by Farideh Farhi
Paul Pillar has aptly explained why the vote this week in the House of Representatives for even more sanctions against Iran (H.R. 850) is at odds with the stated US foreign policy objective of changing Iran’s nuclear policies. While the Senate is unlikely to go along, at [...]]]>
by Farideh Farhi
Paul Pillar has aptly explained why the vote this week in the House of Representatives for even more sanctions against Iran (H.R. 850) is at odds with the stated US foreign policy objective of changing Iran’s nuclear policies. While the Senate is unlikely to go along, at least for now, the vote brings into question the motives for such a move.
I do not know whether the folks in the House wanted to remain in the good graces of the pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, as Ali Gharib and M.J. Rosenberg suggest, or if they really do want to block any possibility of a deal with Iran to hasten regime change — which State Department folks keep telling me is not the official and stated policy of the US government. The bottom line is, however, that the motives are irrelevant to the chilling effect the vote’s outcome will have on negotiations and Iran’s skepticism about the Obama administration’s ability to “have the sanctions gone in a moment if it will substantively and constructively negotiate with the P5+1” as stated last month by Wendy Sherman, the US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs.
The vote is undoubtedly a signal that members of Congress are more interested in making the Iranian government cry uncle than negotiating. That’s not a smart move if the US government’s objective and stated policy is to convince Iran to limit its nuclear program and subject it to a more robust inspection regime. And let’s be clear: the message is not only to the Iranian government; it’s also to the Iranian people.
There is really no going around it. The House’s vote also shows the proverbial middle finger to the Iranian electorate, who went to the polls on June 14 in large numbers to the tune of 73 percent — a significantly higher participation rate than in years of US presidential elections — and voted for someone who was an unlikely victor because of his stated desire to reroute Iran’s foreign policy and improve relations with the world. That same electorate then treated Hassan Rouhani’s victory as a reflection of its will by celebrating in the streets.
Just to reiterate, in addition to the systemic odds against him, Rouhani was elected by an Iranian public who refused inaction despite the results of the contested 2009 election and the repression that followed. Prodded by two former presidents, centrist Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and reformist Mohammad Khatami, Iranian voters forcefully entered the fray to support Rouhani’s key promises of “prudent” economic management, interaction with the world and a relaxation of the highly securitized political atmosphere.
The vote ensures that Rouhani will be actively involved in convincing his Western interlocutors as well as skeptics inside Iran that through diplomacy, an agreement that respects Iran’s sovereignty — as well as the Islamic Republic’s legitimacy in protecting that sovereignty — and addresses Western concerns regarding the potential weaponization of Iran’s nuclear program is possible.
It is true that Rouhani will not be the sole decision-maker and has to negotiate with Iran’s other centers of power. An agreement must also receive broad support inside Iran and could be torpedoed by domestic forces framing it as a disproportionate concession to Western “bullying”.
But the need to convince other domestic stakeholders should not be confused with Rouhani not being given room to pursue, at least for a while, a “fair” agreement that also addresses the P5+1′s concerns. The fact that Rouhani is being told by no less than Leader Ali Khamenei not to trust Western powers should be construed as Khamenei’s fall-back “I told you so” position in case of failure and not an inhibitor of the attempt to reach an agreement.
Both reformist Khatami and hardline Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were given room to negotiate with Western powers during their presidencies. An agreement during Khatami’s presidency could not be reached because of the Bush administration’s insistence on “not a single centrifuge spinning.” A potential confidence-building agreement to transfer fissile material out of Iran during Ahmadinejad’s presidency was first rejected by a whole array of political forces inside Iran who were fearful that a deal with outsiders would pave the way for domestic repression in the tumultuous post-2009 election. Later, a similar agreement was rejected by the Obama administration, which did not want to abandon the success it was having in creating a willing coalition in favor of sanctions.
And herein lies the challenge for the folks who seem to have a voracious appetite for sanctions. In voting into office a reasonable face of Iran, the Iranian electorate is also counting on an encounter with the US’ reasonable face. Demanding significant confidence-building measures from Iran in exchange for vague promises of significant steps by Western powers in the future — promises that, given Congress’ stamp on many of the sanctions in place, are unlikely to be fulfilled soon — doesn’t seem all that reasonable.
The attitude and judgment of the Iranian electorate should not be taken lightly. In the midst of a region where hope about the positive impact of an Obama presidency has all but vanished, failure to reach an agreement with the reasonable face of Iran will be perceived as yet another clueless — and dangerous — US policy of heavy-handed demands without a clear understanding of the end game and the costs for achieving it.
