Iran International
A member of Iran’s nuclear negotiating team says removing the terrorist designation of its Revolutionary Guard is not enough and Tehran wants other guarantees.
Mohammad Marandi, introduced in Iranian media as an “advisor” to its negotiating team, said in Tehran, “Even if America at this moment completely removes the Guards [IRGC] from the terrorism list, the current situation will not change and we would not be able to speak of an agreement, because there are still a few problems remaining, the most fundamental of which is a guarantee by the US over its possible obligations.”
The statement clearly reintroduced past Iranian demands that the United States would not withdraw from a new deal or impose future sanctions in the future. The Biden administration and others have said that the President constitutionally cannot provide such guarantees, as a future administration can act according to its own policies.
Iranian officials and politicians have tried to downplay the issue of removing the IRGC from the US list of terrorist organizations as the main hindrance to reaching an agreement. Marandi’s statement is a more direct manifestation of this approach, given the fact that he has acted as a media advisor to Tehran’s negotiating team.
Whether the emphasis on securing guarantees is an attempt to deflect popular resentment in Iran against the IRGC as the reason for the lack of an agreement, or it is a genuine shift in Tehran’s position in the talks, is difficult to say.
Marandi presented a realistic picture of the Biden administration’s precarious domestic situation in garnering support for reviving the 2015 nuclear agreement, JCPOA. He said there is considerable Congressional opposition to what opponents say are too many US concessions during the Vienna negotiations since April 2021.
But he presented an interpretation of the diplomatic situation that recently officials and media in Tehran have advanced. In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the West, especially Europe need Iran’s oil and natural gas and that puts pressure on them to make a deal.
The problem with this reasoning is that without full normalization of relations with the West, Iran’s capacity to supply significant amounts of oil, and especially gas, is very limited. A nuclear agreement would not be sufficient to unlock full Western financial and technological investments needed to boost Iran’s oil and gas production to a significant level. Iran has shortages of gas even for its domestic consumption and its oil minister Javad Owji has said that at least $160 billion is needed to revitalize oil and gas production.
Full normalization of relations means that Iran should drastically retreat from its aggressive regional policies amounting to an attempt to build a Shiite “empire” extending to the Mediterranean. However, Tehran calls its regional policy its “red line.”
Marandi in his interview explicitly brought up the issue of investments. “If there is no guarantee for foreign investments, no company will dare toenter the Iranian market to invest and this would clearly impact our economic interests.”
In other words, Iran wants full economic benefits just for a cap on its nuclear program. Given the secret nature of the Venna talks, it is not clear if the cap would be permanently preventing Iran from expanding its nuclear capabilities or would follow the original JCPOA sunset clauses.
Marandi insisted that the IRGC’s delisting issue is an excuse by the West not to give economic guarantees. In other words Iran’s position of receiving every concession but not negotiating over its regional policies would amount to “having your cake and eating it too.”
However, there was little if any sign of a positive attitude in the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman’s latest statement about the visit. Saeed Khatibzadeh said: "The United States has violated Iran's rights and has taken things from the Iranian nation's pocket which it should return."
Political analyst Ali Bigdeli told Nameh News website in Tehran on Monday that Mora's visit to Tehran is not likely to solve any problem. Bigdeli stressed that any breakthrough in the current situation of the talks needs a change of strategy and approach in Tehran.
Mora will stay in Tehran for more than one day, and this could mean that extensive talks are under way, although the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman's statement leaves very little hope for a "change of approach.” A change in Iran's strategy is even more unlikely following Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's meeting with Syria's Bashar al-Assad in Tehran on Sunday, as the outcome of the meeting could be a bigger role for Iran in the region.
During the past weeks some Iranian observers suggested that Iran should soften its positions in Vienna as the country badly needs an agreement that would reduce the pressure of sanctions on Iran's ailing economy.
Bigdeli said Mora was not successful in his previous missions to Tehran. This is his second visit since late March. He was not successful in his first visit as the Americans rejected the idea of delisting the IRGC as a terrorist group. But he added that now Biden might need an achievement before Congressional elections in November.
Bigdeli explained that "Talk of IRGC has derailed the nuclear negotiations. Now Iran needs to change its strategy about the region and problems are unlikely to be solved unless it adopts a pacifist approach to its regional and international strategy."
He added: "Iran needs to change its ideological anti-West approach which has led to the current deadlock. This has brought Israel closer to our borders…For once we should begin to change our views about the missile program, regional issues, human rights and so on if we really want to solve our problems."
Bigdeli stressed: "We should prioritize our national interests. Without doing so, Mora's visit and similar initiatives are not going to change anything. Our current approach has led to our isolation and created all of these economic problems."
Meanwhile, another Iranian political commentator and former diplomat Jalal Sadatian has also told Nameh News that "There is not much hope in reaching an agreement in Vienna unless one or both parties make essential changes to their positions."
He said, "Iran should have allowed the previous government [Hassan Rouhani] to forge an agreement as everything was ready [last year]. But that opportunity is lost.,” and now the IRGC issue is preventing a deal, waiting for a political decision to be made in Tehran [by Khamenei]."
Sadatian added that "in the current situation the US is not in a hurry as it knows that we have problems in our country." He went on to say that Iran is now more cautious in its relations with Moscow after the war in Ukraine and is counting to some extent on building better ties with Europe. But if the talks are not conclusive, pressures inside Iran will mount to a level higher than what we see today."