Negotiations in Vienna between Iran and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany for reviving the 2015 nuclear agreement, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, have been suspended for weeks.
All sides are in apparent agreement that most issues have been resolved and that a draft accord outlining the framework for returning Iran and the United States to their obligations under the JCPOA is, for all practical purposes, ready for signing. While Enrique Mora, the European Union’s foreign policy coordinator, has said that there remain a few unresolved issues, the most important obstacle to concluding negotiations is Washington’s refusal to remove Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from its list of foreign terrorist organizations.
But, in contrast to the their Western media image as a cohesive and homogeneous political force completely united in insisting on the IRGC’s removal from the terrorism list, Iran’s hardliners actually have deep fissures within their ranks, deepened even more by the total economic incompetence of the administration of President Ebrahim Raisi.
During his “campaign” for the presidency, Raisi had promised that his administration will quickly tame the high inflation, reduce unemployment, take care of the poor, and build one million new homes every year for the people. After ten months in office, Iran’s economy is in worse shape than it was last year at this time, even though Iran now exports 1.2 million barrels per day of oil, nearly twice the amount compared to last year. Moreover, its export earnings should be significantly more today; the market price in 2021 was about 65 dollars per barrel; it now hovers around 120 dollars.
Regarding the JCPOA, Iran’s hardliners can be divided into two groups. The first group consists of the “rejectionists” — those who oppose JCPOA, with some even advocating exiting the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Chief among these are Saeed Jalili, Iran’s top nuclear negotiator during the administration of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He was so ineffective that when the United States and Iran began negotiating secretly in Oman in 2012, he was left out.
Several months ago, Jalili wrote a 200-page letter to the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urging him to leave the JCPOA altogether, enrich uranium to 90 percent or higher, beyond the threshold for making nuclear bomb, and then use it as a winning card in direct negotiations with the United States. Others in this group include Hossein Shariatmadari, managing editor of the hardline daily Kayhan, the media mouthpiece of a faction of IRGC officers; Javad Karimi-Ghodousi, a former commander of the IRGC’s Basij militia who now serves in parliament (Majlis); and the rejectionist faction in the Majlis that represents Jebheh Paydaari Enghelab-e Eslami (The Resistance Front of the Islamic Revolution), the most radical right wing of Iran’s political groups.
In addition, a group of relatively young hardliners, who refer to themselves as “innovative revolutionaries,” oppose any engagement with Washington and have assailed former President Hassan Rouhani and his foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, for negotiating and signing the JCPOA. A prominent member of this group is Vahid Jalili, Saeed’s younger brother, who is now deputy director of Seda va Sima [Voices and Visages], a national network of radio and television controlled by hardliners.
Ironically, Iran’s current chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani, was himself one of the fiercest critics of both the previous government and the JCPOA itself. Many in Iran blame him for delaying negotiations between the Raisi and Biden administrations last year and now for failing to conclude the negotiations.
The second group consists of relatively pragmatic conservatives and hardliners who believe a return to the JCPOA serves their interests provided that a face-saving way can be found that will protect them against attacks by the first group. Chief among them is Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian.
A modus operandi of Iran’s hardliners is that, before embarking on a new major policy initiative, be it domestic or international, they float “rumors” or “trial balloons” in order to gauge the public’s reaction, as well as those of their opponents among the political factions. Amir-Abdollahian appeared to be doing just that a while ago when he said in an interview, “Top officials of the Sepah (IRGC) have emphasized to the Foreign Ministry that you should do whatever is needed for our nation’s national interests, and if you reached a point at which the [only] issue was Sepah, it should not be an impediment to [your] negotiations.”
In other words, Amir-Abdollahian, a conservative career diplomat, was hinting that the issue of removal of IRGC from the terrorist list should not prevent Tehran and Washington from concluding an agreement for returning to the JCPOA. The rejectionist front reacted fiercely to Amir-Abdollahian’s position, with Shariatmadari angrily demanding an explanation.
Although Amir-Abdollahian appeared to retreat, he is still quietly advocating a more flexible and moderate foreign policy, particularly regarding the nuclear negotiations. When he spoke recently at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, he complained about rejectionists in the Majlis preventing him from concluding the Vienna negotiations. He also downplayed the importance of the discussions surrounding the IRGC’s terrorist designation and condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which was surprising, given the close ties between the hardliners and Moscow.
Both Zarif and Rouhani have repeatedly emphasized that the tentative agreement that they had negotiated with the Biden administration last year regarding the restoration of the JCPOA, included the removal of the IRGC from the terrorist list. If true, it would be the Biden administration that is reneging on its earlier promises, once again missing an opportunity for reaching an agreement with Tehran that would reduce tensions in the Middle East.
Peaceful demonstrations against the government’s incompetence in addressing the deteriorating economic situation, and, more generally, the rule of the hardliners have been taking place in Iran for some time. The middle class, Iran’s engine of change, has, however, largely stayed home due to its own economic insecurity and fears that escalating tensions with the United States may lead Iran to a fate similar to those of Syria and Libya. But if the JCPOA is restored, the economy begins to recover, and tensions between Tehran and Washington are reduced, the middle class will much more likely join the push for a more representative political system in Iran.
