Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, has criticised the dominance of the assassinated Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) commander Qassem Suleimani in Iranian diplomacy, and admitted his own influence over Iranian foreign policy was sometimes zero in a leaked audio recording.
The remarks are from an interview the Iranian foreign ministry admits Zarif gave last March, but it says has been distorted through selective quotes. The leak was claimed as an exclusive by Iran International, a Persian language network viewed by Tehran as hostile and owned by Saudi Arabians.
Suleimani was assassinated by a US drone strike in January 2020, and official criticism of the IRGC’s influence on Iranian foreign policy is extremely rare.
Some say the leak appears designed to discredit Zarif internally but others will claim that the interview is an attempt by Zarif to exonerate himself for the failures in Iranian foreign policy.
