John Chuckman
COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE BY AHMED ABOUDOUH IN THE INDEPENDENT
“Middle East Explained: What is Britain’s policy on Iran? What do the Iranians want?”
"What is Britain’s policy on Iran?"
Policy?
Where does anyone see anything resembling a policy?
Officials listened to the hare-brained John Bolton and illegally arrested a tanker near Gibraltar, setting off a host of events that were all avoidable.
Then Britain sends a couple of warships to join with America’s provocative and completely unnecessary presence in the Gulf.
And we get the odd poorly thought-out words from Britain’s government, like the absurd response to Iran’s reasonable offer to cool things by trading tankers.
No, the British government maintains, with a straight face, that not all hijackings are equal.
I beg to differ, they are, and, if anything, Britain’s was the most damaging.
It started, quite predictably, a series of responses from Iran.
Where is there anything from Britain that can be called policy, especially given the fact that Britain at least maintains it still supports the other signatories to the Iran nuclear agreement?
Britain’s behavior in these matters works against such support. It is completely unhelpful.
If this is called policy, then some of Boris Johnson’s lunatic schoolboy antics and nasty name-calling can be called dignified behavior by a senior official
