Influential Brit-tank urges US-Iran talks: the text

The Foreign Policy Centre, which is a relatively young but well connected British think-tank, earlier this week issued a significant report titled Time to Talk: The case for Diplomatic Solutions on Iran.
That link there goes to an easy-to-download and -read HTML version of the Executive Summary and Recommendations sections of the report.
I made that HTML version myself, as a public service, by cut-n-pasting from the PDF version of the report that’s posted on the FPC website— because I think the report is important but I am totally fed-up with trying to download, read, and use materials that are posted on the web only in the form of clunky great PDF files. And I imagine many other people might be, too.
A plea to the friends at the FPC: When you have important and serious contributions to add to the global discourse on crucial issues, please do so in a way that is web-friendly and thus aids the timely dissemination of your ideas to the global public, and not just in a form that is optimized for people who can come along in person to pick up your dead-tree version, along with all the over-stylized graphics and totally dysfunctional broad white spaces associated therewith!
Do you think anyone at FPC ever actually tries to use the PDF versions they put up on the web??
I am in Egypt for most of this month. Like the vast majority of the world’s other people, I am now nearly wholly reliant on the web for my connection to the global discourse. I see no way that I could, in anything like timely fashion, get ahold of the dead-tree version of the FPC report… So I am totally reliant on what FPC has put up on the web; and this is, as I said, extremely hard-to-use and inadequate.
FPC should take a page out of the “communications strategy” book used by, for example, Human Rights Watch. When they have a report to issue they will typically produce a “Media Release” that contains the main points of the report, plus a couple of canned quotes attributed to (or perhaps even uttered by?) some person connected with the report. They send that Release out to their media contacts and also post its whole text in HTML on their website, along with a link to the full text of the report that is in PDF or sometimes in HTML as well.
By contrast, when looking for material about the “Time to Talk” report on the FPC website today (Wednesday) I found only a very dated notice telling me that the report “will be launched… at 10.30am on Monday 5 February 2007”, along with a few additional pieces of teaser information about it… And then, links– presumably added subsequent to the launch?– to: the PDF version of the whole text in English, a Farsi-language version of the Executive Summary, and a BBC report on the launch.
Kudos to them for producing– and in timely fashion even if only as a clunky PDF file– the Farsi-language materials.
But another gripe I had with what they offered was that the report’s Executive Summary did not even contain the Recommendations! Why on earth not? Instead, as it stood there in the first 2-3 pages of the dead-tree (and PDF) versions, the Summary ended by arguing that “Diplomacy is the only viable option”, without telling you what the content of that diplomacy should be… For that, you need to scroll down the white wastelands of the PDF file till you get to the “Recommendations” included at the end of the main text.
But they should, surely, be right there in the Exec Summary?
They’re pretty good– and they do constitute, after all, the main argument of this report. They are addressed primarily to a British, or British-governmental, audience.
Here’s what they say:

Recommendations
Even according to the worst-case scenario, there is time for further diplomacy. This time should be used to build confidence between the negotiating partners, helping to break cycles of mutual hostility, and to develop Iranian interests in established and potential political and economic relationships with the international community. The possible consequences of military action could be so serious that governments have a responsibility to ensure that all diplomatic options have been exhausted. At present, this is not the case.
The UK has a role to play in catalysing this process, mediating between EU member states and the US. Through genuine commitment to the diplomatic process, the UK can indicate that it is willing to treat Iran fairly in negotiations, which would strengthen the hand of moderates within Iran and send an important signal to the Iranian people.
The diplomatic track is clearly fraught with difficulties. But as long as fundamental obstacles remain in place – such as preconditions concerning the suspension of Iran’s enrichment activities – the potential of diplomacy cannot fully be tapped. Diplomatic strategies are most likely to progress if the UK government and other key parties agree:
➔ To either remove preconditions for negotiations or find a compromise that allows both the US and Iran to move forward without having to concede on their respective red lines;
➔ To seek direct negotiations between Iran and the US;
➔ To prioritise proposals and demands by assessing the security risks associated with the different technologies being developed by Iran (i.e. enrichment and reprocessing) and to agree to this assessment within the UN Security Council – Iran’s plans to use reprocessing technology should be addressed promptly;
➔ To develop the proposals offered by the P5+1 on 6 June 2006 in return for tighter inspections and a commitment from Iran to abandon all ambitions towards reprocessing (as offered by the Iranians in 2005);
➔ To explicitly address mutual security guarantees for the US, Israel and Iran.
The UK has an important role to play in fostering a climate of pragmatism. It is recommended that the UK government continue to give full backing to the diplomatic process whilst directly addressing the need for full and direct negotiations between Iran and the US administration. The time available should be used to build confidence on both sides, and the UK has a crucial role to play in supporting that process. Only through direct US-Iranian engagement can an agreement be found and the potentially devastating consequences of military action be avoided.

That last paragraph is crucial.
Will Tony Blair respond positively to FPC’s urgings, I wonder? In the “About us” page on their website they say: “The Foreign Policy Centre is a leading European think tank launched under the patronage of the British Prime Minister Tony Blair to develop a vision of a fair and rule-based world order… ” I am not entirely sure what “patronage” involves in this context. It should, surely, at the very least imply that he gives serious consideration to the arguments they make?
But anyway, the general arguments there are relevant for a readership far beyond the wave-tossed borders of the British Isles– including, a readership in the halls of power in the United States. Particularly the arguments the report makes for an intensification of the diplomacy and the opening of direct negotiations between Iran and the USA.
Anyway, do feel free to download and broadly distribute the HTML file I’ve produced there.