Diplomacy with Iran

Juan Cole shares this from Ambassador Gerald B. Helman on the Bush administration's apparent change of policy on negotiating with Iran on his Informed Comment blog.

The decision by the Administration to send William Burns, the State Department’s third ranking official and a career diplomat, to participate in the five power talks with Iran over its nuclear activities, certainly invites speculation as to how far the Administration has changed its policies regarding Iran.

Helman says that these talks will be similar to the diplomatic model employed successfully in multi-lateral talks with North Korea.

This new diplomatic process was not undertaken by the participants for the pleasure of sitting around a table to talk to one another. Instead it served to facilitate “multiple bilaterals,” a process and dynamic with which experienced diplomats are well aware and welcome because it provides a cover and process within which otherwise hostile countries can negotiate.

Helman suggests that the decision to send Burns was very likely made by President Bush with full knowledge that it "undercuts John McCain’s position on Iran and his claim to superior experience, and validates Barack Obama’s judgment favoring the negotiating track."

The Washington Post also reports this week that the State Department is considering opening an Interest Section office in Tehran which would place US diplomats inside Iran for the first time since 1979.

Curiouser and curiouser.