Iran Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (L) listens to the Supreme Leader, Tehran, Iran, July 15, 2018
UPDATE, MAY 3:
Iranian media have split over coverage of the Supreme Leader’s castigation of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.
The main English-language State outlet, Press TV, is direct: “Leader Rebukes Foreign Minister Zarif over Leaked Remarks on Foreign Policy”.
But other English-language sites ignore the comments. Mehr and Tasnim backs Ayatollah Khamenei’s affirmation of the military, after Zarif criticized its primacy in foreign policy: “Quds Force Major Factor Preventing Passive Diplomacy in West Asia: Leader”. Iran Daily prefers, “Leader Stresses Massive Turnout in Forthcoming Presidential Election”.
Farsi-language newspapers are vocal in backing the Supreme Leader’s smackdown of Zarif and the Foreign Ministry. Ebtekar headlines, “Leader: Foreign Policy Not Being Determined in Foreign Ministries Anywhere in the World.” Iran declares, “Leader: Foreign Ministry is an Enforcer of Policies Not a Policy Maker”.
ORIGINAL ENTRY, MAY 2: Iran’s Supreme Leader has blasted the Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, over Zarif’s leaked remarks about the primacy of the Revolutionary Guards in foreign policy and operations.
Ayatollah Khamenei said in a Sunday speech that he was “surprised and sorry” and then lowered the boom on Zarif: “Some of these comments are the repetition of the hostile talks of our enemies, the repetition of the words of America.”
Last week, an 191-minute extract from Zarif’s oral history on February 24 — for the records of a Government research center — were leaked by an unknown person to the London-based, Saudi-funded TV channel Iran International.
The Foreign Minister told his friend, economist Saeed Laylaz:
In the Islamic Republic the military field rules. I have sacrificed diplomacy for the military field rather than the field servicing diplomacy….The structure of our Foreign Ministry is mostly security oriented.
He said that the Guards often acted without consulting the Government, and that he learned of the extent of Israeli attacks on Assad regime and Iranian targets in Syria from former US Secretary of State John Kerry rather than from the military.
In an especially controversial passage, Zarif said the late Gen. Qassem Soleimani — the head of the Guards’ Quds Force, killed in a US drone strike in January 2020 — went to Moscow to “demolish our achievement” with the 2015 nuclear deal.
A Supreme Smackdown
Khamenei said on Sunday, “We shouldn’t say things that would convey the meaning that we are repeating what [our enemies] are saying, whether on the Quds Force or on martyr Soleimani.”
#Iran leader (on leaked audio of FM Zarif): We heard some officials saying some words that were shocking. We heard that the enemy media spread those words. It is unfortunate to hear them…We should not repeat what they (enemy) said about the Quds Force & Qassem Soleimani.
— Abas Aslani (@AbasAslani) May 2, 2021
The Supreme Leader did not deny the substance of Zarif’s remarks. Indeed, he reinforced them by saying the Foreign Ministry does not shape foreign policy but merely implements it.
He said the authority for foreign policy is with the Supreme National Security Council, comprised of top-level officials from different parts of the regime.
After the reprimand, Zarif praised Khamenei for a “unifying” speech: “Following the opinions and insights of the Leader is an undeniable necessity for foreign policy.”
He said he hoped that he and his colleagues, currently pursuing talks in Vienna over the 2015 nuclear deal, can fully implement the Leader’s ideas for Iranian progress.
#Iran FM @JZarif, in reaction to the speech by the leader, says "to me & my colleagues leader's compassionate remarks are last say & end point for expert discussion". He added he will work together with other officials in country in fully implementing the views of the leader.
— Abas Aslani (@AbasAslani) May 2, 2021
At the time of the taped interview, Zarif reportedly asked Khamenei for support against pressure from conservatives. The Foreign Minister promised not to run in June’s Presidential election.
Last week, after the leak of the audio, the Foreign Minister said he “was very sorry that a secret theoretical talk regarding the need for synergy between diplomacy and the (military) field…turns into domestic infighting”.
However, he implicitly pressed his case about the Guards’ pre-eminence in foreign policy, calling for a “smart adjustment” and “priorities through legal structures and under the great purview of the Supreme Leader”.
President Hassan Rouhani did not refute Zarif’s comments, but blamed the leak of the audio on “the Zionist Regime, regional reactionaries and the United States” because they “are angry about Iran’s achievements [and] because all the plots that they had attempted to hatch against our country for four years was gone”.
Rastgoo,
There was extensive evidence of intimidation and suppression of the opposition, including the raids, detentions, and cuts of communications. Your phrasing “voter intimidation” is a red herring.
And you probably should consider — if you’re looking for analysis and not just pumping out diversionary misinfo/disinfo — why the Supreme Leader accepted Rouhani as President in 2013.
S.
“And, oh yes, whataboutism and Trumpian disinfo.”
