the countries in the world who insist that that is their right.

We've seen that development now in Argentina, who are developing a capability as well. It's not unique, and I think it is a -- let me just say that I think the best solution that I've heard as a way of dealing with this is in fact a new effort to completely outlaw independent national enrichment and reprocessing and put it under one or two international authorities to control and locate in one place, as a way of preventing this from being generated, being -- too much of it being produced and being made available to terrorists and the like.

That is a proposal by Graham Allison in his latest book about nuclear terrorism and how to avoid that. The advantage of that is that it actually offers a universal rule. It doesn't just apply to one country. I think we have a problem applying it to one company or another.

If we apply it to all countries and basically say enrichment and reprocessing is too dangerous and is going to have to end, then I think we've got the basis of a negotiation with somebody.

HYDE: Mr. McCaul.

ACKERMAN: But in fairness can Mr. Sokolski ...

HYDE: The gentleman's time has expired.

ACKERMAN: Mine, but I had to ask a question of both of them. I think they have a conflict here.

HYDE: Well, I know, but we have a conflict with other members. If you want to take an extra minute to further encumber the conflict.

SOKOLSKI: Show some discipline. There's no question that people have interpreted the treaty the way that Mr. Sick has described. It's also very clear, if you look at the negotiating history and amendments that were rejected to guarantee the rights that are now propounded under Article IV, that that is not what the treaty meant to allow.

We need to go for a moratorium on a lot of things. We need to reexamine this as a result of the revenue. I would not say the word loophole, yet, though. I would say it's been misread. We need some good lawyers here.

HYDE: Mr. McCaul.

MCCAUL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The thought of a nuclear Iran is a terrifying thought, indeed, and I happen to agree with the administration in terms of the best way to combat terrorism and the nuclear threat is the spread of democracy in the Middle East.

I do believe that in Iran, currently, there are a lot of forces for the democratic cause. A reference was made to the term nonviolent regime change, and I think we could all certainly support that. My question is -- actually, I have two questions. The first is, how realistic is that when you're talking about a tyrannical dictatorship and one that's a theocracy?

And then my second question is if you could elaborate on what impact the recent elections in Iraq have possibly had on Iran in terms of the Shia becoming the majority party in Iraq, and of course the Shia is a majority in Iran as well. So that's what I'd throw out to the panel.

PALMER: One of the things that's really consistent about the last 40 years is that all of the experts have said in advance of the nonviolent peaceful regime change that it was impossible. Just six months ago, in the Ukraine, for example, if you looked at the press or academic writing or State Department, foreign ministries in Europe, everybody was saying no. And Kuchma himself was saying, no, the Ukrainian people are passive and apathetic and they're not going to do it.

Well, we saw what they did. And I was on a talk show via VOA last week with Iranians who called in from Tehran, from Isfahan and other places. It's so clear to those who've spent any time talking, particularly the younger Iranians, that they're ready. They're totally disillusioned with Khatami, with this pseudo government that has no authority.

They're ready, but they need help, and we're not helping. I mean, there are no accurate U.S. government programs of any kind to help them, and we know how to help. We were very instrumental in what happened in Ukraine and in Georgia and in Serbia and many other places. So we need to get our act together to help Iranians get sovereignty, get control over their own lives.

If you look at the support structure of Khamenei, it's extremely fragile. There's huge splits within the religious leadership in Iran. Most of the senior ayatollahs disagree with his running the government. They believe that's not the role of mullahs, and even within the security services, they're split. I believe that you could have change very quickly if we really got our act together.

MCCAUL: And allow the NGOs to be in the country?

PALMER: Right. Right, I mean, there are hundreds of things we could do, hundreds of things, out of Iraq, in Europe, via the airwaves, inside Iran, I mean, just hundreds. And it doesn't cost a lot. It cost us $30 million in the case of Serbia.

MCCAUL: Any comments on the Shia question in terms of that became the predominant party in Iraq and whether that influences in a negative or a positive way in Iran?

SICK: Could I make a comment on that from New York? I just wanted to draw your attention to the fact that Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, who was actually at one time viewed as the successor to Khamenei, and is definitely contrary to the present regime in Iran, has been under house arrest for many years. He is now openly able to talk and speak, and the other day he made the statement that Iraqi clerics should not interfere in the country's state matters. This is not their field of expertise and it should be dealt with by experts.

