Nuclear Issues

Having been targeted indirectly by the “leading from behind” policy under President Obama, Iran is now faced with a more organized US effort under Trump to establish a regional setting — an "Arab NATO," the Middle East Strategic Alliance (MESA) — that is supposed to “push back” against Iran. Against this backdrop, however, Iran does not seem worried about US efforts to create MESA. In fact, Washington’s new anti-Iran campaign in the Middle East and beyond is interpreted as falling within the “milking logic” of the Trump administration.

In 2006, in the midst of a fierce war between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice famously stated that the world was witnessing the “birth pangs of a new Middle East.” She was right—but not in the sense she had hoped. Instead of disempowering Hezbollah and its sponsor, Iran, the war only augmented the strength and prestige of what is known as the “axis of resistance,” a power bloc that includes Iran, Iraq, Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas in Palestine.

As part of the India and South Asia Program’s annual speaker series, Ambassador MaleehaLodhi, the Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to the United Nations discussed her country’s regional agenda.

Iran is holding a high-stakes parliamentary election Friday. In mid-January, the conservative Guardian Council surprised some observers with the massdisqualification of reformist candidates in Iran’s upcoming parliamentary elections. This institutional gambit was partially rescinded a few weeks later, after a new review of the qualifications of the candidates. While the disqualifications show that the conservatives still hold the reins of power in Iran’s political system and set the terms of the game, as the reversals signal, they cannot dictate the final results or eliminate competition.

With the successful negotiation of the nuclear agreement, the coalition that backed President Hassan Rouhani on the deal will begin to fragment as factional rivalries and infighting increase and once again shape political competition inside Iran. The electoral results, however, will not have a significant impact on the continued implementation of the nuclear agreement. Instead, the conservative establishment in Tehran seeks to maintain leverage over Rouhani on broader international developments as well as domestic matters. In particular, these elections will be more important in determining the future path of development Iran chooses and how economic reform will be undertaken by the Rouhani administration.

"Now that President Barack Obama has secured more than enough votes in the U.S. Senate to assure the implementation of the agreement with Iran on nuclear issues and sanctions, we can focus on the lessons learned from the process’ intense political dynamics. Three in particular stand out: U.S.-Israeli, U.S.-Saudi Arabian/Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and GCC-Iranian relations. U.S.-Israeli bilateral ties get the most attention these days, but all three are equally important, and turbulent in their own ways."

In the wake of yet another extension in the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1, the next step for the United States to move toward a final comprehensive agreement with Iran is to engage with those Iranians it likes the least—the hardliners. Crafting a sophisticated agreement capable of persuading Iranian hardliners and the Revolutionary Guards to accept a final deal is essential to moving the negotiations forward. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and his moderate team of negotiators are constrained by the hardliners who, in turn, have nothing to lose if negotiations fail. While the lifting of international sanctions is commonly considered to be the main economic incentive for Iran to agree to a deal, we should be aware that many U.S. sanctions will remain against key hardline actors in the Iranian regime for non-nuclear related reasons. In other words, those hardline elements most opposed to the current talks—the spoilers—are also the ones that have the least to gain from their success.

"While a threat to U.S. interests, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) presents us with a unique opportunity to 'reset' the Middle East equation—to actively transform regional relations, to abate the cold war between Iran and Saudi Arabia and to forge a new working relationship with Iran," writes Payam Mohseni. "As the United States moves to escalate its war against ISIS and forge a coalition against the terrorist group, it is important that Iran be included in the process. After all, U.S. and Iranian interests have increasingly converged in the Middle East with the emergence of a common enemy, and no power in the region is better suited to taking on ISIS than Iran and its affiliated Shi’a militias in Iraq."

Payam Mohseni, just returned from a long trip to Iran, offers his observations on Iranian attitudes toward nuclear negotiations gleaned from meetings with Iranians from across the political spectrum. He finds a distinct disconnect between Iranian and American perceptions of the relationship between the two countries.