Iran nuclear deal a triumph for multilateralism

But regardless of how the US presidential candidates spin this important issue, there is no denying what the US-led coalition has achieved in its dealings with the Iranians. 

In the view of the administration of President Barack Obama, the Iranians have made significant concessions. In a nutshell, Tehran has permitted restrictions to be placed on each of its nuclear installations.

Moreover, the fact that Iran came clean about the existence of a number of its atomic facilities has been billed as a major breakthrough. Even staunch critics like Gary Samore, of Harvard University’s Belfer Centre for Science and International Affairs, have hailed the provisional agreement.

Iran made the right choice by entering the agreement, because the future of its economy was at stake. Most of its people are young and want to engage with the world, not live in an isolated and sanctions-hit country. But Iran’s influential mullahs were afraid that opening up too fast would lead to their own demise as powerbrokers.

Nevertheless, US Republicans in charge of Congress and some minority Democrats are poised to play their part by pushing through a draft bill requiring the White House to provide a “verification assessment report” as a safeguard against Iran going back on the deal and building a nuclear bomb.

We should not lose sight of the fact that this accord is a work in progress. A number of items have yet to be worked out, including the inspection regime by international teams and the pace and direction for lifting the sanctions on Iran. In this respect, no one should jump to the conclusion that this is a done deal.

The agreement comes amid a period of rapid and violent change in the Middle East. This regional turmoil 

 expands well beyond the sphere of US-Iran ties and is centred on the issue of collective security for the region.

The US made a big blunder 12 years ago when it invaded Iraq on the basis of faulty intelligence that Saddam Hussein’s regime had obtained weapons of mass destruction. Though many countries – including Thailand – joined the US-led “coalition of the willing”, the invasion was nevertheless America’s doing.

Obama seems to have learned from the mistakes of his predecessor George W Bush and is taking a more collective approach. The interim deal on Tehran’s nuclear programme has been signed not just by Iran and the US. Five other major powers are signatories – China, Russia, Britain, France and Germany.

And though US Secretary of State John Kerry led the negotiations, Washington made sure not to go it alone or leave any player at the talks in the dark.

The Bush administration introduced this policy of multilateralism in dealing with Iran in 2006.

Obama maintained this framework and added harsher economic sanctions, which led to the historic breakthrough witnessed in Switzerland last week.

More work still has to be done, but there is no doubt that this is the start of a new beginning.

While it is still too early to call the accord with Iran a success, the return of multilateralism as a way of resolving such a major challenge gives us reason to be optimistic.

From the look of it, the world community appreciates Washington’s return to an international policy that calls on others to play their parts. We can only hope that Congress follows suit by endorsing its government’s foreign-policy direction. But with the campaign season under way and presidential candidates making all sorts of promises, the future of the deal with Iran remains uncertain.