That was particularly interesting, because is a grand ayatollah, which Khamenei is not, and he was deliberately criticizing the critical rule in Iran. Those are the kinds of voices that currently exist, and I think they are going to be using the Iraqi experience as a way of making the points that they want to make in their own country.

MCCAUL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

HYDE: Thank you.

Mr. Berman?

BERMAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Actually, I think the grand ayatollah's granddaughter, she's also been speaking out on this subject a little bit. I was in Europe this weekend, and the drumbeat of the Europeans generally in those countries involved in the negotiations now with Iran is the U.S. has to get into this. You have to come to the table in some fashion so that we can achieve our common goal, which I guess is a permanent, free and enrichment that's so verifiable that we can feel even more comfortable that they're not developing a weapon than we do with the supreme leader's fatwa.

And I'd just like to start with any of the three of you, what is the price of the U.S. going in and what is it to get Iran to agree to this, assuming we could rely on the agreement and the verification process that they agree to? Is it the threat of force of the table? There was an article in the "Wall Street Journal" yesterday that indicated that a lot of people had thought that their desire for foreign investment was so intense that the promise of trade and cooperation agreements with Europe might do it.

This article did a pretty good job of at least shaping up that notion for the short term based on the assets Iran is getting from the price of oil these days. I know Professor Sick had some long-term questions about that theory, but the article gave some doubts that even things like strengthening ILSA would have much impact on the Iranians.

So I was wondering if any or all of you could play out what that package might look like that would achieve that deal and what are the costs of making that package, not to mention -- and perhaps touching on the question of whether issues like support for terrorism, which at this particular moment, in the context of Hezbollah and what's going on between the Israelis and Palestinians may be the single biggest threat to forward progress on that front, given what they could do in terms of the rekindling of violent attacks.

Thank you. I don't know who wants to get into this, but ...

PALMER: I'd be happy to start, Mr. Berman. The Committee on the Present Danger believes that we do need, in fact -- we, the U.S. government, we the American people, do need to do something dramatic to reach out to the Europeans to show that we recognize their priorities and their concerns, most importantly to reach out to the Iranian people. And therefore we favor a package which would be comprehensive. That is, as in the case of the Helsinki Accords and our approach to the Soviet Union where we said we'll talk about your concerns about military security, nonaggression. We'll talk about the economic package, which was the second part of the Helsinki Accords, but we're going to insist also on the third basket, which is human rights and democracy.

If we're going to sit down with you, everything's going to be on the table. We want a comprehensive approach, and we're not afraid of sitting down with you at the table. I think we could call -- the committee believes we could call Khamenei's bluff and also in a certain way call the Europeans' bluff if we came forward with the kind of dramatic package that we suggest in our paper where we say we'll talk about everything.

We'll talk about trade investment, but you've got to talk about everything -- terrorism, human rights violations, nuclear weapons development. If you want progress, it's got to be on all of these fronts.

BERMAN: Will we talk about taking force of the table?

PALMER: We could certainly, as we did with the Soviets in the Helsinki Accords, we can talk about nonaggression, yes, but they have to be willing to meet our concerns. It has to be a broad package, including removing sanctions if they do certain specific things. If they stop supporting Hezbollah, we should be willing to recognize that in material ways.

SOKOLSKI: Yes, I think there is a fundamental moral hazard that has to be grappled with. If you do not identify a North Korea or Iran first as a violator before you go into the talks, you do end up condoning the notion, which was voiced by many of the members here, that oh my gosh, there's a reward. The second point I think -- so first thing's first, I would get that identification done as best as we can. And that, I think, is the key reason we should be supportive of the Europeans, not necessarily because we think they'll succeed, but we know they will cooperate with us if they fail.

BERMAN: But that raises the issue of what could happen if the U.N. Security Council if we got it to the U.N. Security Council? Why would the Chinese and the Russians ...

SOKOLSKI: Well, here, I think you need to be more upbeat. You need to be more upbeat. Something has changed. I've been going to Europe and holding conferences with the French government and next week with the German government. The Russians are changing their tune. They are actually saying if we can come up with some country- neutral fashion to describe a whole phenomena, not just Iran, big chunks of the foreign ministry are looking for ways -- they also like to talk about other things with us and I won't get into that.

I don't think Russia is going to be interested in bolting if Europe and the United States are unified. That has not yet happened, but if it did, keep in mind, the original vote that prompted this crisis in the IAEA occurred because Russia voted with us, and when they voted with us, China felt like the odd man out and voted with us as well.

