DUBAI: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Tuesday he was neither “overly optimistic nor pessimistic” about talks with the US on Iran’s nuclear programme, in an apparent move by Tehran to play down growing public expectations of a deal.
Failure to reach a deal with President Donald Trump to end Iran’s decades-long dispute with the West could profoundly hurt the Islamic Republic, Iranian politicians and insiders have said, even if Washington is subsequently portrayed by Tehran as the guilty party.
After last weekend’s talks between Tehran and Washington in Oman, which both sides described as positive, Iranian expectations of economic relief have soared, according to Iranians reached by telephone and by messages posted by Iranians on social media.
The two sides have agreed to hold more talks on April 19 in Oman.
Iran’s battered rial currency has gained some 20% against the dollar in the past few days, with many Iranians hoping an deal to end Iran’s economic isolation may be within reach.
“We are neither overly optimistic nor pessimistic regarding them. After all, it is a process which was decided and its first steps have been well implemented,” Khamenei said in a meeting with lawmakers, according to state media. Tehran has approached the talks warily, doubting the likelihood of an agreement and suspicious of Trump, who abandoned Tehran’s 2015 nuclear pact with six powers during his first term in 2018 and has repeatedly threatened to bomb Iran if there is no deal.
“From here on, it (the talks) must be followed through carefully, with red lines clearly defined for both the other side and for us. The negotiations may lead to results, or they may not,” said Khamenei.
“Avoid linking the country’s fate to these talks.”
Since relations with Washington collapsed after Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the U.S.-backed Shah, enmity toward the United States has always been a rallying point for Iran’s clerical rulers.
Meanwhile, The first round of talks between Iran and the US over Tehran’s nuclear programme could be described as constructive only if the Islamic republic showed “some level of political maturity and acted like a normal country”, Iranian Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi has said.“We have to wait and see if the Iranian regime has reached that level of political maturity and wisdom to renounce its political ambitions and to act like a normal country. And that way, make sure that the threat of war is removed from the region,” Ebadi said on the sidelines of the Global Justice, Love and Peace Summit in Dubai.