Fars News reported on comments by Iranian negotiator Hossein Ghorbanzadeh about the course of the talks on Sunday at the Burgenstock Resort near Lucerne, Switzerland.
He indicated that real progress was made on some issues, especially the conditional lifting of US sanctions on Iranian oil and petroleum products, saying that draft language to that effect will soon be finalized and then put into practice.
(It might be noted that only Congress can permanently lift sanctions, but that in the case of Syria Trump has been issuing serial 6-month waivers on sanctions from the executive branch.)
Ghorbanzadeh said the discussions focused on the five principal paragraphs of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) , as envisaged in clause 13.
These included: 1) the end of the war on all fronts [i.e. including Lebanon], 2) the lifting of the blockade, 3) the reopening of the Strait, 4) the temporary lifting of sanctions on Iranian petroleum, and 5) the unfreezing of Iran’s sequestered assets.
He said that Lebanon, i.e. the first point above concerning ending the war on all fronts, loomed large in Sunday’s talks. Ghorbanzadeh insisted that the MOU cannot be implemented until the war in Lebanon ceases.
Although Fars News maintains that the Iranian team has left the site of the negotiations and returned to their hotel rooms on hearing about Trump’s violent threats on Sunday, that move appears to have been a bit of theater and not a sign that the talks were being discontinued.
Even as the Iranian negotiating team in Switzerland pursued these talks, President Massoud Pezeshkian was forced to deny any rift with the country’s clerical Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, regarding negotiating with the Americans. Pezeshkian said that all three branches of government were united behind the talks, which he underlined were aimed at improving the standard of living for all Iranians. He therefore was taking his case against the hardliners — who reject the negotiations — to the public, who are demonstrably upset about their declining standard of living. Khamenei had issued a statement saying that he initially opposed the parleys, but was convinced by the president to go forward. Pezeshkian’s critics in parliament are warning him against contravening the leader’s red lines on Iranian sovereignty. (Thanks to BBC Monitoring for some of this analysis.)
Meanwhilte, The Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement jointly with Pakistan on Sunday’s round of negotiations at Burgenstock, Switzerland between the US and Iran, with Pakistan and Qatar as intermediaries.
The statement is relatively upbeat and belies the Iranian story that they stormed out at the end because of US President Donald Trump’s belligerent tweet. Qatar and Pakistan say that “Encouraging progress has been made including the creation of a mechanism for further technical talks.”
They reveal that the negotiating parties have set up a “High Level Committee” to oversee the further mediation and reach a final understanding within two months. Under it will be working groups focused on sanctions and the nuclear issue.
There will also be a dispute resolution group that will seek to make sure the Memorandum of Understanding is put into effect.
Taking a page out of the Cold War playbook, the High Level Committee will set up an open line of communication among the US, Iran, Pakistan and Qatar to deal with potential misunderstandings and to ensure that commercial ships can pass through the Strait of Hormuz.
Photo of Lake Lucerne by Lin Mei on Unsplash
This mechanism recalls the hotline that Lyndon Johnson set up with the Soviet Union, which actually operated by teletype. That step was intended to forestall another unfortunate incident like the Cuban Missile Crisis. Lyndon Johnson first used the hotline during the 1967 Six Day War.
Given that US politicians like the madman Lindsey Graham are again hinting around at nuking Iran, the analogy to the 1960s hotline seems apt.
Along these lines of attempting to prevent a return to active hostilities, the statement says that “the parties agreed on the creation of a de-confliction cell, between the parties, the Lebanese Republic and facilitated by the Mediators, to ensure the adherence of the termination of military operations in Lebanon as per the MoU.”
They affirm that the Burgenstock resort near Lucerne, Switzerland, will be the site of continued “technical talks” throughout the coming week.
Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Distinguished University Professor in the History Department at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page
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