Second, I don't think there is a diplomatic tug that will get the Iranians thrown off their course and actual declare that they want to renunciate their nuclear program, much less the human rights issues. My guess is you might be able to get them to do that, but boy, you'd have to threaten going after the 100 families that run that place. You'd have to be able to say that you were going to kill the regime economically with some kind of embargo. It would be very tough stuff, but then, once they agreed, I don't know if you could get them to follow.

CHAIRMAN: Chairman Royce?

ROYCE: Thank you. One of the concerns I think with the development of this capability on the part of Iran is what effect it would have on the Sunni -- not only in the Gulf, just in terms of an arms race. We have heard about the concerns about their capabilities and the fact that the Saudis arguably worked with the Pakistanis, helped finance the development of Pakistan's bomb. And the financial ties there, along with the deep links between the intelligence services between Saudi Arabia and the militaries have fueled the speculation that there is this nuclear cooperation, and that the Saudis or the Gulf states have a call on the bomb if they need it.

What are your insights on the potential cooperation between Pakistani and Saudi governments if you end up with Iran clearly having the bomb and you've got this tension between Shia and Wahhabis.

SO: It's quite real. My boss in 1991 was told point-blank by then the army chief of staff of Pakistan to back off the sanctions or the bomb would go to Iran. I think if you take a look at some of the visitations of Mr. Khan to Pakistan as well, it's quite striking. I think it's a major concern, and it's one of the reasons why a real loophole in the treaty, which is the allowance of transfer of nuclear weapons to NPT member states as long as the weapons that's transferred is under the control of the country that transferred it -- this is called NATO. This is what we do. This is what the Russians used to do.

We may want to reexamine how sound that is in this new millennium, and we certainly have to be worried about the transfer of weapons-usable materials.

ROYCE: Let me move into my other question, which has to do with the fact that if you had asked Bruce Ercheson (ph) years ago when we were doing Radio Free Europe whether or not it was logical to believe we were going to change Polish society, I think none of us would have believed the response. But, somehow, clearly Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel, those broadcasts touched a nerve.

We had things we don't have there now. We had the Catholic Church as an institution, we had the labor union, Solidarity as an institution, working for the change. But somehow those cultures changed and those involved in the process at the time give the lion's share of the credit to those broadcasts.

I listened into the broadcasts into an Iran with an interpreter and followed this, and clearly you've got the same -- although he institutions aren't there to support it, you've got the same popular will that want to learn about market economy and want to learn about rule of law and all the rest of it.

What is the likelihood that we could, with a concerted effort, have the same type of effect that we had in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

PALMER: Well, I think the likelihood is extremely high. If you look at the nature of Iranian society today, if you read books like "Persian Pilgrimage," which is done by a "Washington Post" reporter of Iranian origin who spent a year and a half wandering around the country just talking to taxi drivers and ordinary people ...

ROYCE: But where are the institutions? We had those institutions.

PALMER: We did and we didn't. I mean, yes, the Catholic Church was there in Poland, and Solidarity for some of the time was there, but in Ukraine, for example, where were the institutions. The church in Ukraine was not helpful at all.

So the key question, I think, is the will, and the will is there in Iran. Students have done this again and again and again, they just haven't been able to do it on a large enough scale and with the right strategic sense, and that's something we can help them with. But the radios and television are absolutely critical, and if you look at the hours a week or the hours a day that VOA's on in Farsi, or Radio Farda's on, or look at the budgets that the TV stations in California have to operate.

We're not doing anything today out of Iraq, for example, direct at Iran it terms of broadcasting, whereas the Iranian mullahs, as we know, have been broadcasting very powerfully into Iraq and funding political parties and doing a lot of stuff.

So we have a new base in Iraq from which to do a lot of things ...

ROYCE: What's the gridlock on that? Are we concerned that it would look like destabilization, Mr. Sokolski?

PALMER: I think part of the gridlock is what Secretary Schultz identified, and that is there's not a senior figure in the U.S. government who wakes up and looks in the mirror in the morning and says, what am I going to do about Iran? And that's all he says to himself.

We need somebody, the counselor at the department, an undersecretary level person, we need somebody who doesn't do anything except Iran.

SOKOLSKI: The two-year study that my center completed, partly with public funding, I might add, actually came up with a list of recommendations that overlap to some extent with these others. It's quite clear that the public diplomacy dimension of our efforts towards not just Iran but the whole Muslim world is not what it needs to be by a long shot.

