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POLITICS-IRAN: Rafsanjani Offers Hope On Nuclear, Oil Issues
Analysis by Saloumeh Peyman
TEHRAN, Oct 17 (IPS) - The fact that it was former president Hashemi Rafsanjani who announced Iran's readiness to talk on the ''country's nuclear dossier without any pre-condition'' rather than his hardline successor, Mahmud Ahmadinejad, offers a glimmer of hope for reconciliation with the West on the key nuclear and oil issues.
When Rafsanjani, who now wears the hat of chairman of the shadowy but powerful State Expedience Council (SEC), announced on Saturday that ''Tehran is ready to begin dialogues for transparency on the nuclear dossier,'' it was a sign that the reformists were once again calling the shots in Iran despite their shock defeat in the June presidential elections.
It is another matter that foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said on Sunday that Tehran would not comply with a demand by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that it stop uranium conversion at its Isfahan facility and fall in line with a key European Union condition for resumption of talks.
Asefi told reporters that the freeze on uranium conversion was made voluntarily and that Iran reserved the right to make fuel for its reactors as signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Talks between Iran and the EU-3 (Britain, France and Germany) broke down in August, when Iran rejected a deal that offered trade and other incentives for a full cessation of fuel cycle work, the focus of fears that Iran could acquire nuclear weapons.
But the unexpected intervention by Rafsanjani, regarded as a pro-Western politician who also has the ear of the 'Supreme Leader' Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is a sign that the days ahead may see a softening of Tehran's approach and a dilution of President Ahmadinejad's authority.
Much would depend on what exactly are the powers of the SEC to which Rafsanjani was appointed on October 3, and who in turn, appointed another former pro-West president, Mohammad Khatami to the body's decision-making High Council.
After his election in 1997, Khatami had begun a process of reform and reconciliation aimed undoing the isolation of Iran after the 1979 ouster of the Shah of Iran and the installation of an Islamic republic.
Curiously enough, the powers of the SEC were recently expanded with Speaker Gholamali Haddad-Adel mounting a defence of it in parliament saying it was in the interests of greater discipline.
According to Haddad-Adel all macro-level policies could only be made after consultations with the SEC which is also now charged with supervising the execution of those polices.
In other words, say critics, this was virtually amounted to the creation of parallel authority.
For his part, Rafsanjani has tried to play down his role and said the SEC does not have any contact with the executive. ''The SEC used to have a supervisory role but now this role is with the Supreme Leader and we report any wrong doing to him,'' he said at a recent public function.
According to the secretary of the SEC, Mohsen Rezaee, Ayatollah Khamenei had in fact delegated some of his own powers to the SEC and that it would from now on supervise the affairs of the judiciary, executive and the legislature.
The new development has prompted cynical analysts to say that ''money and the members of the Iranian elite Hashemi Rafsanjani himself will now have the final say in Iran's day to day socio-economic and political lives".
For those who overwhelmingly voted for Ahmadinejad, the empowering of Hashemi Rafsanjani after the humiliating defeat at the hustings, is a blow but there has been no backlash so far except some murmuring in parliament and rumours across the country.
The acid test for the SEC is how much of a say it would have in the appointment of ministers to the key portfolios of oil, education cooperatives and social security and welfare - vacancies that Ahmadinejad has not been able to fill in so far.
Ahmadinejad who claimed that his electoral victory was nothing short of a ''second revolution'' after the creation of the Islamic Republic in 1979 has railed at 'gangs' with vested interests preventing from appointing an oil minister and many said the reference was to Rafsanjani and his yet powerful networks within and outside the country.
''We are a newly-founded private engineering and consulting company seeking oil fields development projects in which the government is the major client. As far as we are concerned, the lack of appointments means that it will be difficult to decide on tenders'' told IPS Ahmad Tofanian , an engineer told IPS.
Ahmadinejad has packed most of the other key jobs with hardliners including the governor-generals who administer provinces but many believe that these Osulgaraian (adherents of Islamic values) could end spoiling relations with countries that border the provinces they administer.
For now the concern is mainly the effect that the Osulgaraian are having on on the economic front and also on the diplomatic front where their lack of experience in handling international affairs is beginning to show up.
''All this has a great impact on economy of the country and slowed down particularly stock market and private sector as everything in limbo'', said Hasan Shbazian , an accountant in a civil engineering company.
''A few weeks before the new government took over the Tehran Stock Market(TSM) had begun to drop and since Ahmadinejad formed his (incomplete) cabinet the indices have kept on nosediving'', a stockbroker said.
Iran, the stockbroker continued, has been kept afloat so far by ''the magic of petro-dollars and with oil selling at over 50 dollars a barrel the government run companies have continued to do well since they are operating within an oil-exporting economy.''
Hussain Kadkhodaee , economist and expert on Tehran Stock Market shares the cynical view regarding the role of petroleum. ''About 70 percent of the Iranian Stock Market is in the control of the state-run companies , governmental investment firms, particularly those affiliated to the state-run banks,'' he pointed out.
Masoud Nili an economist close to the defeated reformists wrote in an editorial in the 'Shargh' daily on Sept.24: '' à the oil revenue is going to reach around 50 billion dollars by the end of this year ( Iranian calendar , ending March 21st 2006) but it may not bring fortune''.
The new government, while trying to ''bring the fruits of surging oil price to the table'' of ordinary Iranians, had better brace for fighting with the highly probable gallant inflation, Nili opined.
It is in this context that Ali Khamenei may have decided that it is best to temper Ahmadinejad's zeal with the practicality of Rafsanjani and also give him a hand to steer Iran through its present crisis with the West over the nuclear recycling issue. (END/2005)
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