In Shift, U.S. Makes Quiet Overtures to Iran Following Election Upset

In the most serious U.S. attempt in a decade to engage Iran in dialogue, the Clinton administration has quietly signaled through diplomatic channels that it seeks to improve the volatile relationship between Tehran and Washington.

“We would like to end the estrangement,” a senior administration official said. “And we are now looking for ways to accomplish that goal.”

The U.S. wants to take advantage of a political shift inside Iran, symbolized by a presidential election upset in May in which a relative moderate won office, and to do so soon enough to prevent a potential confrontation if the Islamic republic is eventually tied to last year’s bombing of a military complex in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 U.S. service personnel.

Ironically, Saudi Arabia--which made the strongest case about Iran’s role in the bombing--has been a central intermediary in relaying the U.S. message to Iran, the official said. Abdul Aziz Abdallah Khweater, a senior member of the Saudi Council of Ministers, outlined U.S. terms for eventual rapprochement during a visit to Tehran last week.

The U.S. official declined to elaborate on those terms.

U.S. officials are looking for Iran to take a major step away from its sponsorship of international terrorism, the official said. As an early signal of Iranian intent, Washington will watch President-elect Mohammad Khatami’s Cabinet appointments, which are expected before he takes office Aug. 3.

The United States is particularly interested in the ministries of intelligence and interior, the two posts that have been linked with promoting extremism. Intelligence Minister Ali Fallahian has been linked in a German court to Iranian-backed plots to assassinate dissidents abroad. His departure is considered essential to improved relations.

“Iran has proven in recent years that it is capable of changing its behavior,” the official said.

For example, the official said, Iran “has a working relationship with the Russians despite strong ideological differences.” Iran and Russia have worked out a deal in which Iran does not meddle in the Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union, while Moscow helps restock Iran’s arsenal, depleted by 40% in Tehran’s 1980-88 war with Iraq.

If relations with the United States improved enough that the administration ended its policy of economic isolation, Iran could, among other things, gain access to badly needed Western technology and equipment for its outdated oil industry.

But senior administration officials fear that before the new Iranian government has a chance to respond to U.S. overtures, the Saudi bombing investigation could develop conclusive evidence pointing to Iranian involvement.

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Khatami will need time to consolidate his hold on power in a faction-riddled political environment before he can take any bold steps to improve ties with the U.S.

“We would love to see Iran take action that shows response to our concerns--and to do something before momentum takes over on [Capitol Hill] or among other quarters that would make it difficult to argue the case for dealing with Iran again any time soon,” the senior official said.

A possible source of such difficulty is the Saudi dissident being held in the U.S.: Hani Abdel Rahim Hussein Sayegh, who may have been a driver and lookout in the attack on the Khobar Towers apartment compound, according to information provided the United States primarily from Saudi officials.

Sayegh was deported last month from Canada to Washington and is scheduled to appear in court Thursday. It is uncertain whether he will stick to his original agreement with U.S. investigators, in which he would provide information about the Saudi attack in exchange for being allowed to plead guilty to a lesser charge.

Khweater’s visit to Iran last week was designed to boost relations between the two oil-rich neighbors, which have been tense since Iran’s monarchy was ousted in 1979. Ties were severed by 1991.

Khweater’s talks with senior Iranian officials included current President Hashemi Rafsanjani and were followed by the signing of several economic accords between Saudi Arabia and Iran that effectively reestablish trade ties.

Both Saudi Arabia and Israel, two countries usually at opposite poles on regional tensions, have urged Washington not to retaliate against Tehran if evidence proves that Iran had a direct hand in the Khobar attack, high-level U.S. sources say. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made the case personally with the administration, they add.

Although Israel considers Iran a major threat to stability in the region, Israeli officials oppose a U.S. military response at least partly out of fear that their country could be the target of Iranian retaliation.

The Clinton administration first signaled its decision to push the issue of rapprochement with Iran shortly after Khatami’s surprise landslide victory May 23, which President Clinton called a “very interesting” development and “a reaffirmation of the democratic process there.”

“I have never been pleased with the estrangement between the people of the United States and the people of Iran. They are a very great people, and I hope that the estrangement can be bridged,” Clinton said. “What we hope for is a reconciliation with a country that does not believe that terrorism is a legitimate extension of political policies.”

He made clear that other issues remain major hurdles, most notably Iran’s opposition to the Mideast peace process and its program to build weapons of mass destruction. But the tenor of his remarks has persisted.

At the Denver summit of the Group of 7 industrialized nations last month, the final communique “noted with interest” the results of the Iranian election. It also praised Iran’s role in helping negotiate a recent cease-fire in Tajikistan and called on Iran’s government to engage constructively in other regional and world affairs--language crafted by the U.S., American officials say.

Until Iran takes action, however, the administration is making clear that its policy of “dual containment,” which seeks to isolate both Iran and Iraq, will remain in place.