(CROSSTALK)

HYDE: I've been told we have two votes at quarter after, so if you don't mind, Mr. Royce.

Mr. Menendez.

MENENDEZ: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank all of the panelists for their testimony. I have three questions which I'd like to lay out and then solicit your responses to. One is, for some time I as a member of this committee have been extremely concerned about the IAEA, how it functions in this regard as it relates to Iran, how we are actually making voluntary contributions beyond our membership contributions to the IAEA, which goes to create operational capacity at the Bushehr nuclear facility, it boggles my mind. And yet we know since November of 2003 that the IAEA has found a series of violations by Iran, yet it has still to this date not referred Iran to the Security Council of the United Nations.

So question number one is, is it not time for the IAEA to refer Iran to the Security Council as a process under which we become really serious about engaging in the high risks to the world that Iran poses in this regard.

Secondly, A.Q. Khan has some of the most important information in the world on Iran and North Korea's nuclear program, since he ran the nuclear supermarket where they purchased their goods. The administration didn't protest when the Pakistani government pardoned A.Q. Khan in exchange for information in his activities. But we haven't pressed to directly speak to Mr. Khan, so all the information we're getting is filtered, filtered by the Pakistanis. It seems to me to be a ludicrous position to take.

Should we not be insisting that we have access to Mr. Khan ourselves so that the vital information -- for example, we don't know whether he sold a bomb design to the Iranians, as he did with the Libyans. Because if Iran has a workable bomb design, then it's much closer to a nuclear weapons arsenal.

And, finally, I'd like to invite the panel's comments on what I in recent months have heard the noise level on Iran has increased significantly. In one respect, that's good, but when I read the comments being made and the reports that are coming out, I get concerned. In the "Washington Post" last Sunday, it reported that the administration has been sending unmanned drones over Iran, looking for evidence of their nuclear weapons program.

The administration is conducting a review of its intelligence on Iran, similar to the one conducted leading up to the Iraqi war. A recent "Washington Post" article reported that according to a senior U.S. official, the U.S. military is updating its war plans on Iran. In the State of the Union, the president referred to Iran as the world's primary state sponsor of terror, pursuing nuclear weapons while depriving its people the freedom they seek and deserve.

Secretary Rice has said that a military attack on Iran is not on the agenda at this point, and we can go on and on. What do you take all of those comments to add up to? Is it in preparation for not diplomacy but for organizing the world community for some more robust action, or do you just take it as showing serious concern about Iran?

Those are the three questions I have, and I invite the panel to answer if they have reflections on any one of those.

SICK: Could I offer a comment in response?

MENENDEZ: Well -- oh, I'm sorry.

SICK: It seems to me that the objective for U.S. policy with regard to Iran and in the region as a whole is to come to an end state in which Iran has a contained, monitored enrichment program, as small as possible, and hopefully under very tight constraints, together with some kind of economic and political integration with the West, whether it's the WTO or some other form.

That is the end state to be desired, but we're far from that point at this stage. With regard to the noise level, I agree, it is very high. I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing. To the extent that we are bringing additional pressure to bear on Iran and getting their attention, I think there's something to be said for that.

If, however, we are not coupling that with some kind of willingness to participate actively in getting to that end state that we would desire, it seems to me we're missing the boat. And it's the balance between those two that I think we have to maintain, and the government, to be far, doesn't always have control over the noise level. But to the extent that we do, it seems to me we do have to mix these, and at this point, it's all noise and it's not cooperation, as far as I can tell.

SOKOLSKI: I think it would be good to get the referral to the U.N. Security Council. I think it would be just as important that we take up the point that Congressman Ackerman raised, and that is what's permitted under the treaty, whether you violate it or not. And we've kind of dodged that, and I think that's where you ought to be working to get more cooperation with other nations.

With regard to Mr. Khan, we should not be the only ones asking to get access, and yes, we all should try to get access. We need to get that story as completely as possible, and it needs to be made, within limits, as public as possible.

MENENDEZ: Thank you.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much. I want to thank our witnesses for their insights. They are very, very helpful, and I do have a couple of questions. The first one, with regard to religious freedom, and Ambassador Palmer, we've worked together with regard to Helsinki issues. Your ambassadorship at Hungary was -- you did a tremendous job and we do appreciate that.

Members of the country's religious minorities in Iran, as we all know, are very severely discriminated against, and if one converts to a non-Muslim from a Muslim faith, the death penalty is imposed. We know that the Baha'i, 300,000 to 350,000 strong are severely discriminated against, as are the Christians, as are the Jews, as are the Sunnis and the Sufi Muslims.

