Source: PRI's The World

Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has dismissed the leaking of U.S. cables detailing Arab calls for Washington to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities as propaganda, describing the release as psychological warfare against Iran.  Carnegie’s Karim Sadjadpour spoke with PRI anchor Lisa Mullins about the apprehension felt by the Gulf states toward Iran’s nuclear, explaining that the WikiLeaks documents simply provide confirmation of longstanding attitudes.

Sadjadpour said he was not surprised that major regional powers such as Saudi Arabia would go so far as to call for the bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities, although he admitted to being taken aback by official statements from smaller Gulf countries such as Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain, and Oman advocating a similarly militaristic response.  According to Sadjadpour, the documents reveal that amidst the “fanning of the military flames toward Iran … the United States is a voice of reason and has exercised restraint over the Gulf states and Israel.”  Although many of the Gulf states have aggressively criticized Iran’s nuclear policies through private diplomatic channels, they are more reluctant to state these positions publicly.  As a result, Mullins observed, there is a mismatch between the “bellicose” tone expressed in many of the WikiLeaks documents and the comparatively restrained rhetoric that Gulf countries use in their public statements on Iran.

According to Sadjadpour, an analysis of the WikiLeaks documents reveals Iran’s profound diplomatic isolation. “Its only real friend, if you can call it that, is North Korea,” he said.