Iran's president has rejected the resignation of top diplomat Mohammad Javad Zarif, throwing his support behind the man who negotiated the 2015 nuclear deal with the West. Zarif has been under pressure from hard-liners.
Image: Eric Piermont/AFP/Getty Images
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Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has rejected the resignation of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, saying his departure would be "against the country's interests."
On Monday, the US-educated Zarif abruptly announced on social media that he had offered his resignation, signaling growing factional differences between Rouhani's moderate camp and hard-liners.
But by Wednesday, Zarif had received the endorsement of ally Rouhani, the majority of parliamentarians, a top Revolutionary Guard commander and, implicitly, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
"As the supreme leader has described you as a 'trustworthy, brave and religious' person in the forefront of resistance against widespread US pressures, I consider accepting your resignation against national interests and reject it," Rouhani wrote in a letter to Zarif, according to state news agency IRNA.
Calculated move?
Zarif, the main architect of the 2015 nuclear deal, has been under pressure from hard-liners who feel vindicated in their distrust of the West following the US withdrawal from the international agreement and a reimposition of unilateral US sanctions.
It remains unclear whether Zarif offered a public resignation or whether it was orchestrated, but analysts have speculated it could have been a calculated move to demonstrate power aimed at critics seeking to undermine the work of the Foreign Ministry.
"As ordered several times, all bodies — including government or state bodies — must be in full coordination with this ministry with regards to foreign relations," the president said in his letter to Zarif.
Iran's Islamic Revolution 40 years on
40 years ago, the revolutionaries led by Ayatollah Khomeini seized power in Iran. Anger against the Western-backed Shah regime helped Khomeini establish his hardline Islamic system, which still dominates the country.
Image: Reuters/Official Khamenei website
'I feel nothing'
On February 1, 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Tehran from exile in France. When a reporter asked him how he felt upon his return to Iran, Khomeini replied: "Nothing — I feel nothing." Some analysts interpreted his remarks as the Shiite leader's idea about embarking on a "divine mission" where emotions hardly mattered.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Images
The Shah ran out of time
Two months before Khomeini's return to Iran, an estimated six to nine million people took to the streets in the country's major cities. The demonstrations were largely peaceful, compared to the violent September 8, 1978, protests. The Shah regime, headed by Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, had realized that its time in power was over and that they could not stop Khomeini's return.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/UPI
Even women rooted for Khomeini
The revolutionary mood was so intense in Tehran that even many women celebrated Khomeini's return, ignoring the fact that Khomeini had slammed Shah's measures for women's emancipation in exile. In 1963, the Shah of Iran granted women the right to vote.
Image: picture-alliance/IMAGNO/Votava
A spectacle of exuberance
In 1971, the Shah and his wife Farah Diba (seen in the picture) staged a lavish spectacle on the ancient site of Persepolis to mark the "2,500th anniversary of the Iranian monarchy." Many heads of state attended the event. Khomeini, in his message from exile, condemned the monarchy as "cruel, evil and un-Islamic."
Image: picture alliance/akg-images/H. Vassal
Exile and death
Under pressure from the Islamic Revolution, the Shah (left) had left Iran on January 16, 1979. After spending time in several countries, he succumbed to cancer on July 27, 1980 in Cairo, Egypt.
Image: picture-alliance/UPI
Consolidating power
In the beginning, women's rights were not a major issue for the Islamic revolutionaries. They only imposed hardline Islam after consolidating their victory.
Image: Tasnim
Soldiers join the revolution
Upon Khomeini's return to Iran in 1979, the military did not confront the protesters. On February 11, the army declared itself neutral. Despite that, the revolutionaries executed several generals in February and April.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/EPU
New government
Soon after his return, Khomeini declared the monarchy, the previous government and parliament illegal, and said he would appoint a government "because of the fact that this nation believes in me." According to Iran experts, it was not self-deception but reality.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/FY
The liberal face of the revolution
Mehdi Bazargan, a scholar and pro-democracy activist, had campaigned against the Pahlavi dynasty, for which he had been incarcerated for several years. Khomeini appointed him as his first prime minister, although Bazargan was critical of him as well. Bazargan had called Khomeini a "turbaned Shah" after a meeting with the Ayatollah in Paris. He remained in office for only nine months.
Image: Iranian.com
Occupation of the US Embassy
In November 1979, radical Iranian students seized the US Embassy in Tehran and took the embassy staff hostage. The students were fearful of Shah's return to power with US help. Khomeini took advantage of the situation. He dismissed his opponents as "US allies."
Image: Fars
Ali Khamenei – guardian of the revolution
In 1989, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was elected by the expert council to succeed Khomeini. Khamenei, to this date, has the ultimate power over all state institutions. Although the 79-year-old does not have the same charisma as his predecessor, he represents the policies of Iranian hardliners who refuse to reform the system and continue to persecute dissidents.
Image: Reuters/Official Khamenei website
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A veteran diplomat, Zarif has been a smooth English-speaking voice and Iran's primary interlocutor with the West at a time when Europe is trying to keep the nuclear deal alive despite US sanctions.
In recent months, he has been struggling in parliament against critics opposed to anti-money laundering legislation that is needed for a European Union mechanism to allow continued trade and investment despite unilateral US sanctions.
Iran also needs Zarif to work with India and China to find ways to ease the impact of sanctions.
"Zarif is too valuable for the Iranian system to let him go at a time when his diplomatic skills are needed more than ever," said Ali Vaez, director of the Iran project at the International Crisis Group.
Top general endorses Zarif
In a further endorsement, General Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran's elite Quds Force — the overseas arm of the Revolutionary Guard Corps — recognized that Zarif "is indeed in charge of the Islamic Republic of Iran's foreign policy."
The foreign minister is "supported and approved by the system's top authorities, from the supreme leader down," he added.
"There was no deliberate attempt to leave Dr. Zarif out of the Rouhani-Assad meeting," the general stated, blaming a "lack of coordination in the president's office."
Soleimani, the point man on Iran's military operations in Iraq and Syria, also attended the meeting with Assad.
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Taking control of foreign policy
In an apparent attempt to ease tensions, Assad on Wednesday invited Zarif to Syria, where Iran has been one of the main backers of the regime.
On Tuesday, Zarif told Foreign Ministry staff that he hoped his resignation would "act as a spur for the Foreign Ministry to regain its proper statutory role in the conduct of foreign affairs," IRNA news agency reported.
In a social media post on Wednesday, Zarif expressed gratitude for the "generous affections and unsparing support" of officials and the people. Zarif is one of the country's most popular public figures, according to opinion polls.
