Vienna Talks and Iran

It became clear that no serious fight with jihadists can be put up without Russia. Concessions for Moscow have to be made, in particular, in the context of Iran's involvement in resolving the Syrian crisis.

The sensational appearance of an Iranian representative at the Vienna talks on Syria is explained by two factors: the persistence of Russia, whose role and influence in the Middle East and on the world arena in general increased dramatically after the beginning of its military operation, and the softening of the West's stance towards Iran after signing the agreement on the Iranian nuclear programme.

Moscow's resolute intervention in the Syrian civil war has shown the world the utter fallacy of the impression created after the developments in Crimea that Russia had presumably become an isolated state, almost an outcast, who had nothing to do other than lick the wounds inflicted by Western sanctions.

Everyone started talking about Putin momentarily reversing the situation: first of all, he embarked on a mission that was too tough for the coalition formed by Washington to combat ISIS and started actively crushing the quasi-state created by jihadist militants; therefore, Russia was the one to get to the forefront of the fight against the deadly threat to humanity. Secondly, the Kremlin made it clear that it would not allow the downfall of the legal regime in Damascus, in part because it considers the regime necessary in defeating ISIS.

It became clear that no serious fight with jihadists can be put up without Russia. Concessions for Moscow have to be made, in particular, in the context of Iran's involvement in resolving the Syrian crisis.

As to the softening of the West's position towards Iran, it is quite logical and can be attributed to the fact that Iran was excluded from the top of the enemies list, as a state about to face a war. Time has come to lift anti-Iranian sanctions, it may even be followed by resumption of diplomatic relations between Washington and Tehran. In any case, it is clear that Israel no longer has a pretext to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities, a step that would have immediately sparked a big war, pulling the US into it. Western states have a different goal now: they need to reestablish their influence on Iran by means of soft power, so they have to refrain from irritating Iranians, to spread propaganda aimed at displaying the futility of Iranian authorities' compromise on the nuclear programme, not to mention giving pretexts to Tehranian warmongers and naysayers. Clearly, if the West persisted in keeping Iran out of the Syrian negotiation process, anti-Western political groups in Tehran would have reaped the benefit from the situation.

Moreover, Western diplomacy had nothing to lose or risk with inviting Iran to Vienna, because it was evident that Tehran would speak in Moscow's tune. The positions of Russia and Iran were absolutely identical on Bashar al-Assad's fate and blocked any breakthroughs on this issue. The Iranian minister could not add anything new, he reiterated the arguments of Sergey Lavrov.

It turned out that only Israel and Saudi Arabia were against Iran's involvement into the political process to resolve the Syrian crisis, but their views were brushed aside.

Iran's interest in collaborating with Russia on the Syrian issue has two explanations: first of all, Assad's regime is the only reliable ally of Tehran in the Arab East. The fall of the Damascus regime would close the gates to the Arab world for Iran, not to mention the fact that the ruling Alawite elites are still Shiites. Secondly, Iran does not want emergence of a powerful extremist Sunni state near its border. It is common knowledge that for Al-Qaeda Shiites look no better than Jews and Christians. The events in Iraq last year, the bitter fate of Shiites are still vivid in the memory.
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