Iran

While there is understandable concern at the thought of any country newly joining the "nuclear club", it is still possible to detect a whiff of hypocrisy in the current level of outrage being expressed by the USA towards Iran joining the nuclear ranks.

Firstly, the Iranians are correct when they say they have the right to produce nuclear energy for domestic use under the Nuclear non-proliferation Treaty. And Bush, since his reasons for invading Iraq have proved so spurious, has no right to demand that the rest of us trust him when he immediately assumes the worst about Iranian intent.

More importantly, the Nuclear non-proliferation Treaty cuts both ways. Yes, it insists that no new country's arm themselves with nuclear weapons, but it also puts an obligation upon countries which currently have a nuclear capability to disarm. As Blair has made no secret of the fact that he is considering recommissioning Trident - and Bush has announced he is developing a new range of "bunker busting" nuclear weapons - Britain and the US seem, to me, to be the least qualified country's in the world to lecture others on their adherence to the treaty.

And, as Bush has announced that he reserves the right to use nuclear weapons - even against non-nuclear opponents - one can understand why many country's may come to see the possession of a nuclear weapon as the only way to protect themselves from a possible US invasion.

And when your regime has been named as part of an "Axis of Evil" - and the US and Uk currently occupy one of your neighbours - this mindset has an undeniable logic. Especially if one notices that, since North Korea developed her own nuclear arsenal, Bush's rhetoric against that regime has markedly softened.

And, lest we forget, North Korea was not a nuclear power when Bush - in a fit of Anything But Clinton pique - dismantled the carefully constructed mechanisms Clinton put in place to encourage North Korea to comply with the Nuclear non-proliferation Treaty.

The ramifications of this - not only for the US, but for the world - are enormous. By his swaggering disregard for international law and his threat to use nuclear weapons - even against non-nuclear opponents - it could be reasonably argued that Bush has done more than any previous US president to encourage nuclear proliferation.

The questions raised by the Iranian refusal to comply with the US's skewered reading of the Nuclear non-proliferation Treaty are more complex than they first appear.

At the heart of the matter is the question of whether we, in the West, are serious about following the letter of the treaty. The actions of Bush and Blair, by continuing nuclear weapon development, say that we are not.

We are then left in the dubious moral position of insisting certain country's are civilised enough to possess them and certain country's are not.

As the myriad of lies that prefaced the Iraq invasion are now exposed for all to see - does anyone believe that we still occupy the moral high ground on this matter?

Having lost the moral high ground, we have only two options. We can continue to insist that no new country's avail themselves of weaponry that we possess, we can threaten to invade any and every country who do not comply, although the North Korean example shows that this is a battle of attrition that we will probably lose.

Or we can be serious, and treat the Treaty with the same level of respect that we demand of others, and disarm.

I know which option I'd choose.