Former President’s Memories Reveal Politics Leading to Iran’s Separation
A website in Tehran released parts of the memoirs of former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, shedding light on the politics surrounding Iran’s nuclear program.
The publication of Rafsanjani’s memories began when he was still alive, and several volumes appeared in the years before his suspicious death in 2017. All volumes published after his death were reviewed by his son Mohsen before publication.
According to Chand Sanieh [A few seconds) website, which first published the new, unpublished parts are about Rafsanjani’s angry reaction to unltraconservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s “radical behavior”. Rafsanjani believed this offered “a pretext” to the United Nations Security Council to impose sanctions on Iran and form a global consensus against the Islamic Republic in 2006, one year after Ahmadinejad was first elected as Iran’s President.
It was the re-publication of the memoires by moderate conservative website Khabar Online on July 10 that lent some credibility to the disclosures about the beginning of Iran’s isolation in the international community as a result of its secret and controversial nuclear program.
Rafsanjani wrote on March 21, 2006, that “factional disputes in Iran and the dismissal of efficient diplomats as well as uncalculated remarks by Ahmadinejad about uranium enrichment, human rights and terrorism provided an opportunity for the United States and its allies to portray Iran as a threat to the international community.”
Two former presidents on the left and Ahmadinjad to Khamenei’s right during his presidency
In November, Rafsanjani wrote about his visit to the enrichment site in Natanz, adding that “Even Hassan Rouhani who is usually skeptical about these matters acknowledged that the efforts have been successful. Both Rouhani and I told -then – nuclear Chief Mohammad Aghazadeh that Ahmadinejad’s uncalculated remarks hinder Iran’s progress.”
On December 11, Rafsanjani noted that the UN Security Council has unanimously ratified a resolution against Iran with even Qatar voting for it. “Ali Larijani [then secretary of the Supreme Council of National Security] come to see me. He was nervous and critical of Ahmadinejad because of his countless statements. He said he told the President to stop two of the enrichment cascades to avoid resolution, but he refused to do so. He told Ahmadinejad to go and find out Khamenei’s point of view on this. “
Rafsanjani wrote on March 20, 2007: “We have a bad situation in foreign relations. We are isolated except for relations with some countries including Syria and Venezuela. Two resolutions have been issued against us and a third is coming. There are sanctions already. imposed on Iran and possible US military attacks. “
Rafsanjani has been a major proponent of Iran’s nuclear program and missile development since the late 1980s when he realized that the armed forces were incapable of fighting Saddam Hussain’s army. The decline of Iran’s arsenal from the days before the revolutionary under the monarchy and its lack of an effective air force and navy caused it to be vulnerable in the region.
In 2006, when writing these parts of his memoirs, his former profound influence on Iran’s political system was not directly suppressed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and he was already on course in his final separation in 2009, when Ahmadinejad became President of Iran for the second time. time in a rigged election marked by IRGC intervention.
