Backed Into a Corner

Foreign Policy Magazine                       April 13, 2012

 

Backed Into a Corner

 Hey America, there's a pretty good reason why Iran doesn't trust you. Maybe it's time for a different approach.

 

BY HOSSEIN MOUSAVIAN 

NOTE:  Ambassador Hossein Mousavian is a research scholar at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and a former spokesman for Iran's nuclear negotiating team. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The Iranian Nuclear Crisis: A Memoir, published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

 

The Obama administration has done more to undermine Iran over the past three years than any U.S. presidency in the 33 years since the Iranian revolution. Under the shadow of a policy of "engagement," the United States and Israel have led a campaign of economic, cyber, and covert war against Iran. Yet this coercive approach, conducted along with sporadic negotiations on nuclear issues between Iran and the P5+1 group of China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States has failed to resolve the future of Iran's nuclear program.

The primary issue is mistrust.