Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has ruled out standing for president in the election scheduled for early 2021. “I have no experience in running an administration and realizing general policies,” he told Kar-o-Kargar daily in an interview published on Sunday [October 4]. “I had the power to run the Foreign Ministry, but I lack the power to run the President’s Office.”

In a new revelation, Zarif said that he had warned top officials about possible “turmoil” before widespread protests broke out last November after a dramatic rise in gasoline prices, but as a member of the government was obliged to accept decisions it had taken.

The journalist interviewing Zarif described him as “utterly tired,” “reluctant” and no longer the man who had spoken passionately about foreign policy. In his defense, Zarif said he knew before being appointed foreign minister in 2013 that anyone trying to progress Iran’s nuclear case would be attacked domestically.

While Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, known as the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) was achieved in an atmosphere of distrust, Zarif argued, the election of Donald Trump as United States president in 2016 was expected by no-one. Zarif pointed out that Trump had abandoned many international agreements. “Nonetheless, we designed the JCPOA in a way that even Trump could not leave it without horrible international consequences,” he said.

Zarif portrayed Trump as someone greatly influenced by advisers and officials. When his interviewer pointed out that Trump had dismissed John Bolton, who he said wanted war with Iran, as National Security Adviser, Zarif reminded him that Trump had left the JCPOA on Bolton’s advice. Zarif said that the US killing of Qasem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s al-Quds Force, in Baghdad in January was a “trap” laid for Trump by “another war-monger in the Trump administration,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Zarif during the interview, sometime in early October 2020

Asked whether he believed Trump was responsible for all Iran’s problems and how far he blamed obstruction by rivals of President Hassan Rouhani, Zarif said: “Political factions should voice their ideas bravely, but some of them prefer their partisan interests over national interests. Some of them have been harassing me, but my responsibility is defending the country’s interests rather than defending myself. As the foreign minister I point out how Trump has broken his promise, but at the same time, I follow the in-house conflicts too.”

Turning to the US presidential election on November 3, Zarif detected a distinction between Trump and his Democratic Party challenger, former vice-president Joe Biden: “The difference is that Biden knows that the US cannot topple the regime in Iran,  but Trump either does not know that, or he has fallen into a trap aimed at pushing him toward a war with Iran.”

Zarif stressed that Iran was open to talks whoever won the US election: “Iran definitely wants to negotiate. But who set fire to the negotiating room? Trump or Iran? Negotiation means sitting at a table to talk, not overturning the negotiation table. Trump rudely left the negotiating room, but Iran is still there with the other five JCPOA members. Trump can also return to the room if he meets the conditions for such a return.”

Iran remained ready, said Zarif, for economic partnership with US companies such as Boeing and with European companies.  But in the US, he argued, Congress had been against the JCPOA from the start, although Trump’s withdrawal from the deal in 2018 let down American companies and workers, with many Boeing employees losing their jobs when the company’s $20-billion contract with Iran was terminated (an exaggeration by Zarif, given Iran’s order from Boeing constituted 10 percent of the company’s total orders in 2018).

Explaining the apparent conflict between his recent statement over his willingness to help arrange prisoner swaps with the US and him being unable to intervene in judicial affairs, Zarif said: “As foreign minister, I cannot tell a court to do something about a prisoner because the judiciary is independent. But when it comes to prisoner swap, then I can go to the judiciary as foreign Minister to further the swap.”