Hamid Abutalebi, Advisor to Hassan Rouhani: National Interests Have Lost Their Meaning

The political advisor to the former President of the Islamic Republic believes that the main internal problems of the country stem from the incorrect foreign policy that has become strategically confused. According to Hamid Abutalebi, national interests have lost their place in the country's foreign policy. Abutalebi states that the structures and agents lack the ability to resolve the crisis of strategic confusion. From his perspective, when foreign policy cannot solve this problem, 'we witness the ongoing ambiguity in the meaning of foreign policy in the country.' The loss of national interests and 'strategic confusion' has also existed in previous Iranian governments, but experts believe it has intensified in the last two years. In this regard, on September 7, 2021, Diako Hosseini, a senior foreign policy expert, stated to the 'Khabar Online' website that he thinks 'the thirteenth government has a fundamental problem, which is that it lacks a theory regarding foreign policy and a vision for it.' According to this political analyst, many of the phrases used in Ebrahim Raisi's government are clichéd, to the extent that balanced relations and constructive interaction were also repeated in previous governments. He emphasizes that even the focus on Asia is a general concept that can easily become contradictory with a few basic questions and showcase its problems. Critics argue that Ebrahim Raisi's definition of national interests differs from what people refer to as national interests, and in the view of some, there is no correlation between the two. On June 10 of this year, Ebrahim Raisi stated that the government is committed to supporting the nuclear industry in line with national interests. However, many believe that the nuclear industry is the greatest factor jeopardizing national interests in Iran. Hoshmatollah Falahatpisheh, the former head of the National Security Commission of the tenth parliament, stated on January 6, 2023, to the Shargh newspaper that 'the most oppressed concept in Iran is national interests.' According to him, both those who advocate negotiations and previously deemed the negotiating government as unpatriotic, spies, etc., and those who continue to beat the drum of non-negotiation do not have a proper understanding of national interests. Falahatpisheh emphasized that 'it was supposed that after the JCPOA, about 70 billion euros would be invested in Iran's oil, gas, and petrochemical industries, but all these opportunities went to our neighbors around the Persian Gulf.' He believes that the consequences and effects of these lost opportunities have fully manifested in air pollution and economic and livelihood problems. The intertwining of national interests in Iran with nuclear energy has caused irreparable damages. Some experts estimate the direct and indirect losses of the Islamic Republic's nuclear activities to be up to 2 trillion dollars. Donyaye Eghtesad also reported in 2018 that the losses in the oil and gas industry due to sanctions and lost markets amounted to 400 billion dollars. Blinken: 'We are not in a position to talk about a nuclear agreement with Iran.' The Pentagon's next step to counter the threats from the Islamic Republic; deploying Marines to the CENTCOM region. John Kirby: The U.S. and its allies are 'committed to ensuring the security' of shipping in international waterways. Protests from 'ambassadors and diplomats' against the approach of China and Russia; the high cost of unilateral Eastwardness. Advice to Sunni scholars; Mowlavi Abdolhamid: 'Pay attention to the interests of the nation.'