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Eurasia
March 1, 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 18
Iran’s reformists fight to hold on to Zarif
Will Conroy in Prague
Reformists in Iran have mounted a rearguard action to call on President Hassan Rouhani to refuse the shock resignation request of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif announced late on February 25. Whether Zarif stays on or not may determine whether the hardliners in the country manage to tip the balance in foreign policy and pull Iran out of the nuclear deal.
With Iran under excruciating economic pressure brought about by the sanctions-led economic at- tack the US has directed at the country, veteran diplomat Zarif and fellow centrist pragmatists in the government are on a daily basis under intense pressure from hardliners and the conservative theocracy led by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that vets the Rouhani administration’s decisions.
Although Zarif, popular with voters, has not stated exactly why he asked to quit in an Instagram message posted in the middle of the night, an interview he gave to Jomhuri Eslami newspaper, published on February 24, was telling. In it, Zarif condemned infighting between Iran’s parties and factions as a “deadly poison” and said it was a barrier to devising foreign policy. “We first have to remove our foreign policy from the issue of party and factional fighting,” Zarif said. “The deadly poison for foreign policy is for foreign policy to become an issue of party and factional fighting.”
It was Zarif, who to the fury of hardliners who said that the US could never be trusted, negotiated the
Zarif casts his vote in the 2017 poll that saw the landslide re-election of President Rouhani.
late 2015 nuclear deal with Obama administra- tion, France, Germany, the UK, Russia and China.
After Donald Trump in May last year unilaterally pulled Washington out of the multilateral pact and announced he would use the heaviest sanctions ever imposed on the Islamic Republic in a bid to crush its economy to the point that Tehran would come to the table to make concessions on its Middle East policies and activities, the hardliners felt vindicated. Many angry voices demanded that Iran itself should respond by immediately walk- ing out of the accord (formally named the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, JCPOA), but with the remaining signatories pledging to stay in the agreement and protect it, Zarif and the Rouhani administration have taken the line that the best path remains sticking with the deal in a strategy that involves working to a ‘West minus Trump’ approach.
The strategy does indeed damage the credibility of the US as the world’s foremost power – resist- ance to Trump’s sanctions approach towards Iran has, for instance, partly prompted efforts by the EU, Russia, China, Turkey and other countries to work towards mechanisms whereby the weight of the dollar in world trade will be reduced – but Iran is hurting; it’s economy is back in recession and it is particularly notable that the EU, as vocal as it has been in opposing Trump’s attempt to bin the JCPOA, has come up with very little to protect trade and investment centred on Iran, with mem- ber states and companies fearing US reprisals.