Iran Strives To Become The Regional Power-Holder Competing Against T

IRAN STRIVES TO BECOME THE REGIONAL POWER-HOLDER COMPETING AGAINST TURKEY.

PanARMENIAN.Net
26.06.2008 GMT+04:00

Iran’s intention, or to be more exact, her wish to participate in
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict regulation must be viewed from the point
of view of its striving to become the regional power-holder.

Lately Iran has started to attract the attention of the world community
more and more often. And the thing is not only in the permanent
threats of the USA and Israel, but also of the fact that Tehran is
trying to become the power-holder of the region. Iran’s real rival
in this issue is Turkey, who does not have the support of the Arab
countries. However, it is quite possible that the Islamic course of
the Justice and Development Party (AKR) may help Turkey to overcome
the difficulties with the Arab world.

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ But Iran does not have these difficulties and she
is more independent, than the very Turkey, who always turns back to
the USA and in some cases to Israel. Israel’s announcement about her
readiness to open fire on the nuclear powers of Iran in Tehran has
definitely been taken as a bad joke. According to the representative
of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Iran Muhammad Ali Hussein,
Israel is not strong enough to threaten Tehran, but she wanted to
overcome certain home political crises and distract the attention
of the society. "Tel-Aviv needs such events to rehabilitate the low
spirits of the Israeli authorities after they lost to "Hezbollah" in
Lebanon in 2006," he said. In his turn President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
announced that the President of the USA George Bush will not attack
Iran in the neat future. "The time of George Bush in the head of the
United States is coming to its end, and the President of the USA will
not do any harm to Iran, even regardless of the US troops’ invasion
of the bordering Afghanistan and Iraq," emphasized Ahmadinejad.

Iran’s intention, or to be more exact, her wish to participate in
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict regulation must be viewed from the point
of view of its striving to become the regional power-holder. "Iran
was a mediator in the regulation of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, but
unfortunately under the outer pressure our country was debarred from
mediation," announced the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the
Islamic Republic of Iran in the month of June in Baku. According to
him, if there is a suggestion from both parties, his country is ready
to take the responsibility of the mediator in the regulation process of
the conflict. "Although, I do not consider the work of the OSCE Minsk
Group satisfactory, Iran supports the negotiations in these frames,"
said the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran.

The official Baku reacted very quickly. "Baku is not against mediation
of Iran in the regulation of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Taking into
consideration the recourses that Iran possesses, the official Tehran
may assist the regulation process, if the right messages are sent to
Armenia," said the press-secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
of Azerbaijan Khazar Ibrahim. Let us leave it to Ibrahim to decide what
is meant by this "right messages", which Tehran is going to send to
Armenia. However, there is one truth to be reminded, and we must say
that a diplomat of his rank cannot be ignorant of such a truth. The
Islamic Republic of Iran cannot be a mediator in the regulation of
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. "Iran simply cannot join the negotiation
process. Iran is not included in the OSCE Minsk Group. Moreover,
she is in very complicated relations with the USA, an OSCE Minsk
Group co-chair. The announcement of the Deputy Minister of Foreign
Affairs of Iran in this case must be taken with one correction, in
which country he said this, and why," says the political scientist
Alexander Iskandaryan.

Azerbaijan’s vain attempts of bringing the work of the OSCE Minsk Group
to zero will hardly bring to the desired results. And Iran definitely
will not play all these games at least for one simple reason; it
has enough problems of its own to solve. Baku perhaps thinks that
the regulation of the conflict failed to reach to the UNO, so we
must try on the regional level. Moreover, when there are all Islamic
countries all around us, most of which are members of the Organization
of Islamic Conference (OIC). However, Azerbaijan forgets that there
is also the League of Arab States, where Armenia has the status of an
observer. After all, if Azerbaijan turns to OIC, what will keep away
Armenia from turning to the League of Arab States and show the Arab
states its real position in Karabakh conflict regulation? It’s as
simple as that, the closer the presidential elections of Azerbaijan
are, the more aggressive the comments of the official Baku regarding
the conflict and Armenia itself becomes.