Hassan Rouhani has been declared the victor in the Iranian presidential election. He won with 50.7% of the vote which means that a run-off election will not be necessary. Rouhani is regarded as the moderate candidate in the election and he had called for better relations with the West. Ahmadinejad’s anointed successor, Tehran Mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, and the former nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, were regarded as the hardline conservative candidates and they were soundly defeated. It is hard to say what kind of changes Rouhani might attempt–I suspect the most the West can expect is a change in the tone of Iranian foreign policy. Major changes were unlikely given that all candidates had to be pre-approved by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his associates.
Pakistan has been rocked by violence in which the home of the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, and a bus filled with female students going to school were bombed. The Baluchistan Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the blasts, which also included a siege at the hospital where the students were being treated. The attacks were in retaliation for the killing of rebel associates in the city of Quetta. The violence is likely to continue and to worsen.
The Whitehouse has published a transcript of an On-the-Record Conference Call by Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes on Syria that was held on 13 June. The transcript deserves a close read because it suggests that the “change” in Syrian policy occasioned by the assertion that Syrian has used chemical weapons against the rebels (the “red line” drawn by President Obama). It actually suggests that there has been no major policy change other than to initiate contact with the Syrian Military Council, the military arm of the rebel forces. President Obama is going to wait until the G8 meeting before he makes any definitive decision–at this point I would suggest that the US is going to remain aloof from the conflict.
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