January 24-2014
by Warren L. Nelson
. . . did they misunderstand each other?
In one of the stranger stories in the history of international relations, Iran has been invited by the UN to a conference on Syria and then dis-invited less than 24 hours later when the Islamic Republic failed to do what the UN said it had pledged to do.
The embarrassing incident could come back to haunt Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif, who stood at the middle of the issue.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called a news conference Sunday afternoon to announce that he was inviting Iran to a meeting on Syria being held this week. He said he understood that Iran would be announcing Monday that it
would accept the foundational document of the meeting, and that Iran was therefore qualified to attend.
But on Monday, the Iranian government denounced that foundational document. Hours later, Ban’s office announced that Ban had rescinded his invitation and Iran would not be allowed to attend.
The key question was what Iran had told Ban that convinced him to invite Iran on Sunday. In the days since, Tehran has simply sidestepped that question and instead denounced the United States ad infinitum for pressuring Ban to rescind his invitation and denounced the United Nations for showing that it is under the thumb of the Americans.
But Ban clearly thought he had a deal with Zarif or he would never have issued the invitation.
What is unclear is whether: a) Zarif misled Ban with a lot of diplomatic gibberish that effectively suckered Ban; or b) Zarif thought he could make a commitment to support the meeting’s foundational document but was overruled by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi.
Either way, Zarif looks bad. In the first instance, he looks crafty but untrustworthy. In the second instance, he looks to have little power and is unable to make a commitment that will stick, the kiss of death for a foreign minister.
There is also a third possibility—that Ban fumbled the ball, thinking he heard Zarif make a commitment that he never had made and failing to nail down a crucial matter before acting.
At issue was a one-day conference in Switzerland on Syria being held this past Wednesday. It was really not all that important. It wasn’t even a negotiating conference. It was just a meeting intended to urge the contending parties in Syria toward a compromise. The actual negotiating was scheduled to begin today between the government of Bashar Al-Assad and an umbrella group of rebels.
The United States—as one of the sponsors along with Russia and the UN—had insisted that no country could attend the one-day session unless it first subscribed to the agreement that emerged from an earlier meeting, which said that the Syrian government and rebels should negotiate the setting up of an interim regime to take over from the Assad government until elections could be held. Iran has always rejected that foundational document.
Washington has said publicly and frequently that Iran could not be invited unless it changed its position.
Sunday afternoon, Ban called a news conference and announced that he was inviting another 10 countries—in addition to 30 invited some weeks back—and the last country he named was Iran.
Ban read a statement saying, “I have spoken at length in recent days with Iran’s foreign minister, Mr. Javad Zarif. He has assured me that, like all other countries invited to the opening day discussions in Montreux, Iran understands that the basis of the talks is the full implementation of the 30 June 2012 Geneva Communique, including the Action Plan. Foreign Minister Zarif and I agree that the goal of the negotiations is to establish, by mutual consent [of the rebels and Assad government], a transitional governing body with full executive powers. It was on that basis that Foreign Minister Zarif pledged that Iran would play a positive and constructive role in Montreux. Therefore, as convener and host of the conference, I have decided to issue an invitation to Iran to participate.”
In the Q&A that followed, Ban said, “I understand that they [Iran] may also issue a statement.”
In Washington, US officials were appalled that Ban would issue the invitation in advance of the promised statement. Clearly, Ban trusted the Islamic Republic much more than Washington. US officials said Ban had kept Secretary of State John Kerry informed of his talks with Zarif and had never hidden anything from Washington. But they said they consistently urged Ban to wait for a public statement from Tehran before issuing an invitation to make sure that Tehran wouldn’t just waffle and use vague and ambiguous terms.
The State Department swiftly issued a statement saying it considered Ban’s invitation “as conditioned on Iran’s explicit and public support for the full implementation of the Geneva communique.” That was a clear warning to Tehran that Washington would oppose the invitation publicly if Tehran failed to give “explicit and public” support.
Iran issued several statements the next morning. But they all contradicted what Ban had said. It was the diplomatic equivalent of spitting in his face.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham issued a very carefully phrased statement: “Based on the official invitation, Iran will participate in this conference without any preconditions.”
