Your trusted source

Press TV has conducted an interview with Foad Izadi, a professor at University of Tehran, about China’s call for the creation of a new Asia security cooperation that includes Russia and Iran.  

Press TV: This has turned out to be quite a conference here and we’re looking at a new alliance.

I would like to obviously talk about what the Chinese president has said when he called for the creation of a new Asian structure for security cooperation based on a regional group and he has included Russia and Iran. What was your first reaction when you heard this statement from the Chinese president?

Izadi: Well, I think the Chinese are tired of US interference in their affairs. The United States unfortunately has been pressuring China at the same time that it has been borrowing money from China, which is kind of odd for anyone to do.

Just yesterday, as you know, we had the United States naming five Chinese military officials, accusing them of spying, something that the US does every day on a huge basis.

So I think what you’re seeing is the United States being dealt a blow by what the Chinese government is doing.

I think the Chinese-Iranian-Russian alliance is a nightmare for the United States; and I think, given their relations between Russia and the United States and given the relations between Iran and the United States, these three partners are quite able and ready to form an alliance with other Asian countries and basically defend their national interests against the United States and a number of European countries.

Press TV: What kind of reaction can we see from the United States? We know about the pivot to South East Asia – obviously that’s one of them; hopefully they’re not going to come out and talk about this alliance like how they termed it as an ‘axis of evil.’

You’ve got three countries, Iran, Russia and China, each have many areas that go against the United States. The United States has tried to counter the differences with various forms and means – of course we could talk about Iran and their civilian nuclear program; and Russia in terms of what’s happening in Ukraine; and China most notably about the territorial disputes that exists in the East China Sea.

Izadi: As you know, both China and Russia are members of P5+1 so I think Iran is interested in basically reaching an agreement with these two countries on how this process of talks between Iran and P5+1 is going to go.

I think in the news we had today, President Rouhani actually has discussed the nuclear talks with both Chinese and Russian leaders. I think Iran is looking for ways of getting around the sanctions that is hurting the country and I think both China and Russia can play an important role in terms of basically helping Iran to survive these sanctions and get around them. I think the deal that was reported between Iran and Russia is something that may have a future. I think the Chinese government officials and the Russian government officials realize that if Iran is hit hard and if Iran faces major difficulties on its economic situation this is not in their strategic interests.

None of these two governments, neither China nor Russia, would want to see an Iran that is in line with US foreign policy; they don’t want to see another pro-American regime in this part of the world. Realizing that fact, they will try to cooperate with Iran for Iran to go through this process.

Given the fact that the United States is using military postures against both China and Russia – as you know we had US navy airplanes roaming around the East China Sea; we had US air force airplanes roaming around Ukraine, I think showing this type of action of military postures against these two countries is going to backfire and is going to make that alliance much more feasible for all three countries.

Press TV: Our guest Patrick Basham raised many points and he seemed to indicate on different occasions about how this current administration in the US under President Barack Obama is not very successful for lack of a better world and is not displaying America as being the number-one super power.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but previous administrations also displayed themselves in one way or another like the way Obama has – perhaps Obama has exceeded this in different areas.

What reaction did you have to Patrick Basham’s statements before we went on our break?

Izadi: Actually I think the Obama administration is doing relatively better in terms of realizing that the hegemony of the United States is coming to an end.

I think the fact that they want to pivot toward Asia is a signal that they understand that Asia is gaining power and influence internationally.

I think they also realize that entering into endless, useless wars has hurt the United States and they are not going to follow the Israeli demand on attacking Iran or causing other criminal activities in this part of the world with regard to starting a new war.

Given the fact that the US has a huge debt; given the fact that there are major social problems within the United States I think the Obama administration has rightly realized that there are major difficulties at home that need to be addressed and that entering into new adventures internationally is not really good for the United States.

Having said that, we have a difficulty with all US administrations in the last many decades and the difficulty is that they do not realize the limits of their power in terms of how much they can push around other countries, especially countries that are gaining power, especially countries that are economically major players in the world.

You see what happened in Ukraine. I don’t think anyone in Washington realized that the Russian government was going to respond in the way that the Russian government responded. I think instead of following the wrong steps of previous administrations, the Obama administration needs to realize that there are limits to US power and they need to realize that pushing Iran too much, pushing Russia, causing difficulties for Russia or sanctioning Russian officials at the end is going to backfire the same way that it has backfired against Iran.

And I think the more they push Iran and cause difficulties for Iran, the more Iran will look east and will try to form alliances with countries like China and Russia and I think overall that is a very bad strategy for the United States to push these three countries to get closer to each other and form an alliance against the United States.

Press TV: One of the consequences is this big deal that was struck between China and Russia of 400 billion dollars, over the next 30 years, worth of gas and it is said the two countries are going to bypass the US dollar. Has the US miscalculated its moves?

Izadi: I think no one in Washington is happy with the deal with the exception I guess of Chinese and Russian embassies.

We have a situation where the financial deal is obviously important; but bypassing of the US dollar I think is a major step toward getting rid of the dollar for international economic transactions and this would be quite devastating for the United States.

The US government basically prints as much money as it wants without really worrying about inflationary consequences of that action and the reason is that, up until now at least, a major part of international transactions, financials transactions have gone through the dollar system.

If countries decide to bypass the dollar and use their local currencies for transactions then this many dollars are not going to be needed internationally, it will stay in the United States.