TEHRAN: Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif urged Iranian diplomatsTuesday not to resign en masse following his shock announcement he wasquitting but to keep up their work defending Iran’s interests.
The announcement on Instagram late on Monday by Zarif, the lead negotiatorof Iran’s landmark 2015 nuclear deal with major powers, prompted reportsthat large numbers of diplomats were considering resigning too in a show ofsupport.
But in comments to ministry staff on Tuesday, Zarif said: “I advise all youdear brothers and sisters in the foreign ministry and embassies toresolutely follow your duties in defence of the country and refrain fromsuch acts.”
The official IRNA news agency said Zarif had also commented for the firsttime on the reason for his announcement.
“I hope my resignation will act as a spur for the foreign ministry toregain its proper statutory tole in the conduct of foreign affairs,” itquoted him as saying.
There was no immediate indication President President Hassan Rouhani hadaccepted the resignation and a petition urging him not to was signed by amajority of members of parliament, senior lawmakers said.
According to Iran’s Entekhab news agency, Zarif’s resignation appears to belinked to a surprise visit by Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to Tehran onMonday.
The top diplomat was not present at any of the meetings Assad had with theSupreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Rouhani, according tosemi-official news agency ISNA.
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Entekhab said it tried to reach Zarif and received the following message:“After the photos of today’s meetings, Javad Zarif no longer has anycredibility in the world as the foreign minister!”
As the lead negotiator in the nuclear deal, Zarif’s standing within Iran’spolitical establishment took a hit when the US withdrew from it andreimposed crippling unilateral sanctions last year.
Ultra-conservative MPs tried to impeach him, only backing down in Decemberas the initiative lost steam.
Zarif said his main concern throughout the negotiations for the nucleardeal had been about pressure from inside Iran.
In an interview with the conservative Jomhoori Eslami newspaper publishedon Tuesday, he said partisan disputes over foreign policy were “a deadlypoison. APP/AFP