With the Iranian government and electorate in the same corner, at least for now, it will be much harder to describe the sanctions regime as anything but a vindictive policy of collective punishment intended to not only bring down the Iranian government, but also destabilize the lives and livelihoods of the Iranian people. An academic who regularly visits Iran recently told me he was surprised by the extent of negative attitudes towards the US even in northern Tehran — the supposed bastion of secular and “westernized Iranians”. Things have really changed in a couple of years, he said.
I am not very keen on anecdotal evidence but the observation makes sense. Moves that reject the Iranian people’s efforts to change the course of their government’s policies and instead intensify policies of collective punishment will reap what they sow.
Photo Credit: Mona Hoobehfekr
]]>by Peter Jenkins
In 1729, two years after the publication of Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift, Dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, wrote a scathing satire on the English elite’s indifference to the plight of Ireland’s rural poor.
The “modest proposal” that he put forward was that each year 120,000 Irish [...]]]>
by Peter Jenkins
In 1729, two years after the publication of Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift, Dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, wrote a scathing satire on the English elite’s indifference to the plight of Ireland’s rural poor.
The “modest proposal” that he put forward was that each year 120,000 Irish infants should be slaughtered upon reaching their first birthday and offered as a delicacy for the nourishment of Ireland’s Anglo-Irish land-owners and administrators as well as for export to England.
“I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled, and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout,” Swift wrote.
If Swift were alive today, what, I wonder, would he make of the indifference of US Congressmen and women to the hardship that Iran’s poorer classes are experiencing as a result of US-inspired commercial and financial sanctions, and the loss of income those sanctions have inflicted on commercial and financial enterprises in countries that have been trading partners of Iran but also think of themselves as allies of the US?
Perhaps Swift would be tempted to offer the good members of Congress an updated modest proposal, along the following lines.
]]>I am deeply impressed by the honest desire of the noble members of the Congress of the United States of America to secure respect for the rights of the benighted inhabitants of Persia, as demonstrated in a Bill (H.R. 850) “to impose additional human rights and economic and financial sanctions with respect to Iran, and for other purposes”.
I humbly suggest to their Honours that the sanctions proposed in this Bill are too mild to admit the probability that they will achieve improvement in the conduct of the rulers of Persia which is thereby sought.
I therefore venture to propose that the measures contemplated in this Bill be complemented in the following ways.
Congress shall require the President of the United States of America to take advantage of the manifest truth that Persia constitutes a threat to the peace and safety of the entire globe and to secure the passage of a United Nations resolution which will require members of that institution to surrender to the United States jurisdiction over any offspring of Persian parents below the age of 12 years who are resident in their land.
These children shall be despatched to the United States where they will be interned at the expense of those members of the North Atlantic Alliance which have failed to make an adequate contribution to the wars fought by the United States to bring freedom and democracy to the inhabitants of Mesopotamia and Afghanistan.
The internment of these children will serve to induce the inhabitants of Persia, whose rights are so generously cherished by the honourable Congressmen, to expel their rulers and introduce a government that is ready to respect the wishes of Congress in all regards.
Should any member of the United Nations refuse to comply with the aforesaid resolution, the President is to be required to execute the confiscation of such monies as that state may have deposited in the vaults of American banks, by way of retribution. Confiscated monies shall be transferred to Congress to defray the expense of enacting this measure and to ensure that members of Congress have the wherewithal to achieve re-election.
The offspring of Persian parents resident in the United States shall be exempt from this measure except insofar as one of the Persian parents, or both, is a vendor of used motor conveyances. Experience has shown that vendors of used motor conveyances who are of Persian origin constitute a mortal threat to the survival of a great nation. Their good conduct must be obtained by holding their children as guarantors.
I submit that this measure will bring upon the noble representatives of the American people renown more lasting than bronze.
by Jamal Abdi
The notion that U.S. sanctions on Iran are supposed to act as diplomatic leverage to get a nuclear deal may be dispelled once and for all by a new Congressional action now in the works.
The House is poised to move ahead with a new round of [...]]]>
by Jamal Abdi
The notion that U.S. sanctions on Iran are supposed to act as diplomatic leverage to get a nuclear deal may be dispelled once and for all by a new Congressional action now in the works.
The House is poised to move ahead with a new round of Iran sanctions, and a slew of new sanctions proposals are set to be introduced in the Senate, even as a host of current and former senior U.S. officials — including Secretary of State John Kerry – have warned the body to hold off on new sanctions at the risk of imperiling a diplomatic resolution to the nuclear standoff.
For some in Congress, this seems to be precisely the point.
Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL) is circulating a draft measure that would make regime change, not a negotiated solution, the official U.S. policy. Kirk promises to introduce that measure shortly, but first will introduce two smaller sanction measures to cut off Iran’s foreign exchange and block its natural gas deals, all building up to the grand finale. The first was introduced this week, S.892, which is designed to cut off Iranian access to euros. It would sanction any foreign entity that converts currency held by Iran’s Central Bank or other sanctioned Iranian entities into non-local currency. Blocking off Iranian access to euros will of course make it more difficult for Iran to purchase Western medicines and exacerbate the reported sanctions-induced medicine shortage now plaguing Iran.
Sen. Kirk hopes to attach these smaller bills to another sanctions package in the House before formally introducing his regime change bill. That bill will mandate that sanctions be kept in place until Iran transitions to a democratic government — a preposterous notion given the disastrous effect sanctions are having on Iran’s civil society and democracy movement. The bill would echo the Iraq Liberation Act, which was passed and signed by President Clinton in 1998 and cemented regime change as the official policy toward Saddam Hussein. That measure all but guaranteed Saddam would not comply with sanctions — what was the point if they would never be lifted? — and was cited by Congress as the basis for authorizing war with Iraq four years later.
In the meantime, the House is considering H.R.850, a measure that would sanction U.S. allies that conduct commercial transactions with Iran. Despite existing humanitarian waivers, this could affect transactions that include food and medicine as commercial entities and banks are becoming increasingly fearful of conducting any business transaction with Iran for fear of being penalized by the United States. Congress attempted to pass a similar measure last year as part of a previous sanctions package, but removed it at the last minute after intervention by the Obama Administration. A Congressional aide told Congressional Quarterly at the time that the measure “would be impossible to enforce and only make our allies really angry. They would have endangered their cooperation with the sanctions we have now.”
Nevertheless, the House Foreign Affairs Committee is looking to move H.R.850 in a matter of weeks. Next Wednesday, the committee will hold a hearing with Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman, the top U.S. negotiator conducting multilateral talks with Iran, and Treasury Under Secretary for Financial Intelligence and Terrorism David Cohen, who is in charge of implementing the Iran sanctions. Committee Chairman Ed Royce ominously said the hearing was “a chance to press the Administration on critical questions surrounding U.S. participation in the P5+1 negotiations and its implications for the enforcement of sanctions.” The implication being that the U.S. could be implementing more sanctions if pesky diplomacy wasn’t getting in the way. The next step would be to move the sanctions bill.
Regardless of what Sherman and Cohen tell the chamber, it may make no difference. Secretary of State John Kerry implored the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in April to hold off on further sanctions and to not interfere with diplomatic efforts to little effect. Congress has become increasingly bold in dismissing the White House’s requests when it comes to Iran. Congress has also thus far ignored reports from senior former officials like Tom Pickering, Dick Lugar, Ann Marie Slaughter warning that sanctions were outpacing negotiations and threatening to upend the diplomatic process.
The Kirk measure on foreign exchange introduced this week, in fact, circumvents the White House and doesn’t even require the President’s signature. It pronounces that, regardless of when the bill would actually be passed, the sanctions on foreign exchange would go into effect starting May 9. This means the U.S. will retroactively issue sanctions against any bank conducting a transaction after this date, so long as the bill passes at some point. It is essentially sanctions by Congressional decree. The threat of sanctions from the Hill is now so great that they do not even need to be passed to have a chilling effect. It is a stunning display of impunity by Iran hawks in Congress and groups like AIPAC and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies that are supporting these measures.
It’s little wonder, then, that the narrative in Tehran is that even if Iran complies with U.S. demands on its nuclear program, the sanctions will continue and the President can’t do a thing about it. While Kirk’s Iraq Liberation Act for Iran may not yet be introduced, he may not have to get his final bill passed in order to lock in the sanctions as regime change policy.
The dominant narrative in Tehran is already that, much like with Saddam’s Iraq, the sanctions on Iran will never be lifted. The President has no mechanism to formally lift many of the hardest hitting sanctions — he is dependent on Congress. And Congressional hawks have indicated that if Iran compromises, it will be proof the sanctions are working and instead of easing them in a quid pro quo, more sanctions should be passed. Tehran’s narrative is being reinforced by Congress, and unless the U.S. can convey that there is an offramp from sanctions, Iran’s nuclear program will likely continue apace.
– Jamal Abdi is the Policy Director of the National Iranian American Council, the largest grassroots organization representing the Iranian-American community in the US. He previously worked in Congress as a Policy Advisor on foreign affairs issues. Follow Jamal on Twitter: @jabdi
Photo: The Central Bank building in Tehran, Iran.
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