Erdogan's Saudi Visit Signals Isolation For Iran - Analyst
Iran is facing an uphill battle in its foreign relations, an analyst has said in Tehran in the wake of Turkish President Recep Erdogan’s visit to Saudi Arabia.
Iran is facing an uphill battle in its foreign relations, an analyst has said in Tehran in the wake of Turkish President Recep Erdogan’s visit to Saudi Arabia.
In a shift in its regional policy, Erdogan this week visited Saudi Arabia, while having delayed a similar visit to Iran. Abdolreza Farajirad, a professor of international relations in Tehran told ILNA news website that Erdogan is signalling his preference to strengthen ties with Riyadh amid his country’s economic crisis.
Iran is under United States’ sanctions, he said, and Erdogan needs economic partners.
Turkey and Saudi Arabia have a common will to "reactivate a great economic potential" between the two countries, Erdogan said on Saturday, after his first trip to the kingdom since 2017.
Speaking to reporters on a flight back from Saudi Arabia, where he sought to mend frayed ties, Erdogan said the sides were determined to accelerate efforts for the common interests and stability of the region, Turkish media reported.
"We agreed with Saudi Arabia to reactivate a great economic potential through organizations that will bring our investors together," Erdogan said.
Farajirad said that Erdogan is acting according to Turkey’s national interests. US sanctions have reduced Turkish-Iranian commerce and what Ankara needs is investments and trade. He pointed out that Erdogan’s outreach began with the United Arab Emirates and then Israel, culminating with his trip to Saudi Arabia.
Over his long tenure, Erdogan has shown that he is capable of shifting his foreign policy direction to address Turkey’s needs, Farajirad said emphasizing the importance of pursuing national interests.
Although he could not openly criticize the Islamic Republic in Iran’s controlled media environment, the analyst was indirectly drawing a parallel between Turkish foreign policy and Iran’s ideological approach to foreign policy.
“This shows our foreign policy is at an impasse, although I don’t want to criticize the foreign ministry, but until there is no agreement in Vienna, the impasse will continue,” Farajirad argued.
After more than year of negotiations with world powers, particularly with the United States in Vienna, Iran has still not agreed to revive the 2015 nuclear agreement, JCPOA, demanding that its Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) be removed from a US list of terrorist organizations.
Washington, in return, maintains that the terrorist designation has nothing to do with the nuclear issue, and if Tehran wants non-nuclear sanctions to be removed it should be willing to discuss its destabilizing regional role.
So far, the Islamic Republic has remained defiant, emphasizing its opposition to Israel and Arab countries that have normalized ties with the Jewish state.
The IRGC continues to speak loudly and emphasize its ongoing support to militant groups in the region.
Farajirad argued that in the meantime, Riyadh’s foreign policy has become active again, taking positions which make it easier for other countries to draw closer to its positions. As a result, it has had successes in improving ties with Qatar and Turkey and also influence events in Lebanon and Pakistan, where the Muslim League has returned to power.
Erdogan, in turn, has found the moment opportune for trying to benefit from Saudi Arabia’s vast financial resources, especially at a time of high oil prices, “to benefit from trade with Saudi Arabia and investments by Riyadh.”
A short audio recording was published by Israeli media on Saturday with a photo of a man introduced as Iranian national Mansour Rasouli, 52. In the audio recording, Rasouli says he was sent to Turkey by the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) to establishing an operational network to assassinate an Israeli diplomat in Istanbul, a Germany-based US general, and a journalist in France.
The audio recording surfaced hours after Iran International's report of the alleged Iranian triple assassination plot. Iran International's diplomatic sources said a member of the IRGC'S Qods Force had been detained in an unnamed European country for assassination plots in Germany, France and Turkey.
Apparently duped by his interrogators' claim that they were from one of Iran's many intelligence bodies, Rasouli says in the recording that accepting to carry out the operation was a mistake that he will never make again.
Israeli television channels including Channel 12 which broadcast the recording, without providing a source according to The Times of Israel, claimed it was made by Mossad operatives posing as Iranian secret service at Rasouli's home in Tehran but did not hold him after the interrogation. The newspaper also said Hebrew-language outlets had reported that some Israeli officials had confirmed earlier reporting of the plot by Iran International on Saturday.
Channel 12 news added, also without citing a source, that the Shin Bet security agency — which generally operates within Israel — also participated in the detention in Iran.
Iranian media, except the semi-official Mehr news agency and hardline Mashregh news website that have made very brief references to a Haarez report on the foiled plot to assassinate an Israeli consulate worker in Turkey, have remained silent about Iran International's report and the audio recording shared by Israeli media.
Iranian, Israeli, and Turkish officials have not made any comments about the reports of the alleged assassination plots.
It is not clear whether Rasouli, whose current whereabouts are not known, and the operative that diplomatic sources said had been detained in Europe are the same person or different agents involved in the same operation.
Israel has allegedly carried out dozens of operations and assassinations inside Iran, including the assassination of Iran's top nuclear man and senior IRGC member Mohsen Fakhrizadeh in November 2020 for which it has never officially taken responsibility. Ex Mossad Chief Yossi Cohen in June 2021 strongly suggested Israel was behind attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities.
Referring to the theft of thousands of Iranian secret nuclear document in February 2018 from a warehouse near Tehran, Cohen said more than 20 Mossad agents were involved in the operation. He said the agents were not Israelis, adding that all of them are alive and some of them have already left Iran.
Following Cohen's remarks, former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who in the past few years has cast himself as an opposition figure, alleged that the highest-ranking Iranian intelligence official in charge of countering Israeli spies in Iran was himself an agent of Israel.
Ahmadinejad did not name anyone nor specify the time period in question but attributed the success of Israel's intelligence operations in Iran to the high level of Tel Aviv's influence and infiltration in the Iranian intelligence and security agencies.