Iranian Leader Plans to Address the U.S. on TV

After weeks of openly suggesting a detente, Iran’s new president plans to speak to the American people in a televised interview next week, and the Clinton administration is ready with responses that could gradually lead to diplomatic relations, U.S. and Iranian officials say.

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami and President Clinton are directing the sensitive initiatives personally, the officials also say.

Khatami, who has repeatedly signaled a desire to reduce U.S.-Iranian tensions, has decided to talk to Americans in a Cable News Network interview around midweek, an Iranian official said Tuesday.

Clinton has said he would “like nothing better” than to open discussions with Tehran and is looking for concrete proposals to do so, U.S. officials say.

The steps by both sides reflect the rapidly growing interest in ending a generation of enmity that, at its worst, included hostage seizures and suicide bombings of Americans by Iran or its allies and the U.S. Navy’s accidental shoot-down of an Iran Air passenger plane, which killed 290 civilians.

Yet the potential next moves are uncertain. A senior U.S. official said Khatami has been unclear about whether he wants to “exchange pingpong teams”--a reference to the first step in resumed U.S.-Chinese relations in the 1970s--or engage in speedier or more direct steps.

“What we don’t know is whether Khatami will actually say something like ‘Let’s meet at the Palace of Nations in Geneva at 2,’ ” the U.S. official said.

From the U.S. side, the administration has developed possible responses that depend entirely on what Khatami says and does, officials say. Details of the potential responses are not being disclosed.

But the U.S. does continue to insist that before full diplomatic relations can resume, Iran must deal with three critical issues: its opposition to the Middle East peace process, its program of developing weapons of mass destruction and its support of extremist groups.

The administration, for example, recently relayed a strong message to Tehran calling for an immediate end to Iranian surveillance of American diplomatic facilities in the Persian Gulf, Central Asia and the Balkans, U.S. officials say.

Iran’s surveillance, which began before Khatami’s surprise election in May, exceeds “the normal spy vs. spy stuff,” the senior administration official said. Some activities by Iranian agents, such as monitoring where U.S. personnel park cars and their travel routes, could be interpreted as preparation for attacks.

Despite those obstacles, interest is rising in Washington in resuming a relationship. “The bandwagon is now beginning to roll, and more and more people are now getting ready to jump on,” a U.S. official said.

Several House members and senators have checked with the White House or State Department to explore independent fact-finding trips to Tehran. “It’s a long list, and politically they’re all over the map,” an administration official said.

Among them, U.S. officials say, are Rep. Tom Lantos (D-San Mateo), a senior member of the House International Relations Committee; Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio), a former teacher in Iran and the only Farsi-speaking member of Congress; and Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), a staunch supporter of Israel.

The White House has discouraged a Lantos visit and any other congressional intervention, in part because similar efforts with other nations have sometimes ended badly. Washington wants an “official and authorized dialogue . . . that would be acknowledged publicly with the Iranian authorities,” State Department spokesman James Foley has said.

Timing is crucial for both presidents. The White House will soon face pressure to invoke the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act to penalize France’s Total oil company for doing business with Iran. The 1996 act authorizes sanctions against foreign companies investing $20 million or more in either Iran or Libya. U.S. aid to Russia is also under scrutiny because of Russia’s transfer of missile technology to Iran.

White House officials expect Congress to hold hearings on both issues when it reconvenes in January--and to urge action unless Tehran shows concrete shifts in policy.

Khatami’s warm statements toward the United States came as a surprise if only because they happened so soon after he took office in August. U.S. policymakers have recently concluded that Khatami has been consistently underestimated.

Iran experts assumed that Khatami would have great difficulty overcoming Iranian hard-liners led by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei--the nation’s supreme leader and top religious figure--who in theory has the last word on Iranian policy and whose candidate for president unexpectedly lost to Khatami.

“First, no one thought he could win, but he did, decisively,” the U.S. official said of Khatami. “Then he was going to have trouble getting his Cabinet approved, but he did without serious problems. Then the experts said he couldn’t conduct his own foreign policy, but once again he’s showing that he is strong and determined.”

Khatami has broad support among the Iranian people, who, among other things, have grown weary of strict rules the hard-liners imposed on society.

He earlier this month pledged to speak to “the great American people.” Administration officials have monitored Iranian public debate about and media reaction to that vow, and, to their pleasant surprise, the responses have included relatively little polemic from hard-liners, U.S. officials say.

To be sure, Khamenei asserted last week that U.S. policy is controlled by Israel and its allies. “The U.S. administration as well as the American Congress is financially, culturally and politically hostage to the Zionists,” he said.

And Habiboallah Asgharoladi, a conservative member of Iran’s parliament, was quoted in the Resalat newspaper in Tehran as saying: “Those who think negotiations with the U.S. can solve our problems are deluding themselves.”

But others have not rejected talks out of hand.

Salam, the leading newspaper of former Iranian officials linked with hostage seizures and other anti-American acts, last week called for a national referendum on renewing diplomatic ties.

Perhaps foreshadowing next week’s interview, Kamal Kharrazi, Khatami’s foreign minister, said last week, “It is an achievement and to our advantage to speak to the American people, to reach an understanding with them, to tell them about our problems and to introduce ourselves to them.”

And in a message to mark Christmas, Khatami called for “a new chapter in relations” between Christians and Muslims, saying: “I hope that with mutual dialogue and strengthening of sincerity and a spirit of cooperation we can send the sacred message of salvation, peace and friendship to the human race. I wish for a new chapter in relations between peoples.”