IRGC Commander Praises Khamenei For Not Needing A Nuclear Deal
The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard says the Supreme Leader wants to reach a point where having a nuclear deal with the West will make no difference for Iran.
The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard says the Supreme Leader wants to reach a point where having a nuclear deal with the West will make no difference for Iran.
Speaking to a large crowd on Thursday, General Hossein Salami also tried to present the IRGC and its paramilitary Basij as “servants of the people,” amid a popular uprising in which security forces have so far killed around 450 civilians since mid-September.
Salami repeated regime slogans about “independence” and “self-sufficiency” and said, Khamenei “has turned a few issues into a matter of pride that America cannot swallow. One of these is his strong stand on the issue of JCPOA, and it has reached a stage when the acceptance or rejection of the JCPOA has no importance for Iran.”
After 18 months of indirect negotiations by the Biden Administration to revive the 2015 nuclear accord known as the JCPOA, talks broke down in early September, when the US rejected excessive demands by Iran.
Salami also praised the 83-year-old authoritarian ruler for spreading the influence of the Islamic Republic to other countries, adding that “enemies” cannot accept “this development.”
The Islamic regime uses the term “enemies” to refer to the US, Israel, Saudi Arabia and lately Western Europe, as many countries have criticized its use of deadly violence against protesters.
Many countries raise the issue of Tehran’s “malign activities” in the Middle East, by financially and militarily building a network of militant groups in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and elsewhere.
The IRGC commander then went on repeating accusations made by Khamenei and other officials in the past two months against “enemies” for plotting to destroy Iran. At the same time, he claimed that Iran has become a “powerful force” and “the enemy is fleeing from the Islamic world.”
For this reason, he claimed, the United States is fomenting unrest in Iran, but the Iranian people “are standing up to America.”
In fact, thousands of Iranians across the country celebrated the defeat of Iran’s team by the US side in the World Cup on Tuesday, seeing the loss as a defeat for the regime that tries to use sports to strengthen its image.
The United States has repeatedly dismissed accusations that it has anything to do with the anti-regime protests. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that one of the “profound mistakes” that the “regime makes is in accusing the United States or any other country” of somehow being “responsible for, instigating what’s happening. That’s not at all the case. And to misunderstand their own people is at the heart of the problem that they’re facing.”
But the Biden Administration has also voiced support for Iranians to have the right to peacefully protest and officials have met with Iranian activists to underline that policy.
Blinken in a separate interview with NBC also reiterated the administration’s policy, saying “the most important thing that we can do is first to speak out very clearly ourselves in support of the people’s right to protest peacefully, to make their views known, and as I said, to take what steps we can take to go after those who are actually oppressing those rights, including through sanctions.”
Iranians mainly blame Khamenei, the Revolutionary Guard and its Basij paramilitaries for deadly use of violence against protesters. Many have reached the point that they will accept nothing short of a complete regime change and the establishment of a secular, democratic political system.
These statements appear to be attempts to reassure the restless public that sees the freeze in nuclear talks as yet another ominous sign for the country’s future.
Iranian lawmaker Mohammad Hassan Asafari, a former – and possibly current – Iranian intelligence officer, told Nameh News that the talks over Iran's controversial nuclear program will be resumed in January.
Referring to Foreign Minister Hosein Amir-Abdollahian's uncorroborated comments about messages being exchanged between Tehran and Washington, Nameh News website wrote that there are signs indicating the Americans are after finding the right go-between to resume the talks after a three-month freeze.
The United States has denied the claims that it is messaging Iran to resume the talks.
Meanwhile, he told Nameh News that “it is also in the United States' interest to try to solve its problems with Iran through negotiations." He added that less than two years before the next presidential elections in the United States, Democrats need to show some achievements to voters to help them keep the White House.
The lawmaker warned that if the Americans show no interest in resuming the talks, and decide to continue their pressures on Iran, Tehran has also options on the table that might not be in Washington's interest.
Asafari said: "The Americans have realized that there is no way other than negotiations to settle their difference with the Islamic Republic. They have also realized that threats, sanctions, pressures and an endless series of resolutions against Iran cannot force Tehran to retreat."
