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POLITICS: A Softer, Gentler Era of U.S., Iran Relations?
By Omid Memarian
BERKELEY, United States, May 3, 2007 (IPS) - Tehran's high-level presence at the
meeting this week in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt to discuss Iraq's security
boosts the chances for eventual negotiations between Tehran and Washington
over their long-running disputes, say analysts here and in Iran.
Even if direct talks do not occur this round, indications are that both
sides are seeking a way out of the impasse while saving face. White House
officials have lately modified their rhetoric on Iran, even though Iranian
officials have rejected substantive face-to-face meetings at the summit.
Iranian officials have said that Tehran is ready to negotiate so long as
it is "without any preconditions". The United States severed diplomatic
relations with Tehran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In recent months, U.S. officials have accused Iran of helping Iraqi Shiite
militias launch attacks on U.S. troops by infiltrating advanced explosive
device technology across the border. Iranian officials have repeatedly
denied these allegations, and Washington has produced no solid evidence to
support them. Meanwhile, the dispute over Iran's nuclear programme remains
at a standoff.
However, while U.S. President George W. Bush has repeatedly said all
options, including the use of force, are "on the table" to prevent Iran
from developing nuclear weapons, analysts believe that talking about
Iraq's stability could sideline this course of action and allow space for
diplomacy.
After the costly catastrophes in Iraq and Afghanistan, Iranian analysts
believe that the United States has already eliminated the possibility of
military action against Iran. Although the Bush administration has tried
to put pressure on Tehran by supporting U.N. Security Council sanctions
over its nuclear programme, there has been a shift from the "use of force"
to harsh diplomacy.
"A gradual sanctions scenario is currently under review in the U.S. In
this scenario, there are increasing steps of sanctions against Iran,"
prominent Iranian journalist and analyst Mashallah Shamsolvaezin told IPS
from Tehran. "The West believes the Iranian economy will not be able to
tolerate these sanctions on the one hand, and on the other hand they
believe that when Iran is completely exhausted by the sanctions, it will
come to the negotiating table about its nuclear plans."
He believes that the U.S. failure in Iraq and Afghanistan removes the
possibility of Washington contemplating a military option, politically or
economically.
"The only country that can prevent a cumulative crisis in both Iraq and
Afghanistan is Iran. If Iran becomes destabilised, the situation will
become gravely dangerous," added Shamsolvaezin, editor-in-chief of several
reformist newspapers that have been shut down by the government.
"Any attack on Iran will create tension in the region with a ripple effect
from northern Afghanistan's border with China all the way to the end of
Iraq and Jordan, and this is why it is not very likely that such an attack
will take place."
Dr. Abbas Milani, director of Hamid and Christina Moghadam Iranian Studies
at Stanford University, also believes that the new trend among politicians
in Tehran and Washington is reinforcing diplomacy rather than war
rhetoric.
"While there are certainly dedicated minorities in Iran and America who,
for different reasons, crave a military confrontation, even an attack on
Iran, and while in the expected discourse of diplomacy 'keeping all the
options on the table' is believed to be simply wise policy, I think a
majority of policy-makers in Washington and in Tehran have realised that
at this moment, direct negotiations, even if they end up in failure, is
much more in their interest than a military confrontation," Milani told
IPS.
"While the apologists of the Islamic Republic have for years advocated
'direct negotiations' between the U.S. and Iran, and have long argued that
the U.S. must give the mullahs what they want, there is another way of
approaching such negotiations," Milani said.
"The U.S. and Iran, according to this other paradigm, must engage in
direct negotiations over all the outstanding issues between them,
including the question of the human rights of the Iranian people," he
said. "While the U.S. must recognise that democracy in Iran can and must
only be created by the people of Iran themselves, it can, and hopefully
will, nevertheless, continue to oppose the obvious breaches of the Iranian
people's human rights by the regime in Tehran."
The idea of direct negotiations between Iran and the U.S., now the hottest
topic in the Iranian news media, has received mixed reactions from the
conservative newspaper Kayhan. In its main editorial last week, Kayhan
asked the Iranian government to take full advantage of this historic
opportunity to punish the U.S. in the region.
According to the editorial, "Bush wants to rescue the U.S. from the trap
in which they are caught, thereby saving [the Republican Party] from a
definitive loss in the next elections, hence the U.S. is attempting to get
closer to Iran to use it to solve its own problems."
The hardliner paper, known to be aligned with Iran's supreme leader and
which represents the most radical faction of conservatives in the country,
urged Iranian officials to ignore international requests for Tehran's
support for stability in Iraq.
"It is true that the U.S. is snarled in problems today, the solution to
which might solely rest in Iran's hands. It is natural for U.S. to wish to
utilise Iran's unique position to reduce its headaches; however, it is
feared that once these headaches diminish, the U.S. will become a new
headache itself for Iran and for the region," Kayhan argued.
Of course, for many Iranians, Kayhan's view is interpreted as official
propaganda. A political analyst in Tehran told IPS that the hardliners'
stance on the question, despite appearances, actually reflects their
eagerness to negotiate.
"Remember the arrest of 15 British sailors last month? This newspaper was
among the very few radicals who asked for their trial and even death,
while they claimed that the sailors have been spies," he told IPS on
condition of anonymity.
"But the president released them as an 'Easter gift', and gave them a
plethora gifts in a very unusual ceremony, while the same people who
protested in the streets against the sailors said nothing and even admired
the government," he added. "The more the ayatollahs' rhetoric gets harsh,
the more they tend to talk and negotiate. That's an Iranian style of
negotiation."
*Omid Memarian is an Iranian journalist and civil society activist. He has
won several awards, including Human Rights Watch's highest honour in 2005,
the Human Rights Defender Award.
(END)
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