September 27-2013
Over the several days before the UN General Assembly session Tuesday, both Iranian and American officials made increasingly clear that they were interested in a face-to-face meeting between President Obama and President Rohani.
No one suggested this would be a substantive meeting. It would be little more than a handshake and a photo of the two presidents smiling. But it would make big news and show the ice was breaking and the two countries could at last talk, if not agree.
But at the last minute on Tuesday, Iran said it was ”too complicated” to arrange such a brief get together.
There was time for Rohani to meet the director of the International Monetary Fund and the president of France and assorted other political celebs. But there wasn’t time for Obama.
No one saw it as a slight to Obama. But many saw it as a sign that Rohani didn’t dare go too far and be photographed with Obama. That could enflame the passions of hardliners in Tehran.
Rohani was believed to want a meeting. It clearly fit in with his charm offensive. His aides had kept the option open for days, a further indication of his interest. But at the last minute, the door was slammed shut.
Did the Supreme Leader order Rohani to stay away from Obama? Did Rohani get cold feet as some of the hardliners at home began muttering nastily about the evils of dealing with Washington? That isn’t known.
Had it come off, it would have been the first face-to-face meeting of Iranian chiefs of state since 1978, when President Jimmy Carter famously spoke to the Shah about the stability be brought to Iran. That was only days before the first anti-Shah protest in February 1978 started the revolution.
The White House had proposed “an encounter” on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly — something well shy of a formal sit-down meeting. But two US officials sent to brief reporters said they heard back Tuesday that even such a low-key conversation was “too complicated for Iranians to do at this point,” according to one of the officials.
The officials said the highest level Iran-US meeting this week would involve Secretary of State John Kerry and Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif meeting in the same room Wednesday with the foreign ministers of the other Big Six countries in a ceremonial gathering to kick start the resumption of nuclear talks.
After days of trying to work out the diplomatic logistics of even a casual grip-and-grin, “it was clear that it was too complicated for them,” one official said. “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,” he said, in an apparent reference to the power of hardliners in Tehran.