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00:00Upping the ante before the first talk since 2018 between the United States and Iran.
00:17Sanctions slapped by Washington on five entities, including Tehran's Atomic Authority,
00:22and fresh airstrikes overnight in Yemen on Iran-backed Houthi positions,
00:27airstrikes attributed to the U.S. Ahead of the Saturday talks in Oman,
00:32Iran's president dismissing the accusation, his country seeking the atomic bomb,
00:36instead inviting Americans to explore business opportunities in his country.
00:43We will negotiate, and as the Supreme Leader said, the talks will be indirect. We'll do this
00:47with dignity and hold our heads high, and we will provide whatever necessary guarantees to prove
00:51that we are not seeking a nuclear bomb. They have investigated this a thousand times,
00:55and they can come here and investigate again. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has no
01:01opposition whatsoever to American investment in this country. Investors can come here and invest.
01:06Well, for more, let's cross to Ruz Bey Parsi, director of the Middle East North Africa program at the Swedish
01:17Institute of International Affairs. Thanks for speaking with us from Uppsala.
01:23Thank you for having me.
01:25In that clip we just heard from the Iranian president, is he speaking Donald Trump's language?
01:30I think it's an attempt to speak on the wavelength that Donald Trump usually is, yes.
01:38And how effective will that be?
01:42In and of itself, it will not be effective, obviously, but it is a good sign,
01:45because it shows that Tehran is at least trying to understand how to talk to Donald Trump,
01:50which they didn't really last time he was president.
01:52So, the U.S. slapping more sanctions. Every time we get these announcements of new sanctions
01:59against Iran, we wonder, what are they sanctioning exactly? Is it just an announcement at this point?
02:08I think yes. I mean, to most effects, everything that you can sanction in Iran is already sanctioned,
02:15so it's not going to make much of a difference. But I think it is this kind of tactic of trying to
02:20show just how tough you can be just before you enter negotiations. The problem and the risk with
02:25that, and the Iranians do this too, is, of course, that the other side will be so alienated
02:28and is already distrustful that it might also wreck those very negotiations.
02:34What are you expecting from those indirect talks, and why are they happening now?
02:39Well, I mean, one thing that we need to keep in mind is that Donald Trump changes his mind all the
02:45time. So, it is equally likely that this could lead to something, and it's also equally likely that it
02:50could lead to war. So, in that sense, everything is on the table. The problem for the Iranians are,
02:56of course, that they are very bad at coming to a decision of making a stand and actually following
03:01through. So, the Supreme Leader is trying to hedge his bets in all directions, which means that they're
03:06not really clear-cut decisions made in Tehran on how far they're willing to go in those negotiations.
03:11On the Trumpian side, the problem is that his own White House is a very divided house.
03:16There are those who are trying to seek a war with Iran, partly in conjunction with Bibi Netanyahu in
03:22Israel, and there are those who absolutely do not want to have a war, and therefore trying to seek
03:26to find a negotiated settlement. So, all of those voices are standing behind him, and he happens to
03:33usually believe in the person who talked to him last. And that means that all of this is very much
03:38up in there. And if he does decide to choose the war path, it could prove perhaps more tricky
03:46than it seems, what with Gulf states reportedly saying they don't want flyovers of their territory.
03:56Yes, I think, I mean, the general appetite for anything that could become a regional war,
04:01and that would, of course, be the overarching risk here, is there is no appetite for that in the
04:07region. So, I think everyone is trying to caution the Trump administration into not getting themselves
04:13into a chicken race with the Iranians about who can be the toughest. On the other hand, of course,
04:17the only country that could severely damage the Islamic Republic in Iran is the United States. So,
04:24they do have the industrial capacity to do so. I don't think it's Trump's own instinct to want to
04:29actually have a war. His track record is trying to get the U.S. out of wars, especially in the Middle
04:33East. But again, it comes down to what is a negotiation tactic, and then what is the follow
04:40through in terms of process of being able to reach a deal. The weakness of the Trump administration is
04:45that it's a White House that is not only divided, but also rather chaotic. There is no real bureaucratic
04:50institutional process. And if you want to have an agreement on a tricky issue like this that holds,
04:55and that everyone can trust will survive, then it's going to need a lot of fine print.
05:00One thing that has been consistent in the last month, Ruz Bey, has been these airstrikes on Yemen.
05:06Now, on the surface of it, it's because of those missiles disrupting traffic in the Red Sea,
05:17but it's also a message to Tehran.
05:19Absolutely. And that's part of the, if you want to say, those who are particularly angry at Iran for
05:28its regional, what it's doing regionally, they see this as not only a way of pressuring Tehran,
05:35but also show Tehran that the old days where there would be some kind of balance of power and some
05:40holding back on the American side is no longer. So if Trump feels that there is a military solution
05:47to a problem that cannot be solved any other way, he will not hesitate. And so in that sense,
05:52Yemen is a low-hanging fruit. Though anyone who has studied Yemen, including the Gulf states that
05:57have been warring in Yemen, like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, will tell you that there
06:02is no military solution to the Houthi problem. One final question for you, Ruz Bey Parsi. How should
06:07Europeans who were parties to that 2015 nuclear treaty that Donald Trump walked away from,
06:14how should they view these talks in Oman on Saturday?
06:18I think they are somewhat divided on it. I mean, on the one hand, the problem for the Europeans
06:23right now is that they are no longer part of the incentive. Back in 2015, it was trade with Europe
06:28that was the incentive for Iran to sign a deal. That is gone, partly because what happened when Trump
06:34left was that it made it very clear that Europeans don't have strategic autonomy, as they like to call it,
06:40when it comes to financial matters. They're totally beholden to American sanctions. So whoever the
06:46American sanctions, the Europeans cannot really touch. So in that sense, they are not part of the
06:50carrot in this carrot stick deal. On the other hand, the only lever they have at the moment is snapback
06:55because they're still in the deal. So they could go to the United Nations Security Council and say that
07:00Iran is not following the deal and therefore all UN sanctions come back. But that is, of course,
07:05a negative lever. They don't have anything constructive in that sense right now to offer.
07:10Ruz Bey Parsi, many thanks for speaking with us from Uppsala in Sweden.