British Deputy Foreign Minister's Visit to Iran

Alistair Burt, the UK Deputy Foreign Minister for Middle Eastern Affairs, arrived in Tehran on Friday, September 9, on an unannounced visit. Reuters reported that Mr. Burt will discuss Iran's role in Syria and Yemen with officials of the Islamic Republic during this trip. Bahram Qasemi, the spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, confirmed the news agency's report in an interview with the Hamshahri newspaper. According to Mr. Qasemi, this visit aims to hold a new round of periodic political talks, addressing bilateral issues including consular cooperation and international matters such as the JCPOA. Hamid Baidi-Nejad, Iran's ambassador to London, also announced on Twitter that Alistair Burt traveled to Tehran to discuss with Abbas Araghchi, the Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs, and other Iranian officials. This is the first visit by a senior UK Foreign Office official to Tehran since the US withdrawal from the global powers' nuclear agreement with Iran. Mike Pompeo, the US Secretary of State, and Jeremy Hunt, his British counterpart, had discussed Russia, Iran, the Islamic State group, ISIS, and Yemen a week prior. Although the European Union has differences with the US regarding the JCPOA withdrawal, leaders from the three countries involved in the JCPOA have repeatedly expressed concerns about Iran's missile program and the Islamic Republic's activities in the Middle East. The issue of the detention of Iranian-British citizens has also been a focal point in previous meetings between officials from the two countries. Nazanin Zaghari was granted a three-day leave last Thursday after two and a half years in prison but was transferred back to prison on Sunday. Iranian officials have left Britain's requests for Nazanin Zaghari's release unanswered, and reports have emerged linking her fate with the longstanding debt of Britain to Iran. Abbas Adalat, an Iranian-British citizen and professor of mathematics and computer science at Imperial College London, was arrested at the home of a relative in early May while traveling to Tehran for a workshop and was transferred to Evin Prison. Kamal Faroughi is another dual-national Iranian-British citizen who was arrested by Iranian security forces about seven years ago and remains in prison. He was tried on espionage charges and sentenced to eight years in prison. However, political analyst Reza Taghizadeh wrote on September 2 in a note on Radio Farda that the option of granting diplomatic protection to Ms. Nazanin Zaghari was raised 24 hours after Britain was mentioned as a replacement for the US in the design and construction group for the Arak heavy-water reactor, and her three-day leave could be seen as a sign of progress in political negotiations between Tehran and London to resolve mutual disputes following the appointment of Jeremy Hunt as the new UK Foreign Secretary.