Obama Seeking A Channel To Khamenei?
Obama Seeking A Channel To Khamenei?
In what I’m going to interpret as clear evidence that President Obama reads this blog, the Wall Street Journal reports that the administration is “looking at ways to develop a direct line of communication to [Iranian] Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.”
American and European officials say Mr. Khamenei is the only Iranian leader who can make the ultimate decision to suspend or freeze Iran’s nuclear program.
“The key issue is now to find a channel to Khamenei,” said a senior Western diplomat briefed on the Obama administration’s policy review in recent days. “If the supreme leader moves, he’s going to do it in a very prudent and incremental way.”
The discussions are part of a larger Iran-policy review that the Obama administration is aiming to complete this month, according to U.S. officials. [...]
The Obama administration’s first direct contact with Iranian officials is expected to come later this month at a U.N.-sanctioned conference on Afghanistan in the Netherlands. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other U.S. officials say Washington and Tehran could collaborate in countering the Afghan narcotics trade and weakening the Taliban.
Interestingly, the story notes a “growing consensus is that the U.S. should seek to begin a dialogue with Iran before June elections there, despite concerns that such recognition could strengthen the position of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.” Back in November, the Carnegie Endowment’s Karim Sadjadpour advised U.S. policymakers to “refrain from making any grand overtures to Tehran that could redeem Ahmadinejad’s leadership and increase his popularity ahead of the country’s June 2009 presidential elections.” I’m not sure that seeking a channel to the supreme leader necessarily qualifies as a “grand overture,” though, as much as a simple acknowledgment of who the decider is.
In any case, now would be a great time for everyone to go and read Sadjadpour’s excellent review of Khamenei’s writings and speeches, which Sadjadpour suggests “present arguably the most accurate reflection of Iranian domestic and foreign policy aims and actions over the last two decades.”
4 Responses to “Obama Seeking A Channel To Khamenei?”
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So someone reads one Iranian dissident and one report and that makes you an expert? It’s progress, I’ll give you that.
Ahmadinejad is not the Supreme Leader of Iran and it’s nice to see the US government admitting the obvious.
When you can extemporize on Khamenei and Yazdi and the Assembly of Experts, then I’ll be impressed. When you can extemporize on Kiarostami and the Makhmalbafs I’ll entertain the thought that you may actually take people from other countries as seriously as you take Americans.
I won’t wait up.
March 13th, 2009 at 4:43 pmNormally is the foreign ministry elected, to speak with foreign politicians to avoid any disturb of peace.
March 13th, 2009 at 6:20 pmBut since the enemies for US are very rare, it’s not fashioned to talk about problems directly.
I remember 2003 an austrian politician said he want to go to talk with saddam Hussein about his outlook on the situation and further acts.
This was called diplomatie for thousands of years, and it’s the base of human social life.
But the axis of willinngs called him crazy idiot.
Since USA rules the world, diplomacy means: to be an owner of nuclear weapons! But speech is, what human divides from animal.
Remember when McCain acted incredulously when Obama pointed out that Ahmadinejad was not the most powerful person in Iran? Good times.
McCain really didn’t know.
What a relief to have an *intelligent* person in the White House. You know. Who actually knows about reality and stuff.
March 14th, 2009 at 4:04 amThe neocons and others who support military advances against Iran have been driving the narrative, with the media’s help, that contends Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
However the IAEA recently reported again that Iran is not developing nuclear weapons. Furthermore all of Iran’s installed nuclear equipment remain under the agency’s surveillance and containment guidelines.
In order for Iran to construct a nuclear device, the ton of low-enriched uranium at Natanz would need to be run through a second cascade of high-speed centrifuges to produce 55-pounds of highly enriched uranium. Having retained full access to Natanz, IAEA inspectors found no evidence of that.
Notably nuclear arms production requires an enrichment level above 90%. After twenty-one unannounced inspections at Iran’s nuclear sites the agency confirmed Iran only managed to enrich uranium to a level less than 5%.
As a signatory to the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Iran is allowed to enrich uranium for civilian purposes. By all means and purposes Iran appears to be in accordance with the NPT and the IAEA. Yet without evidence or reason to believe Iran is developing nuclear weapons the US continues to insist otherwise. Given his recent remarks Obama agrees.
Although his foreign policy is pragmatically different, how he approaches Iran is a point of contention.
Prior to Ahmadinejad — Iran tried several times, thru back-channel communications, to contact the Bush administration. Despite Iran’s willingness to discuss a diverse range of subjects including uranium enrichment, anti-Israel and terrorism, Bush and Cheney still refused to talk. Presumably because talking leads to negotiations: translated means making political concessions which Bush and more-so Cheney adamantly opposed.
For the sake humanity we need to learn how to co-exist peacefully in a troubled world.
Thus conversing with unfriendly nations is not optional.
But the dialogue must be based on factual evidence not a discredited narrative.
March 15th, 2009 at 4:58 am