Iran

In his first statements on foreign policy, Islamic Republic’s new President Dr. Ayatollah Ebrahim Raisi made two claims: First that he would be the ultimate arbiter of Tehran’s foreign relations and, second, that his top priority is to “establish close ties with neighbors and promote peace and stability in West Asia.

(The ruling mullahs now use the term West Asia, which was circulated by the Soviet Union, instead of the Middle East, which they regard as a term coined by “Infidel powers.”)

Just week into his tenure, however, it is hard to find evidence to support Raisi’s claim.

The Iranian regime is nearing an atomic milestone in acquiring nuclear weapons. In the meantime, the Biden administration does not seem to have a clear agenda to prevent the mullahs from going nuclear. Even the New York Times reported that the Islamic Republic is “within roughly a month of having enough material to fuel a single nuclear weapon”.

Iran may now be capable of producing enough weapons-grade uranium for a single nuclear warhead within just a month. That’s according to US experts who were quoted in The New York Times last Wednesday after reviewing classified new data from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The experts weren’t permitted to speak in an official capacity, but told the newspaper off the record they think Iran could have the necessary materials to arm a warhead in the foreseeable future. But they think it will be some time before Tehran will have a deployable nuclear device.

“Return to the nuclear talks!” This is the advice that China, France and Russia have been publicly giving to Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s new team in Tehran since they assumed power last month. Other powers, notably Germany, have echoed that advice in private. There are signs that the new Raisi team may be listening to that advice or, at least, trying to prepare public opinion for a return to Vienna with its flag in its pocket.

Raisi, who had once dismissed any negotiations with big powers as “out of the question,” now says he always regarded negotiations as “one instrument of policy.”

Several developments have contributed to what seems a less belligerent stance by Tehran.

While the Biden administration and other members of the United Nations Security Council continue to push for the resuscitation of the disastrous nuclear deal — granting Iran nuclear weapons and global legitimacy — they have turned a blind eye to the mullahs’ ever-increasing violations of human rights.

Recently, a hacking group calling itself Edalat-e Ali (Ali’s Justice) leaked videos of Iran’s prisons, some of which revealed abuse, including beatings and other unspeakable treatment of detainees carried out by the Iranian authorities at the notorious Evin Prison, where political prisoners are held. “We will continue to expose the oppression,” that the Iranian government is “inflicting on people,” the group said.

The past four decades in which the Khomeinist ideology has dominated Iranian state structures, a new breed of “Iranologists” has emerged in Western academic and media circles. Most old Iranologists saw Iran as a glorious but long dead civilization distinguished by religious tolerance, ethnic diversity and an abiding love of artistic creativity. Those who focused on Iran’s story after the advent of Islam recognized monarchy and the Shi’ite clerical institution that, while at times in conflict, played complementary roles in Iranian society.

With the seizure of power in 1979 by the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a new breed of Iranologists emerged to declare the definite end of monarchy in Iran and the advent of a theocratic regime backed by re-energized clergy.