Analysis on Iran and U.S. Diplomacy

Semira Nikou, from the United States Institute of Peace, speaks with Seyed Hossein Mousavian, the former foreign policy adviser to Iran’s former nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani on whether Iran is “ready” to begin diplomatic negotiations with the United States.   According to Mousavian, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will be “ready to negotiate” once Iran is offered the “right solutions package” by the P5+1 (five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany).  Additionally, Mousavian emphasizes that Khamenei “issued a fatwa in 1995 against weapons of mass destruction.  But he is against discrimination, suspension of [uranium enrichment], and the deprivation of Iran’s rights under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).”

Mousavian also says that sanctions “will not change Iran’s nuclear posture” and instead, U.S. sanctions have made Iran more “suspicious of the United States intentions.”  According to Mousavian, the Iranian government views unilateral sanctions as “mechanisms promoted to make a comprehensive agreement impossible and maintain the regime change scenario always on the table.”

Additionally, Geoffrey Kemp writes in the Iran Primer that there are three major obstacles that will prevent diplomatic negotiations with Iran.  According to Kemp, the first obstacle is the power struggle between the parliamentary conservatives and the president’s office, specifically between the supreme leader and the president. The second obstacle is that Republicans are likely to increase pressure on President Barack Obama to enforce more sanctions, and increase isolation and rhetoric about a military strike against Iran.   Kemp argues that, “the third constraint is that the regional dynamics are so volatile that any tentative agreement between the United States and Iran will be held hostage to what is happening in key countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Egypt and Syria.”