Former Nuclear Negotiator Joins Iranian Presidential Race
Hassan Rouhani, a top official during a time of warmer Iranian relations with the West, could be the standard-bearer for the reformist/pragmatist camp in upcoming presidential elections.
The latest addition to what is already becoming a crowded field of Iranian presidential contenders — former national security adviser Hassan Rouhani — could insure that the issue of Iran’s nuclear program figures in what might otherwise be a lackluster campaign.
Rouhani, 64, who announced his candidacy today [April 11], is closely associated with former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, who has been marginalized since his loss to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005 and especially since Ahmadinejad’s disputed 2009 re-election. However, Rouhani kept his head down during post-2009 disturbances and so has a better chance of surviving the vetting process that precedes Iran’s June 14 vote.
Rouhani served as secretary of Iran’s Supreme Council on National Security — similar to the post of White House national security adviser — under both Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami and led nuclear negotiations with Europeans from 2003–2005. Rouhani has been a blistering critic of the stewardship of the issue under Ahmadinejad, noting that in the earlier period Iran was able to continue important nuclear work without provoking the draconian sanctions that are now crippling the Iranian economy.
“It puts the nuclear issue front and center in a way that’s difficult to avoid,” Suzanne Maloney, an Iran expert at the Brookings Institution, told Al-Monitor, in reaction to Rouhani’s announcement.
