Future of the nuclear deal: Iranians apostate

The new government in Iran has been in office for three months. The ultra-conservative President Raisi is playing for a limited time in the nuclear deal, while the desperate population is increasingly losing faith in a deal.

Talks about the nuclear deal with Iran have been on hold since the ultra-conservative government of President Raisi took over in Tehran. According to the Iranian nuclear negotiator Bagheri-Kani, things should continue at the end of November 29th.

At the beginning of the year, many people in the country still had great hopes that if everyone returned to the nuclear deal, their lives would improve too. In the meantime, however, many have given up.

The young Tehran Ali is one of those who has given up. His expectations of the new talks on the nuclear deal are meager.

Nothing will happen, nothing, guaranteed! I don’t think anything will change for anyone. It just goes on like this.

Iran has been in an economic crisis for years

The 31-year-old with a three-day beard and dark curly hair is out and about in Tehran in a tracksuit. He works in the area of ​​interior design, he says: “I’m self-employed. In the last 50-60 days, the order situation has been extremely bad. So even worse than before.”

Iran has been in an economic crisis for years – mainly because of the US sanctions that former US President Donald Trump has gradually enacted. When Joe Biden took over at the beginning of the year, many Iranians had high hopes.

Iran sets two conditions for a return to the nuclear deal

The Iranian government can only get back to the nuclear deal if the US lifts the sanctions. The spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Said Chatibzadeh, named a second condition.

We will only return to the nuclear deal if we can be sure that the return is overall safe.

In other words, if Tehran can rely on Biden’s successor not to quit. Many in the West had suspected that it would be more difficult with the ultra-conservative President Ebrahim Raisi, who was elected in June. His team had long rejected a new round of talks in Vienna. It was said, among other things, that you have to be trained by the predecessors first.

Experts suspect delay tactics

However, some experts suspect a delaying tactic by the Tehran government in order to build up bargaining power. One year after Trump’s exit from the nuclear agreement, it began to gradually violate limit values ​​for uranium enrichment, for example.

On the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rome a week ago, the USA, Germany, France and Great Britain published a joint statement. Iran must change course. President Raisi should do everything possible to bring negotiations to a conclusion with them. This is the only way to avoid a dangerous escalation, the statement says. If Iran complies with its part of the nuclear deal again, the sanctions could also be lifted, which would enable economic growth.

Population increasingly desperate

But that’s just what many in Iran no longer believe in. The carpenter Mohammad is also skeptical.

If there are conversations in the next 20 days or so, things are not going to change right away. The day after that, no problem will be resolved. This will need time. Maybe at some point after an agreement something will change, maybe after two or four months, maybe not until next year.

The 62-year-old is still able to make ends meet with his carpentry, he says. But he is very worried about his son. He also has a job with which he earns enough to cover his daily expenses.

He married. His wife also brings furniture for a future apartment together. But no matter how hard we all try, we cannot find a place for them that they can afford. My son just doesn’t earn enough and I can’t support him anymore.

Raisi must deliver on his domestic promises

The new government has been in office for three months. Everyone expects her to keep her promises now, and the Tehran carpenter reminds of this.

You said that under the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi, the judiciary, legislature and executive will coordinate better and that this will improve the situation in the country. But of course I didn’t notice anything. Prices haven’t come down and people’s problems are still there. In fact, I would say people are getting worse every day. The prices are ten times as high and the people are under immense pressure.

Fewer and fewer people eat meat, says the 62-year-old in his small office. Then he comes back to big politics and recalls the long-time foreign minister in the previous government, Mohammad Jschwad Zarif.

Zarif made 2,000 trips and there was always talk of concluding negotiations today and tomorrow. Nothing has happened. I don’t think the government can do it now either. Nothing will happen unless the superpower USA wants it.

Negotiations without the US

Only she won’t be sitting at the table in Vienna on November 29th. Another clear precondition for Tehran, as Foreign Minister Hussein Amirabdollahian emphasized at the end of October.

We consider talks with the three European countries on the nuclear issue to be sensible and acceptable, but only within the P4 + 1 framework, which also includes representatives from China and Russia.

P4 + 1, stands for the four permanent members of the UN Security Council, Great Britain, China, France and Russia and also Germany. However, the USA is definitely there with representatives in Vienna, for example with the US special envoy for Iran, Robert Malley. But you have to get information from the Europeans about the content of the conversation. At least that’s how it went for the rounds between April and June.

USA threatens Iran

Malley threatened Iran in late October. If diplomacy gets stuck, there are other ways to stop Iran from building nuclear weapons, which is the goal of the 2015 nuclear deal. Which, he read openly.

For Ali, the young man in the tracksuit, this exchange of blows seems to have little meaning. He is like many of his friends, he says.

In my opinion, the interest in it has decreased a lot. Nobody talks about it anymore. You just don’t have the patience to think about it anymore.

Many have stopped following the news, it’s too frustrating. The struggle in everyday life costs her enough strength.