Unrest thins US options
Güncelleme Tarihi:
AFP
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Haziran 22, 2009 00:00
WASHINGTON - While USPresident Obama sticks to his fresh policy toward Iran, post-election violence in the Islamic Republic bodes ill for his desire to improve dialogue. Obama faces much tougher tasks ahead, say observers.
Iran's crackdown on protests prodded President Barack Obama into his most explicit warning yet to Tehran, while narrowing the options for his engagement strategy. Obama has until now trod a delicate line, balancing sympathy with protesters against a desire to not give the Iranian government a chance to paint dissenters as treasonous tools of a hated foreign power. As scenes of bleeding protesters in Tehran, openly challenging supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, filled U.S. television news shows, Obama Saturday directly addressed Iranian leaders.
His statement blended moral, political and religious imagery, but stuck to his principle of not "meddling" in Iranian affairs, despite increasing pressure from domestic critics demanding a tougher tone. "The Iranian government must understand that the world is watching," he said. "Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. The Iranian people will ultimately judge the actions of their own government." This was his most forceful statement of a week in which he argued that U.S. "meddling" in Iran's internal affairs would backfire. Obama had repeatedly called for peaceful protests to be allowed in Iran.
After coming to power vowing to engage U.S. "enemies" including Iran, the disputed election and the crackdown have tested Obama.
On one hand, officials argued that Washington could do little more than watch and wait as Iranians charted their own political future following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed victory over Mir Hossein Mousavi. On the other, the president's cautious stance risked making him appear on the wrong side of history, as the demonstrations, unique since the Iranian revolution in 1979 gathered pace. Obama's foreign policy team also attempted to preserve the option of eventual negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. "I think the president has been clear in underscoring and deploring the violence," said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Friday.
"But ... we still have U.S. interests on many issues including the one on nuclear weapons." Since coming to office, Obama has tried to encourage dialogue, signaling he was not bent on "regime change." But following Saturday's violence and the new reported deaths, his task has become much tougher.
Obama's advisors have worked around the clock to make sense of events. One official last week pointed to bags under his eyes as evidence of the midnight oil being burnt at the White House. But the administration has been hampered by Washington's lack of diplomatic and economic relations with Iran. The quality of intelligence available to U.S. policymakers is also unclear.
His statement blended moral, political and religious imagery, but stuck to his principle of not "meddling" in Iranian affairs, despite increasing pressure from domestic critics demanding a tougher tone. "The Iranian government must understand that the world is watching," he said. "Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. The Iranian people will ultimately judge the actions of their own government." This was his most forceful statement of a week in which he argued that U.S. "meddling" in Iran's internal affairs would backfire. Obama had repeatedly called for peaceful protests to be allowed in Iran.
After coming to power vowing to engage U.S. "enemies" including Iran, the disputed election and the crackdown have tested Obama.
On one hand, officials argued that Washington could do little more than watch and wait as Iranians charted their own political future following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed victory over Mir Hossein Mousavi. On the other, the president's cautious stance risked making him appear on the wrong side of history, as the demonstrations, unique since the Iranian revolution in 1979 gathered pace. Obama's foreign policy team also attempted to preserve the option of eventual negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. "I think the president has been clear in underscoring and deploring the violence," said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Friday.
"But ... we still have U.S. interests on many issues including the one on nuclear weapons." Since coming to office, Obama has tried to encourage dialogue, signaling he was not bent on "regime change." But following Saturday's violence and the new reported deaths, his task has become much tougher.
Obama's advisors have worked around the clock to make sense of events. One official last week pointed to bags under his eyes as evidence of the midnight oil being burnt at the White House. But the administration has been hampered by Washington's lack of diplomatic and economic relations with Iran. The quality of intelligence available to U.S. policymakers is also unclear.