Americans Need Talks with Iran
(FNA)- Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh said Washington is in need of negotiation with Tehran.
"The US and certain other countries need these negotiations (with Iran) and are waiting for its results," Hajizadeh said, addressing a ceremony in the Northwestern city of Zanjan on Tuesday.
Meantime, the senior commander stressed that the West's problems with Iran are not confined to the nuclear issue, as the US-led West is at odds with the strategies pursued by Iran's Islamic Revolution and its regional and global policies.
"They have problems with Iran's Islamic Revolution, Hezbollah (in Lebanon) and Palestine," the General said.
He stressed that Iran will not withdraw from its right of nuclear progress.
A US-based think tank said in September that Iran’s efficient role playing in the international community can best serve the long term interests of the US government and Washington needs better relations with Tehran.
Stephen Walt in a Foreign Policy article said that “the interim nuclear deal with Iran is an important step forward, and the various negotiating teams can be justly proud of their achievement”.
Yet, he reminded that this deal has its own opponents and proponents, but for the opponents the main issue is something beyond Iran’s nuclear program.
“The more important issues are Iran's future relations with the outside world and whether the deal paves the way for reintegrating that country into the world economy and the broader international community,” Walt said.
“The real issue is the long-term balance of power in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East. Iran has far more power potential than any of the other states in the region: a larger population, a fairly sophisticated and well-educated middle class, some good universities, and abundant oil and gas to boost economic growth”, he underlined.
He said that the real point behind the Israeli and Saudi officials opposing nuclear deal is that they want to keep Iran in a box for a long time, isolated, friendless and artificially weakened.
Walt added that besides solving the nuclear issue, the US should establish better relations with Iran in order to balance the power in the Middle East region and above all secure its long term interests since Washington needs good relations with as many countries as possible in the Middle-East. "America's long-term interests are best served by helping reintegrate Iran into the global community... and managing this process will require reassuring existing allies, but this development would also force current allies to listen to Washington a bit more attentively, which wouldn't be a bad thing."
“What matters is whether an agreement on that issue will allow relations between Iran and the United States and the rest of the G5+1 (the US, Russia, China, Britain and France plus Germany) to normalize in the months and years ahead. And it is that development that opponents of an agreement will be desperate to prevent”, he said.
Iran and the six major world powers have already held 8 rounds of nuclear negotiations after inking an interim agreement in Geneva in 2013, and have two weeks time to strike a final deal before the November 24 deadline.
Tehran and the six powers have already held seven rounds of talks in Vienna, and one more round in New York and on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. They started their 9th round of negotiations in Oman this morning.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, his US counterpart John Kerry and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton had earlier had two days of trilateral talks in Masqat on Sunday and Monday.
The Geneva agreement took effect on January 20 and expired six months later on July 20. In July, Tehran and the six countries agreed to extend negotiations until November 24 after they failed to reach an agreement on a number of key issues.