Obama, Rouhani back resumption of nuclear talks
AP
This combination made with file photos shows (from left) President
Barack Obama, Iranian President Hasan Rouhani, Syrian President Bashar
Assad and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Hopeful yet unyielding, President Barack Obama and new
Iranian President Hasan Rouhani both spoke up fervently for improved
relations and a resumption of stalled nuclear talks on Tuesday at the
U.N. but gave no ground on the long-held positions that have scuttled
previous attempts to break the impasse.
The leaders’
separate appearances at the United Nations General Assembly came amid
heightened speculation about a thaw in U.S.-Iranian relations following
the election of Mr. Rouhani, a more-moderate sounding cleric. In fact,
officials from both countries had quietly negotiated the possibility of a
brief meeting between Mr. Obama and Mr. Rouhani.
But
U.S. officials said the Iranians told them Tuesday that an encounter
would be “too complicated” given uncertainty about how it would be
received in Tehran. Instead, Mr. Obama and Mr. Rouhani traded their
public messages during addresses hours apart at the annual U.N.
meetings.
Mr. Obama declared that it was worth
pursuing diplomacy with Iran even though scepticism persists about
Tehran’s willingness to back up its recent overtures with concrete
actions to answer strong concerns at the U.N. and in many nations that
the Iranians are working to develop a nuclear bomb.
“The
roadblocks may prove to be too great, but I firmly believe the
diplomatic path must be tested,” Mr. Obama said. He added that he while
he was “encouraged” by Mr. Rouhani’s election, the new president’s
“conciliatory words will have to be matched by actions that are
transparent and verifiable.”
Mr. Rouhani, making his
international debut, said Iran was ready to enter talks “without delay”
and insisted his country was not interested in escalating tensions with
the U.S. He said Iran must retain the right to enrich uranium, but he
vigorously denied that his country was seeking to build a nuclear
weapon.
“Nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass
destruction have no place in Iran’s security and defence doctrine, and
contradict our fundamental religious and ethnical convictions,” Mr.
Rouhani declared. “Our national interests make it imperative that we
remove any and all reasonable concerns about Iran’s peaceful nuclear
programme.”
U.S. officials said they were not
surprised to see Mr. Rouhani publicly stake out those positions on the
international stage. Still, they say they see him as a more moderate
leader elected by an Iranian public frustrated by international
isolation and the crippling sanctions.
In another sign Mr. Rouhani was seeking a more conciliatory tone, he switched briefly from Farsi to English in a CNN interview
aired on Tuesday night a gesture that would have been difficult to
imagine under Mr. Rouhani’s predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
“I would like to say to American people- I bring peace and friendship from Iranians to Americans,” Mr. Rouhani said.
Still,
the Obama administration is unclear whether Mr. Rouhani is willing to
take the steps the U.S. is seeking in order to ease the sanctions,
including curbing uranium enrichment and closing the underground Fordo
nuclear facility.
The U.S. and its allies have long
suspected that Iran is trying to produce a nuclear weapon, though Tehran
insists its nuclear activities are only for producing energy and for
medical research.
Even without a meeting between Mr.
Obama and Mr. Rouhani, it was clear that the U.S. and Iran were edging
close to direct talks. Mr. Obama said he was tasking Secretary of State
John Kerry with pursuing the prospect of a nuclear agreement with Iran.
Kerry, along with representatives from five other world powers, is to
meet Thursday with Iran’s new foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif.
If
Mr. Kerry and Mr. Zarif hold one-on-one talks on the sidelines of that
meeting, it would mark the first direct engagement in six years between a
U.S. secretary of state and an Iranian foreign minister. A spokeswoman
for Mr. Zarif said on Thursday’s meeting indeed would mark the beginning
of a “new era” in relations with the West.
Mr.
Rouhani did hold a formal bilateral meeting on Tuesday with French
President Francois Hollande, whose country is among the Western nations
that have been seeking a diplomatic resolution to the Iranian nuclear
dispute. It was the first meeting of French and Iranian presidents since
2005, when Jacques Chirac hosted Mohammad Khatami in Paris.
The
potential for direct engagement between the U.S. and Iran was being
closely watched by Israel, which has long sought tough punishments
against Tehran in retaliation for its nuclear program. Following Mr.
Rouhani’s speech, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused him
of “hypocrisy” and said the new Iranian leader showed no sign of halting
his nuclear program.
“This is precisely the Iranian
intention, to talk and buy time in order to advance its ability to
achieve nuclear weapons,” Mr. Netanyahu said.
Mr.
Obama will seek to allay Mr. Netanyahu’s concerns next week, when the
Israeli leader visits the White House. Ahead of that visit, Mr. Obama
signalled that any transformation in the American relationship with Iran
would take time.
“The suspicion runs too deep,” he
said. “But I do believe that if we can resolve the issue of Iran’s
nuclear program, that can serve as a major step down a long road toward a
different relationship, one based on mutual interests and mutual
respect.”
Mr. Obama first reached out to Mr. Rouhani
this summer, with a letter congratulating him on his election and
expressing urgency in resolving their nuclear disagreement before a
diplomatic window closes. Mr. Rouhani responded with a letter of his
own, thanking Mr. Obama for his outreach. In subsequent interviews,
Rouhani also has suggested an interest in a new start between the U.S.
and Iran.
In the days leading up to Mr. Obama’s and
Mr. Rouhani’s appearances at the U.N., American and Iranian officials
were negotiating the possibility of a brief encounter between the
leaders, Obama administration officials said. The last time an American
and Iranian leader met was in 1977, before the U.S. cut off diplomatic
ties with Tehran following the Islamic revolution and the siege of the
American Embassy.
The officials said the White House
was open to the exchange, but the Iranians told them Tuesday that they
couldn’t have a leadership-level meeting at this point.
“The
Iranians have an internal dynamic that they have to manage and the
relationship with the United States is clearly quite different than the
relationship that Iran has with other Western nations,” one senior
administration official said. That official spoke only on condition of
anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the U.S.
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