The 2020 election in the U.S was disputed – evidence was presented of irregularities. You dismissed those out of hand and did not demand a release of all electoral documents but you have done in the case of Iran. Why is it Trump disinfo but not Mousavi disinfo? That is double standards, not whataboutery.
https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/454884/Two-similar-claims-a-whole-world-of-different-reactions
“While Democrats strongly criticized Trump for declaring victory prematurely, they strongly supported Mir-Hossein Mousavi, a presidential candidate in Iran’s 2009 presidential election who strongly protested the results of the election, accusing his rival then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of rigging the election to secure his reelection.”
“…He said the Foreign Minister is part of the decision making process…”
NO, that is a lie! (not surprised) He said “decisions are made somewhere else with higher authority than foreign ministry”
The Foreign Minister is a member of the SNSC. Watch the full speech here: https://twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1kvJpoEvlqaGE?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1388848467531997186%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.presstv.com%2FDetail%2F2021%2F05%2F02%2F651765%2FIran-Leader-Ayatollah-Khamenei-rebuke-Zarif-IRGC-Quds-Force-General-Soleimani
” Remind me, again, if Mousavi’s candidacy was such a threat to the system that the election had to be manipulated in such a drastic manner, why was he ever approved by the Guardians council? ”
You can approve the Pope as candidate when you are going to cook the books to your own liking anyway.
“The Supreme Leader did not deny the substance of Zarif’s remarks. Indeed, he reinforced them by saying the Foreign Ministry does not shape foreign policy but merely implements it.”
He didn’t say that. He said the Foreign Minister is part of the decision making process – Zarif is a member of the SNSC – but that the ministry’s job is to implement policy when decided.
Leader rebukes Zarif: https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2021/05/02/651765/Iran-Leader-Ayatollah-Khamenei-rebuke-Zarif-IRGC-Quds-Force-General-Soleimani
“In the Islamic Republic, the foreign policy is determined at the Supreme National Security Council in the presence of the country’s authorities, and the Foreign Ministry should implement it using its own methods.”
Ayatollah Khamenei also talked about efforts to cast doubt about election integrity:
“Ayatollah Khamenei noted that despite some efforts made in a number of past elections to influence the voting process and the poll results, none of those efforts were important enough to affect the final result of the polls.”
If you’re having to declare 12 years later that you didn’t manipulate an election, that’s a good sign that an election might have been manipulated….
That’s your best “evidence”, is it? Remind me, again, if Mousavi’s candidacy was such a threat to the system that the election had to be manipulated in such a drastic manner, why was he ever approved by the Guardians council? Had it been a close race with a 100,000 votes in it, then a case for a stolen election could have been made But not when the margin is more than 11 million – as Khamenei himself stated.
If the 2009 election had been rigged, we would by now have some had some indication of this. But as the Iranian people themselves have declared, by a margin of 3:1, they believe that there was no major fraud: https://www.ipos.me/en/polls/2015/06/22/green-movement/
Now tell me why in the 2020 presidential election in the U.S, Trump did not win in Arizona (where an audit is now taking place) as well as Georgia and Wisconsin? He lost these three states together by just 40,000 votes that could have got him to 269. Why were the election forms not released by the officials? Why were GOP observers prevented from inspecting the ballots? What checks were in place for double voting?
Rastgoo,
The evidence is throughout 11 years of coverage of EA. I limited my comment to 1 (telling) sentence because I knew you would reply with irrelevance, dodgy polling, and no engagement with the facts at the time and afterward.
And, oh yes, whataboutism and Trumpian disinfo.
S.
One other thing. HOW was the election allegedly manipulated and WHO BY?
In your conspiracy theory, was it the Interior Ministry, the IRGC, the Guardians council or a combination? How did they change the vote counted at the local level (which in some places was >80% for the opposition candidates)?
“Some still charge that Ahmadinejad cheated. That is certainly a possibility, but it is difficult to see how he could have stolen the election by such a large margin. Doing so would have required the involvement of an incredible number of people, and would have risked creating numbers that quite plainly did not jibe with sentiment in each precinct. Widespread fraud would mean that Ahmadinejad manufactured numbers in Tehran without any regard for the vote. But he has many powerful enemies who would quickly have spotted this and would have called him on it. Mousavi still insists he was robbed, and we must remain open to the possibility that he was, although it is hard to see the mechanics of this.” https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/western-misconceptions-meet-iranian-reality
Until you provide an answer, you don’t have a case.
Rastgoo,
Posting a nonsense piece by George Friedman — who has no knowledge of Iran — doesn’t help your disinformation.
The evidence is not that “Ahmadinejad cheated”. It is that there was systematic suppression of opposition vote — including through intimidation, detention, and disruption of communications — and manipulation of vote in favor of Ahmadinejad.
Have a look at the organization of the Iranian system, with the Supreme Leader’s office at the top, and see if you can figure out how that might have been carried out.
Good luck.
S.
Btw, for those wishing to analyse the results to look for signs of “manipulation” read this: http://thomaslotze.com/iran/
Rastgoo,
This was so irrelevant that I found it amusing.
Thanks.
S.