As you also know, every year since 1999, our country has imposed CPC status, which it ought to, because of their record, on Iran and joined other religiously persecuting nations, like the People's Republic of China. But there are other venues where we have now seemingly, as an international community, dropped the ball. As you know, since 1982 to 2001 at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights the E.U. worked in tandem with the U.S.

We cosponsored the resolution for condemning the ongoing repression in Iran. That stopped in 2002. We weren't a member, and that resolution failed by one vote. Nothing was tabled the next couple of years.

We do have the U.N. Human Rights Commission in Geneva meeting slated to begin on March 14th, and my question to you, Ambassador Palmer, to the extent that you may know, will we be either cosponsoring or tabling or introducing our own resolution?

I was struck by Dr. Sick when he said there are people, as we all know, willing to speak out in Iran, and they are courageous people. Many of them are religiously or faith-based people, and yet the repression is ratcheting upwards vis-a-vis their congregations as well as themselves. So we have an opportunity here. The U.N. Human Rights Commission, if it's going to mean anything, it needs to speak truth to power. Will we be tabling a resolution at it?

PALMER: I'm sorry, I don't know whether we're tabling a resolution on that or not, although Freedom House, putting on my other hat, would certainly show you we vigorously support that. But I don't know whether in fact we're going to do it.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: OK. Could you take that back ...

PALMER: Yes, certainly.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: ... going to raise it as well with other ambassadors and with the secretary of state, Ms. Rice herself.

SICK: Could I just add that ...

ACTING CHAIRMAN: Oh, sure.

SICK: If I may put on my other hat that's associated with Human Rights Watch, I would also be happy to take that back. In fact, Human Rights Watch has been working very, very actively to take care of the problem that you're describing, that is, getting the U.N. Human Rights Commission to actually take the kind of actions that it needs to, and a lot of countries in the world are not willing to cooperate with that. And I think if we can start anywhere with the U.S. government and others, there is a constituency there to be built within the Human Rights Commission that could be extremely valuable, and it would actually help to accomplish some of the things we're talking about here.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: I appreciate that. And, very briefly, what would be the reaction to the Iranian people to an embargo, not unlike that which was imposed on South Africa because of apartheid. Because it would obviously hurt them in the short term, and how do you target it to the leadership, which is obviously the intended target, to try to mitigate their behavior?

SOKOLSKI: Our view, the view of the committee, is that we should be doing smart sanctions, targeted sanctions, not broad sanctions. As a number of people have said today, the Iranian people are relatively pro-American, and we obviously want to sustain that. We shouldn't be trying to punish people who are already repressed, already poor, already suffering.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: In light of the vote, I'll go right to Ms. McCollum.

Mr. Delahunt?

DELAHUNT: I think it was Mr. Berman that posed the question about potential Security Council actions, and I just read today, I think it was in "Fortune," that Iran has entered into a $70 billion contract regarding the development of natural gas fields, et cetera, with China. And as a permanent member of the Security Council, I think one could draw an inference that it would be difficult to secure cooperation from the Chinese in terms of Security Council actions.

Just a quick comment?

SOKOLSKI: First of all, you have to fail before you can say the rules are broken. We haven't tried even the case of North Korea. I find that a bit unconscionable. Second of all, what China will do and why, you're absolutely right. The jury is out. I don't know that the $70 billion contract's a concern so much that they don't want to be the subject of sanctions themselves.

Therefore, I would strongly recommend that you go first and no further than simply branding Iran as a violator, and I think if you do, you may find success is not as distant.

DELAHUNT: All right, another problem I have, again, is you alluded to North Korea, and we have Secretary Rice saying that Iran is a totalitarian regime, and the United States will not talk to Iran. And yet the E.U. -- the EU3 is engaged in these negotiations, and yet we're holding back.

On one hand, that's I guess the position of this administration, and yet on the other hand, while we refuse to engage in one-on-one negotiations with North Korea, we're embracing the six-party roundtable conversation with the North Koreans. I don't know about you, but for me there's an inconsistency there that befuddles me, and I wonder how the rest of the world, when examining that reality, that set of facts, what kind of impression are we making in terms of the international community?

PALMER: Well, I think that the international community is befuddled. They think that this is a mistake, and the Committee on the Present Danger also thinks it's a mistake. The great concern, I think, that the president has and that Secretary Rice has is that we somehow would legitimize either the North Korean regime or in this case Khamenei in power, that we would strengthen their control.

