28 Mar 2024
Monday 1 October 2018 - 23:46
Story Code : 321731

The United States and Iran: It's like "50 First Dates"

The New Yorker | Robin Wright: Last week, I went to a roundtable hosted by the Iranian President, Hassan Rouhani, near the United Nations. The Scottish-educated cleric, who wore a white turban and a black robe, strode through a chandeliered hotel ballroom with an entourage of bearded aides in dark suits but no neckties, a fashion item discouraged in the Islamic Republic. I also counted six U.S. Secret Service agentsconspicuous by their ties and clean-shaven faceswho fanned out in the corners. The Secret Service is charged with protecting any foreign head of state who visits the United States, whatever their nationality or relationship with Washington.


Ive been going to these annual events since 1987, when President Ali Khamenei became the first leader since the 1979 Revolution to attend the U.N. General Assembly. Hes now Irans Supreme Leader. Four Iranian Presidents have hosted these get-togethers, some several times. They often include senior White House and State Department officials from previous AdministrationsRepublican and Democraticand former members of Congress, as well as a few think tankers and journalists.

On paper, tensions between Tehran and Washington havent been so troubled since the early years of the Iranian Revolution, in the nineteen-eighties. Last week, President Trump unleashed his fury at the corrupt dictatorship, in two speeches at the United Nations. Irans leaders sow chaos, death, and destruction, he told the General Assembly. They do not respect their neighbors or borders and instead spread mayhem across the Middle East. In his own address in New York, the U.S. national-security adviser, John Bolton, warned Irans leadership that it would have hell to pay if you cross us, our allies, or our partners; if you harm our citizens; if you continue to lie, cheat, and deceive. Whatever the Trump Administrations denials, Irans leaders now believe the United States wants them overthrown.

A few hours later, Rouhani responded from the same dais. The U.S. approach to foreign relations is bullying and authoritarian, he charged. He cited unnamed rulers who invoke nationalism, racism and xenophobia resembling a Nazi disposition to trample global rules and institutions.

Neither President was in the chamber when the other spoke. Yet, in striking ways last week, both hinted that the door to diplomacy is not shut, despite Trumps renunciation, in May, of the historic 2015 nuclear deal. In a bizarre tweet on Tuesday, Trump wrote, I have no plans to meet Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Maybe someday in the future. I am sure he is an absolutely lovely man! Rouhani said something similar at the roundtable last week. I dont believe there are any challenges in the world that cant be resolved, he told us, from the head of a U-shaped table adorned with flowers from the colors of the Iranian flag. There is no dead end. There is always a way forward. More than once, he said it would be easier for both countries to go back to where they were six months agowhen the diplomatic channel was open, before the U.S. abandoned the nuclear dealthan to go back six years.

I asked how vulnerable Rouhani felt to internal pressure, since his Presidency was staked on dealing with the United States. Past Presidents, including Mohammad Khatami and the late Hashemi Rafsanjani, were penalized by their rivals in the political system after flirting with Washington. Khatami, who first suggested bringing down the wall of mistrust, two decades ago, is still banned from travelling, speaking publicly, or being quoted in the Iranian media. Rafsanjani, who orchestrated the arms-for-hostage swap in the eighties and offered the largest oil deal ever to Conoco, in the nineties, to launch rapprochement, was disqualified from running for office again; two of his children (one a former Member of Parliament) have been imprisoned. Even the hard-line Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was disqualified from running for Parliament after his Presidency; one of his Vice-Presidents was found guilty of corruption, another of threatening national security.

Renewed U.S. sanctions have also led big international companiesFrances Total, Germanys Siemens, Italys Danielito withdraw from the Iranian market this year. Irans currency has lost two-thirds of its value in the past six months. In one four-day period this month, the rial lost a quarter of its value. In December and January, protests over economic conditions erupted in all but one of Irans thirty-one provinces.

I have no regrets. I am not sorry, Rouhani replied. We reached a positive point. The revolutionary regime had proved to the world that it was willing to sit around the table, negotiate, and then comply when it signed an accord. Twelve reports by the International Atomic Energy Agency, which monitors nuclear proliferation, have verified Irans compliance. The five other major powers to the dealBritain, China, France, Germany, and Russiahave stuck by it. To circumvent renewed U.S. sanctions, the European Union announced plans during the U.N. General Assembly week to create a new financial entity to facilitate transactions with Irana move that could also challenge U.S. domination of the international financial system. It will be open to other partners in the world, the E.U. foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said, after meeting the Iranian Foreign Minister, Mohammed Javad Zarif.

On Saturday, after Rouhani had returned to Tehran, I spoke twice with Zarif, who was educated in the United States. He compared diplomacy with the United States to the 2004 movie 50 First Dates, starring Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, about a man who keeps having first dates with a woman whohas short-term memory loss and forgets him the next day.

We live in a world of possibilities, so nothing is impossible, but we need to see, he told me. First of all, were not angry. Now, if its going to lead to resolution, you need to be able to build on what you already have, because, I mean, you remember the movie 50 First Dates, when you start all over again the following day. We cant. This is impossible. You need to be able to have a relationship that is based on some foundations. And we have a documentthe nuclear dealthat is a hundred and fifty pages long. It's not a two-page document, he said, referring to Trumps agreement with the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, at their June summit.

So the door to diplomacy is still ajar? I asked.

Im not ruling out the prospect of talks provided the necessary conditions for talks, and that is reliability, Zarif said. Reliability is different from trust. Reliability is that when you sign something you are bound by it.Pacta sunt servandais the old idiom, the basis of international relations. (Ittranslates, from Latin, as treaties shall be complied with.) Otherwise everything will fall apart, he told me. We are waiting for some sense of realism.

At a press conference on Wednesday, Trump predicted, Irans going to come back to me and theyre going to make a good deal, I think. Rouhani said something similar when I met him. The U.S. cant sustain its decision to walk away, he predicted. Sooner or later, this hasty and immature action will come to an end.

Its happened before. The Trump Administration also pulled out ofnaftaafter labelling it a horrible deal that hurts U.S. interests. On Wednesday, the Presidentsaidhe was very unhappy with the negotiations and the negotiating style of Canada and was prepared to move ahead just with Mexico. He also said that hed rejected a request to meet Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the U.N. Over the weekend, however, the two nations brokered a rebranded deal that is not all that different fromnafta.

Negotiating a rebranded nuclear deal with Iran that also includes its missile program, interventions in the Middle East, and human-rights abuses is comparable to North Korea in terms of the complexity and fraught relationship. The volatility of the regional issues was reflected again on Monday, when Tehran fired missilesfrom Iranonisistargets in Syria. It was retaliation for an attack claimed byisisin the Iranian city of Ahvaz, on September 22nd , that killed more than two dozen people. But Irans broader role in Syria, where it supports the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, is uppermost among U.S. concerns.

The Administration is set to impose its toughest sanctions on Iranon all oil exportsnext month, tellingly on the November 4thanniversary of the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Whatever the slim prospects of another dealto avoid a more ominous confrontationtheres no sign yet of that fifty-firstdate.
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