This comes while economic analyst Hadi Haghshenas says that the UN Human Rights Commission's recent resolution has left a negative impact on Iran's economy and coupled with the country's chronic economic crisis, it has made solving Iran's problems even more complicated than ever before.
Haghshenas told Nameh News: "Economic variables such as inflation, unemployment and even economic growth will be affected by both economic and non-economic factors including floods, earthquakes, sanctions and protests." He reminded that Iran’s currency rose every time there was a positive development about the negotiations with the West, and declined every time there seemed to be no prospect for success.
He reiterated that establishing an investigation committee under the supervision of the UN to probe into the use of force and violence by the government during the protests has adversely affected the status of the country's economy.
Nonetheless, like Asafari, political activist and commentator Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani is also adamant that diplomacy will resume once we see a decline in the protests.
Boastfully reiterating that Iran is the only country in the world that can say "No" to the United States, Ardestani said that naturally, the US will do anything to bring Iran under pressure. However, he argued, the West's policy toward Iran “depends on our domestic politics.” Currently, with unrest in Iran, “Westerners try to support the protests.” They work based on their interests.
"That is why they issued resolutions against Tehran at international forums to exert further pressures on Iran. But if Iran manages to come to terms with the protesters and leave the crisis behind, then the Americans would want to resume diplomacy," Ardestani said.
If Iran manages to calm down the protesters, Iran's nuclear case will not be sent to the Un Security Council, there will be no snap-back and no military action against Iran, he maintained.
In a speech to the Revolutionary Guards’ Basiji militia members Saturday, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who had so far not acknowledged the serious challenge the protest movement poses to his rule, confirmed his fears by trying to boost the morale of his loyalists and exhorted them “never to lose hope under any circumstances.”
Khamenei also told the chief of police recently, “Don’t let your morale drop,” according to the leaked audio file of a recent insiders’ meeting focusing on the protests.
Regime propaganda is increasingly proving inept and easy to counter and disprove by the popular opposition whose only platform for expression is social media. The said audio file seems to confirm that protesters have gained the upper hand in what the speaker, deputy commander of the paramilitary Basij Qasem Qoreyshi, refers to as “media war”.
The state had banked, for instance, on World Cup football victories to cast a normal, happy image of the society, but last week when the state media tried to make the win against Wales into a big celebration, many chose to follow the social media campaigns to disown the national team and stayed home even in areas where past celebrations were always the biggest. Photos of riot police cheering in their full gear and parading on their motorbikes in the streets served as proof of the point that the team represented “them”, not “us”, many said.
Authorities have waged a campaign of disinformation for years and a host of fake accounts to counter opponents’ social media activities and campaigns, to sow discord among them, and to spy on them. This tactic succeeded somehow at first, but it seems that they’ve been found out and some fake accounts are now being more carefully considered. Many are quickly losing followers they had managed to lure with content that sometimes looked the most aggressive against the regime.
Facts also seem to have become more and more difficult to hide and distort as individuals and families are taking strength from the growth of the movement. The public eventually finds out every time when other citizens are killed, injured, or arrested, and do not believe when the authorities deny responsibility.
Nearly 450 protesters have been killed but the state not only has not taken responsibility for even one case, but has also cast the blame on others, even protesters themselves. Such incidents have only resulted in greater anger among citizens and more power to the protest movement.
The outbreak of unrest could have been possibly prevented if the death of the 22-year-old Mahsa Amini which sparked the protests could have been hidden from the public. But her family refused to remain silent.
As a result, few believe the official account when Atefeh Na’ami, 37, was found a few days ago in the balcony of her apartment under a blanket with a gas pipe near her mouth.
Authorities say she committed suicide but her family who calls the regime and its officials “occupiers” insist she “gave her life for freedom”. According to her brother, security forces buried her quietly with only a few female members of the family present.
The grievances of the Iranian public are not limited to lack of freedom or social issues, as the slogans chanted by protesters may suggest. What probably causes the greatest concern to the authorities is that protests have not yet become as extensive in impoverished areas where the 2019 deadly protests were the most intense.
In the leaked audio file one of the participants in the meeting quotes the secretary of the supreme national security council, Ali Shamkhani, as saying that 70 percent of Iranians believe their living conditions are fast deteriorating.