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Obama at UN has surprise handshake with Zarif

President Obama shook hands Monday with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif at the United Nations when they accidentally crossed paths.

Word of the handshake was first reported in Tehran by the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA).  It was later confirmed by a White House official.

It did not take long for a hardline Majlis deputy to condemn any handshake as an anti-revolutionary act.

ISNA, citing a source close to Iran’s UN delegation, reported: “Dr. Zarif was leaving the hall when he accidentally faced Mr. Obama and John Kerry, who were about to enter. They briefly greeted each other and the two shook hands.”

Although Kerry, the US Secretary of State, and Zarif shook hands numerous times during talks on Iran’s nuclear program, the handshake with Obama would be the first between a US president and an Iranian official since before the Islamic revolution in 1979.

Despite the nuclear deal, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi has said the United States remains Iran’s “Number One enemy,” a label reiterated by Deputy Mansur Haqiqatpur as he slammed the handshake report.

“We hope this news is not confirmed because, if Mr. Zarif has done such a thing, he has definitely ignored the system’s red lines,” Haqiqatpur was quoted as saying by the Tasnim news agency.

Haqiqatpur  said the circumstances were not yet right to shake hands with any US president.  “America is still the enemy of the Iranian people and the US insists on its enmity toward Iran. Therefore, shaking hands with the enemy is contrary to the revolution’s principles and against the nation’s rights,” he said.

Zarif came in for a lot of criticism a few months ago when he was photographed walking across a bridge in Geneva and chatting with Kerry during a break in the nuclear talks.  That criticism faded after several days—as do most such verbal attacks by hardliners.

In 2013, just weeks after Rohani became president, Obama telephoned him in his limousine as he was being driven to the airport to leave New York after his first UN visit.  That call broke the ice and helped lead to the nuclear talks.  But it also made Rohani the target of much criticism.  Khamenehi said he would have preferred if the conversation had not taken place, but he did not criticize Rohani.

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