That's only true if you have an administration which weak on democratization, which is not explicit about the need for regime change. This administration is very clear about that, and therefore we believe in the Committee on the President Danger -- Secretary Schultz, who in my judgment is one of the great secretaries of state since the Second World War -- we believe there's very little risk that that signal would be sent if we started to talk more openly with the Iranians. And, of course, we do talk to them now, but if we spoke more openly to them that suddenly everyone would conclude ...

DELAHUNT: Let me just say, I agree, Ambassador. I find as much in your testimony that surprisingly I agree with, particularly a robust engagement. I would hope that the administration, however, in terms of its democratization initiative, would also extend that to Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan and some other nations with whom we have created this alliance.

Just one final comment, and again, Mr. Sick, I think you make such a valid point about this should be a universal rule in terms of clarifying the language -- well, let me go back, let me strike that for a moment and go back to the testimony of Ambassador Palmer, who says, "If there were in place an international clearinghouse and monitoring system for using existing enriched uranium for peaceful purposes only, countries seeking it for such purposes would not have to develop their own enrichment capacity."

I think that coincides with the comment you made, Mr. Sick, and is there agreement that this is something that is worthy of pursuit and our aggressive advocacy. And why don't I pose that question and see whether he agrees to Mr. Sokolski.

SICK: Anyway, I do agree that there is a support of meeting of the minds on this, and at least from my point of view, that's a very realistic idea. With regard to talking to Iran, I also agree with you, sir, that we've been inconsistent. We did talk to Iran right after the invasion of Afghanistan. We dealt with them directly, we negotiated with them at Bonne to get the Karzai government created and organized, and the Iranians actually did cooperate.

In fact, the U.S. government, this administration, praised them for it, but other things happen and change, and I think we've now reversed ourselves and have gone to the point where we say we can't have anything to do with them. I think that really is a very costly mistake. It doesn't mean that we have to like them, it doesn't mean that we have to agree with their policies. But if we're going to get them to change in ways that we think are desirable, we're going to have to get engaged ourselves directly, or perhaps indirectly, through the Europeans.

There are a number of ways that we can do this, but the process on the negotiating side is not going to be successful unless the United States is prepared to commit itself to that process.

ACTING CHAIRMAN: The gentleman's time is expired and we're going to have to end the committee hearing, and certainly you can respond in writing to any of the questions that have been posed to you. I have several that I would ask you to do in that manner so that we can conclude the hearing and get over in time to vote.

First of all, there are of course a number of groups, a number of organizations, outside of Iran and I guess partially inside the country, that at least portray themselves to be devoted to the concept of a secular democratic Iran, and are working toward that end. I refer specifically, I think, to the MEK. It's the one of which I am most aware.

I would like to know from you, and again, if each of you could, if you would please, just respond in writing because we're going to have to conclude the hearing. But, first of all, to what extent do you believe that these groups, and the MEK in particular, have a following inside of Iran. To what degree can they claim the mantle of legitimacy as a representative organization of the people who want significant and democratic change in the country?

I recognize fully well the spotty nature -- spotty history, I guess, of the group, but I'm talking about certainly in the last decade or so what they claim to be their intent and what they apparently are doing that are giving us, anyway, the ability to actually provide the MEK, the military arm of it, with some sort of protective status today.

Secondly, do you believe and trust that the objectives that they have established are in fact legitimate? That is to say, do you believe they believe in them, or is this a ruse of some kind to try and entice us into supporting them? If in fact they can be relied upon as a true opponent of the regime, present regime, and if they have some following inside and outside of Iran, what are the steps we can take to in fact encourage them? How can we help them? Should we in fact move to take them off of the terrorist list? That's one way of addressing that issue.

Right now, there was a story I think in a periodical not too long ago that suggested that the DOD is in fact using a number of these folks for clandestine purposes. Should we be expanding that? Should we be stopping that?

And I guess that's it from my point of view. The staff has asked me to add one more, and that is did anyone try to renegotiate the NPT at the time that it was about to expire, during the Clinton administration, to close the reading of the NPT that allows the nuclear fuel cycle to continue. If not, why not? And those are the questions. I would sincerely appreciate it if each of you could respond to the committee in writing.

And, with that, I want to express my sincere thanks for all of you, to all of you, for being here today and for your very insightful observations, and we now conclude the hearing.