Iran's nuclear ambitions could plunge the Middle East into "a new Cold War", the UK foreign secretary has warned.

William Hague told the Daily Telegraph other nations in the region would want to develop nuclear weapons if Iran did.

Without "the safety mechanisms" of the US-USSR rivalry, Mr Hague said it would be "a disaster in world affairs".

But ex-UK diplomat Sir Richard Dalton said Iran was not "rushing towards a nuclear weapon". Tehran insists its programme is for energy purposes.

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 18, 2012 (IPS) - After a week of tense negotiations, a United Nations preparatory committee concluded a final round of talks on Friday to define the rules of procedure for a global Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), which is expected to be finalised in July this year.

The ratification of the report by committee chair Ambassador Roberto Moritan of Argentina closed the last of four prepcoms held since 2010 to lay the groundwork for the ATT negotiations.

The report includes a "non-paper" by Moritan that will be the basis of this summer's talks.

Human rights groups expressed cautious optimism about the outcome.

"This document fits 70 percent of our recommendations," Aymeric Elluin of Amnesty International told IPS.

But the agreement on a vote by consensus, meaning that every state has veto power, may deeply compromise the adoption of a comprehensive treaty, he warned.

"There is a real risk for the final text of ATT not to be adopted in July," he added. "Negotiations on the content will be extremely difficult."

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 17, 2012 (IPS) - When the 193-member General Assembly adopted a resolution against Syria by an overwhelming majority Thursday, the U.N.'s highest policy making body was conscious of the fact that its rulings - unlike the dictates of the 15-member Security Council - are politically impotent because they have no enforcement power.

The vote was 137 in favour to 12 against (including China and Russia, the two big powers who are allies of Syrian President Basher al- Assad), with 17 abstentions.

With Russia and China using their vetoes to block punitive action against Syria in the Security Council last week, the United Nations may have hit a virtual dead end in trying to help resolve the 11- month-old crisis.

The uprising has claimed the lives of more than 5,400 people, mostly civilians and members of the security forces.

But Jose Luis Diaz, head of the Amnesty International office at the United Nations, does not think the United Nations is in a no-win situation.

For proof, you need look no further than the Pentagon's new "strategic guidance" document, issued last month in the wake of Mr. Obama's pledge to cut $485 billion from the defense budget over the coming decade. It repeats many of the core objectives of recent American national security strategy: defeat Al Qaeda, deter traditional aggressors, counter the threat from unconventional weapons.

But it also states, "In the aftermath of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States will emphasize nonmilitary means and military-to-military cooperation to address instability and reduce the demand for significant U.S. force commitments to stability operations." It goes on to note that "U.S. forces will no longer be sized to conduct large-scale, prolonged stability operations."

With this paragraph military planners signaled an abrupt end to the post-9/11 era of intervention. Only a few years ago the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan -- wars of occupation, nation-building and counterinsurgency -- looked like the face of modern conflict. Now they don't. Americans don't believe in them and can't afford them anymore.