Lest that be unclear, Ali-Akbar Velayati, the chief foreign policy adviser to the Supreme Leader, spoke in more concrete terms: “If the invitation is based on accepting the Geneva I statement, it means a precondition and Iran will not accept it…. The Islamic Republic of Iran in no way accepts the Geneva I statement. And if the Geneva II conference is based on legitimizing the accords of Geneva I, Iran will not view it as a legitimate conference.”
Velayati rarely makes such policy statements. The fact that he did so in this case hinted to some that Khamenehi had intervened to put the kibosh on what Zarif wanted to do and Velayati was the hatchet man chosen to state Iran’s position since Zarif could not be trusted to do so.
Deputy Foreign Minister Hossain-Amir Abdollahian soon chimed in, saying, “Setting such a condition that we accept the Geneva I agreement as a condition for attending Geneva II is rejected and unaccepted.”
And Iran’s ambassador to the UN, Mohammad Khazaee, said, “If the participation of Iran is conditioned to accept Geneva I communique, Iran will not participate in Geneva II conference.”
Zarif was in Turkmenistan. He eventually came forward and said, “During the past week, Ban Ki-moon contacted me several times and I clearly told him that we would not accept any pre-condition to attend the Geneva conference.” Zarif was quoted in the media as saying he made clear Iran would “consider any statement to the contrary by the secretary general as being false.” If that was not calling Ban a liar, it was certainly calling him incompetent.
Other countries were not silent. Washington said Iran had to explicitly accept Geneva I to attend Geneva II. Britain and France both said the same thing. Saudi Arabia, which is usually silent in such matters, also spoke out against Iran, saying that no country sending combat forces to Syria could be allowed to attend.
Far more seriously, the rebel umbrella group announced that if Iran came to the conference, it would not. Without both the Syria government and rebels present, there could be no negotiations, so that announcement killed everything.
After Iran spoke out, Ban’s spokesman, Martin Nesirky, said Ban was “dismayed” by Iran’s statements and “is currently urgently considering his options.”
Hours later Ban’s office issued a statement saying the invitation to Iran had been rescinded. The key paragraph said: “In a series of meetings and telephone conversations, senior Iranian officials [note that the statement used the plural] assured the secretary general that Iran understood and supported the basis and goal of the conference, including the Geneva [I] communique. The secretary general is deeply disappointed by Iranian public statements today that are not at all consistent with that stated commitment. He continues to urge Iran to join the global consensus behind the Geneva communique. Given that it has chosen to remain outside that basic understanding, he has decided that the one-day Montreux gathering will proceed without Iran’s participation.”
The next day, Ban’s deputy press secretary, Farhan Haq, added more detail. He said, “There was an oral understanding that the secretary general had been led to believe would be followed by an actual written understanding,” Haq said Tuesday. “In fact, the opposite is what happened, that Iran stated the same positions that it had held previously. And that is why he [Ban] expressed his disappointment at Iran’s decision and took his decision to disinvite them.”
Haq added, “It doesn’t really make sense to have someone participate in discussions if they are doing it without understanding what the basis of the discussions are.”
Iran rushed to put the best spin on its rejection. Majlis Deputy Alaeddin Borujerdi, who chairs the National Security Committee, said, “This shows the reality that the UN secretary general and this organization [the UN] lack independence and are under US influence and pressure.” Borujerdi didn’t explain why Ban had then gone against Washington by issuing the invitation in the first place.
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Afkham called the withdrawal of the invitation “deplorable” and called on Ban to give “the real reason” he reversed himself.
Iran is now publicly arguing that nothing is likely to emerge from the Wednesday meeting without Iran’s presence. But what matters is what emerges from the Assad-rebel talks starting Friday, which Iran would not have attended anyway. Few have held out much hope for anything to emerge from those talks.
Zarif was quoted as telling the Iranian Students News Agency, “Iran was not too keen on attending in the first place.” That was a rewriting of history as Iran has been saying for weeks that Iran is an essential participant and that nothing can happen without Iran’s participation.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who has never agreed with the US demand that all those attending the Wednesday gathering accept the Geneva I outcome, said it was “a mistake” for Ban to rescind the invitation. But he quickly added that it was not “a catastrophe,” calling the one-day gathering of 39 nations a “one-day event” that is “largely ceremonial.”