The Turkish foreign minister spent about two and a half hours briefing editors and columnists last Tuesday on the joint declaration signed in Tehran between Iran, Brazil, and Turkey. The deal, reached after eighteen hours of negotiations, resembled a similar agreement from last October that the Iranians first accepted and then rejected.
The foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu, presented his case in detail and reiterated that his government kept in touch with the US, as did the Brazilians, whom the Iranians said they would consider to be a mediator. Referring to a letter that President Obama sent to the Brazilian president and the Turkish prime minister, Davutoğlu argued that the deal satisfied all of the United States’ conditions : that 1,200 kilograms of low-enriched uranium be transferred out of Iran (in this case, to Turkey), that this transfer be done all at once, and that the fuel rods would be given to Iran within a year.
For the Turkish contingent this was a good deal. The hard work of gaining the trust of the Iranians over the past few years, when Turkey was seen as an apologist for Iran, had paid off. The Iranians trusted the Turks and this is why, in the end, they signed the deal. It must have helped that the Turkish prime minister, Tayyip Erdoğan, told the Iranians that he would not join President Lula of Brazil in Tehran if the Iranians had nothing new to offer. Since Erdoğan indicated that he believed the Iranian program was for civilian purposes only — and repeatedly referenced Israel’s nuclear arms every time he spoke on the Iran issue — his message must have gotten the attention it deserved.
In the end, the Turks and the Brazilians became convinced that this deal could preclude the need for new sanctions. The agreement put a timetable in place and laid out well established principles ; its language observed the rules of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) but also recognized Iran’s right to enrich uranium under the NPT. At the very least, getting Iran’s signature on a formal international document for the first time in a long time was quite important in itself. Davutoğlu was particularly fond of telling his audience at the press conference that he spoke with all the relevant parties in Iran every time he went there in search of a diplomatic solution that would avoid sanctions.
Turkey devoted a great deal of diplomacy to such a solution because while it objects to Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons, it also opposes the military option and stands against sanctions that would be detrimental to its economic interests. Ankara not only brokered a deal that helped itself, but one that the United States and the West should not have any reason to protest — and which could very well pave the way for a more comprehensive diplomatic resolution of the issue.
That the Obama administration strongly disagreed became clear within hours of the news. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Russia and China were on board for a new sanctions package that would be taken to the UN Security Council. For Clinton this was the best answer to what Iran had been trying to do in the last few days. This not only showed that the US didn’t approve of the Tehran agreement, but that it probably had never expected the Iranians to sign it at all. That a couple of mid-level powers were taking matters into their own hands on an issue that occupied center stage in American diplomatic efforts surely added to Washington’s annoyance. Last but not least, Iran said that it would continue to enrich uranium as well.
Looking at the way the press in the US covered this story, I was deeply surprised to see pundits and other members of the American news media once again commenting on world events as if the Iraq War had never happened. Without recognizing how damaged American credibility has become as a result of the war — no less because it so egregiously abused the UN process through misinformation, bullying, and manipulation — it will be difficult for the American public to appreciate what other countries are doing.
After all, the Iraq War was disastrous for the Middle East. It was the Bush administratiom’s rejection of a diplomatic deal by Iran that pushed the scales in favor of Ahmedinejad and an accelerated nuclear enrichment program. It is the Iraq War that made Iran as powerful in Iraq and the Gulf as it is today. So it is difficult to convince regional powers not to speak of populations of the wisdom of American diplomacy all the time.
The historical role of the Obama administration is at least in part the restoration of American credibility. But American and Western credibility cannot be put back in place in total disregard for what other interested parties are saying. If indeed a new world order is in the offing, this will require more participation between great powers and mid-ranking ones. That Iran is not a credible interlocutor and that it has misled negotiators and negotiated in bad faith are all widely shared opinions. Yet this does not suffice to keep the West or the US on the right side of the international agenda all the time.
In this particular instance it is clear that the Iranians played their cards well. But one has to appreciate as well that the deal could be the beginning of a new diplomatic process. The demand by Turkey and Brazil to meet with P5+1 and even participate in the permanent members’ meeting ought not be dismissed automatically. The great powers ought to lend an ear to these two rising powers. Given the fact that everyone talks about the inefficacy of sanctions perhaps it is time to give more imaginative diplomacy a chance.
This will be the line that Turkey will defend anyway.
Turkey and the US have many common interests in Iraq and AfPak, on energy and other matters. The Iran issue was always going to be a difficult one for the two allies to handle. Because of the declaration and Turkey’s conviction that it obviates a sanctions package, the two partners will have to clear the air between each other. Turkey is a non-permanent member of the Security Council and under the current circumstances is likely to vote no on the US proposal — or at best abstain.
This would in due time help deteriorate Turkish-American relations. Whether the Iranians deserve such principled stance by Turkey is a different matter that can only be known if the exchange is allowed to proceed.
