‘Usual tactics’: Euro, US diplomats see Iran dangle to avert IAEA censure as ‘too little, too late’
Diplomats from the US, Britain, France and Germany were meeting in Paris to consult ahead of an IAEA board meeting Nov. 16 in which they're expected to censure Iran for lack of cooperation with probe.
If two months ago it seemed that there might be a window after the U.S. midterm elections last week in which Iran might potentially come back to try to finalize a deal on restoring the 2015 nuclear deal, U.S. and European diplomats and analysts say there is no sign as yet that Iran is preparing to do that.
And with Iran supplying drones to Russia that are being used to attack Ukraine, and Iranian security forces beating and jailing thousands of young Iranians initially spurred to protest by the death of Mahsa Amini following her arrest by Iran’s so-called morality police, European and American positions have grown harder towards Iran.
“It’s clear that there has not been any game-changing moves presented by the Iranian side to make the Americans and the Europeans think that they can revamp the political track for restoring the JCPOA,” said Ellie Geranmayeh, senior fellow and deputy head of the Middle East program at the European Council for Foreign Relations, referring to the acronym for the nuclear pact, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
“I think we are in a situation where the politics, inside Iran with the demonstrations, but also the Ukraine nexus on Iran, means that Iran will have to present the E3 and the U.S. with a very credible position that it wants a deal, and that it’s not just going to engage in talks for the sake of what the Europeans sense was time-wasting over the summer and dragging their feet,” Geranmayeh said, referring to the three European parties to the deal, Britain, France and Germany.
US Iran envoy Rob Malley was in Paris meeting with his E3 counterparts, the State Department said today (Nov. 15). The nations are expected to introduce a resolution censuring Iran for lack of progress in cooperating with a safeguards probe at an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors meeting set to get underway in Vienna on Thursday (Nov. 16).
Iran, in advance of it, dangled the prospect of a visit for IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi and inspectors, but only after the Board of Governors meeting.
Western diplomats said the Iranian offer, apparently discussed in a phone call between Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian and European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Monday, was a predictable tactic to try to avert the censure resolution.
The Iranians offered “a visit by Grossi, which of course they threaten to take off the table if there is censure,” an E3 diplomat, speaking not for attribution, said today. “Too little, too late, as usual.”
“We stick to objective measures of cooperation, or lack thereof, as reflected in the [IAEA Director General’s] reports,” the E3 diplomat said.
“Usual tactics,” another European diplomat said of the Iranian dangle. “They are so predictable.”
Asked if there was any sign of an Iranian good will gesture forthcoming, the European diplomat said no. “Just procrastinating.”
In Iran, protests picked up again today. In Tehran, major subway stops were filled with pockets of demonstrators, chanting anti-regime slogans, a contact in the city said. The majority of stores were also closed in Tajrish’s old Bazaar, north of Tehran, he said.
Videos showed large crowds chanting at a Tehran subway stop. Another incredibly disturbing video appeared to show a security official shooting into a crowd.
Western position hardening
The Europeans, Americans and Iranians may have already moved into a kind of nebulous, post-JCPOA Plan B, several analysts said.
“The E3 position, having been impacted by the protests in Iran and Tehran’s drone exports, appears to be hardening away from a pro-JCPOA position to a plan B posture,” said Sanam Vakil, deputy director of the Middle East program at Chatham House. “The challenge is that no progress or consensus on plan B posturing has emerged.”
Because Iran is repressing its own people and sending arms to Russia to kill Ukrainians, “the appetite in the West for a deal that would grant Iran sanctions relief is significantly diminished,” said Ali Vaez, director of the Iran program at the International Crisis Group.
The United States today announced new sanctions against a half dozen entities and two individuals it said are involved with the production and ongoing transfer to Russia of Iranian unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), including Shahed Aviation Industries Research Center and Russia’s Wagner group. That follows the European Union and Britain yesterday separately designating almost thirty individuals and entities accused of human rights abuses in Iran.
Inertia phase
“The state of play does not lend itself to an assessment that Iran has its ducks in order and knows what it wants from the western side,” Geranmayeh said. “I think there is also understandable hesitation from the E3 and US from engaging and being burnt again—especially when they would take an active hit” for doing so now amid the ongoing Iranian protests.
“So we are left in this weird inertia phase,” Geranmayeh said.
“My sense is the EU team is still best placed for trying to kick-start a series of discussions on this issue,” she said. “The E3 is meeting in Paris with the US team, focused on the [IAEA board of governors] meeting at the end of the week … and planning for the potential fallout and what steps Iran will take to react to the censure.”
“Maybe both the Europeans and Americans and Iranians are in the Plan B phase already,” Geranmayeh said. “Where the U.S. and Europeans are upping the pressure [issuing new sanctions over the protests and drone shipments] on a biweekly basis, and the Iranians are kicking along the nuclear program, expanding it.” The parties could soon be entering “a situation of ambiguity of Iran being a nuclear threshold state.”
“Some might say this sort of contained escalation could work for both the American side and [Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei,” Geranmayeh said. “Because they are neither expending political capital required on both sides for a deal, nor are they escalating to a military tit for tat.”
“But how long,” she added, “can you just simmer along at high heat.”
The EU still hopes to revive the JCPOA, but its position towards Iran is hardening in particular over Tehran’s drone transfers to Russia, a European-based source said.
After the EU’s Borrell spoke with Amir-Abdollahian yesterday, “he was quite cautious about prospects of reviving the agreement,” the source, speaking not for attribution, said. “But the whole stance in Brussels is still very much in favor of getting it done.”
“Now what substantially complicates the whole thing is…the whole drone thing,” the source said. “In Europe, this is felt very strongly. The Nordic and Baltic countries in particular are really concerned with that…but also in Germany,” where, he said, the Green party acts as a kind of “opposition within the government.”
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