Periscope

IRAN: Loaded Letter

The three dots said it all. Former Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani last week released a secret letter penned by the late Ayatollah Khomeini outlining his reasons for accepting a ceasefire with Iraq in July 1988. Iran, wrote Khomeini, didn't possess the weaponry required to keep fighting--and alluded to a commander of the Republican Guard saying that Iran needed "the capability to build a considerable number of laser and nuclear weapons." Just hours after the release of the letter, Iran's Supreme National Security Council ordered all Iranian news agencies to replace the nuke line with an ellipsis.

As the U.N. Security Council once again takes up Iran and its refusal to halt its uranium-enrichment program this week, Khomeini's letter gives pause for thought. It may seem to bolster skeptics who claim Iran indeed seeks nuclear weapons. But it more clearly suggests a rift within Tehran's leadership. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad accused Rafsanjani of "selling out to the enemies, selfishness and lack of faith." According to sources close to him, the letter is a sign of Rafsanjani's frustration at being excluded from Iran's nuclear negotiations--and with the direction of ongoing talks. His team (formerly in charge of the talks with the West) is thought to favor a softer line than Ahmadinejad, and thinks today's leaders, too, need to face up to their weak position.

Indeed, the letter testifies to Khomeini's essential pragmatism--a quality notably absent among current Iranian leaders. "What the Imam's letter shows is that sometimes we need to make sacrifices to keep the Islamic system intact," says a close Rafsanjani adviser who asked not to be named speaking on sensitive matters. "But in order to make sacrifices you need wise men in charge of decisions. Wisdom is what is lacking from the current team in charge of Iran's nuclear negotiations."

-- Maziar Bahari

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