Obama and Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, shook hands for a moment as they met at the United Nations General Assembly.
This was confirmed by Iran’s official Irna agency which stated that the two met by ‘accident’ and shook hands as a result. Also, a White House official anonymously confirmed that there was a “brief interaction at the luncheon, where they shook hands.”
Speaking of which, this the first time that an American President and a top Iran official has shaken hands since 1979. Both countries haven’t had diplomatic relations ever since a pro-western monarchy was removed from power in the same year since then.
Earlier in 2013, Hassan Rouhani, the Iranian President, spoke over the phone with President Obama before leaving the United Nations.
What the Irna report also revealed was that this encounter was by accident. Yet, as a result of this meeting that lasted for a minute, Kerry introduced two of Zarif’s deputies to Obama too.
Of course, Iranian hardliners are very disappointed by the handshake. In fact, Mansour Haghighatpour, a member of parliament’s committee for national security and policy, stated, “The foreign minister [Zarif] has committed a very bad action and he has to apologize to the great Iranian nation.”
One of his committee colleagues, Mohammad Hassan Asafari, told the Associated Press that “an investigation to see what the case” was is necessary. However, other speculate that this simply meant better ties between the two nations.
One such lawmaker, Mehrdad Lahouti, stated that maybe the “Islamic Republic intended to convey … that we are ready to begin a new chapter” with Washington.