Former Iranian President Visits U.S.

September 1, former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami arrived in New York for a nearly two-week visit to the United States. He is taking part in a United Nations conference and speaking to an audience at the Washington National Cathedral as well as at several other locations. Khatami is the most senior Iranian official to be granted a United States visa since the 1979 hostage crisis. Since that time, the U.S. and Iran have had no diplomatic relations.

The visit does not come at a time of cordial relations between the two countries—on the heels of the Lebanon war in which Iran’s proxy Hezbollah claimed victory; in the midst of a nuclear standoff; and with sectarian violence increasing in Iraq. Considering the tight spot the U.S. finds itself in over these issues, the fact that Khatami is visiting the U.S. rather indicates that America is expanding its options as its leverage over Iran diminishes.

“That a former Iranian head of government—moderate or not—will be visiting the United States is no small development,” wrote Stratfor on August 24. “It is safe to say that Khatami could serve as a potential channel of dialogue between Tehran and Washington.”

Stratfor explained:

Khatami is considered a “reformist” and a “moderate,” but is also a senior figure in the factionalized clerical establishment led by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. … Khatami retains a great deal of influence in Tehran because of his ties to Khamenei, who sits at the apex of the Iranian political system. …This visit will not dramatically alter the nature of U.S.-Iranian relations; rather it is the beginning of a lengthy process of parallel diplomacy. …Up until now, U.S.-Iranian dealings have involved back-channel negotiations on Iraq and indirect dealings through the Europeans on the nuclear issue. Khatami’s visit will likely add a third medium of communication: public-level talks. Khatami is close enough to the Iranian regime—and, paradoxically, far enough from it—that any dialogue he holds with U.S. officials works out well for both sides. There is enough ambiguity about the official status of such conversations to give both sides plausible deniability about whatever they say to each other.

America’s willingness to welcome a senior figure representing its archenemy Iran—a country it regards as a sponsor of terrorism, a nation that defies UN resolutions over its nuclear program, a nation that foments violence in Iraq; in short, a nation largely responsible for probably the major portion of America’s current security and foreign-policy nightmares—bespeaks a country that is fast losing the influence befitting a superpower.