As Iranian President Hassan Rouhani left Tehran for New York yesterday, Sept. 22, for the 69th UN General Assembly, various conservatives held conferences and published op-eds warning the president about the nuclear negotiations to take place on the sidelines of the assembly and against a possible handshake with the US president. Supporters of the president have also voiced their opinions via open letters and Twitter.
Tehran University professor Sadegh Zibakalam wrote in a Sept. 21 open letter to Rouhani, “You have not yet set foot on the plane and extremists have pre-emptively started beating the anti-American drums on the matter of you meeting with the American President Barack Obama and [saying] that you do not have permission to do so.”
The letter continued, “Mr. President, at a time when the 5 million people of Scotland freely decide their fate, is it too much to expect for our people to express their opinions about the foreign policy of their country on the issue of anti-Americanism?
“Does the elections mean anything other than people being asked of they are in favor of the continuation of the old policies or not? And have the people, with 19 million votes for you and 4 million votes for Dr. Saeed Jalili, not expressed themselves on the previous policies, such as anti-Americanism?” Conservative candidate Jalili’s policies during the 2013 presidential election most resembled those of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
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