On 28 January at the Frontline Club, a panel chaired by CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer discussed the possible start of a new chapter for Iran following the election of Hassan Rouhani as president. Rouhani is not only in favour with the Supreme Leader and political hardliners but also backed by reformists, due to his running mandate “moderation and wisdom”.

Elizabeth Palmer, Shashank Joshi and Kelly Golnoush Niknejad discuss change in Iran

Palmer started by asking the panel if there had been change for the good since the election of Rouhani?

British-Iranian Emmy award-winning foreign affairs journalist, Ramita Navai said:

“He is the man who can change things, he’s a real insider. . . . He really knows how to negotiate the hardliners. . . . He’s also of course in favour with the big man . . . the supreme leader.”

Kelly Golnoush Niknejad, founder and editor-in-chief of the award-winning Tehran Bureau, hosted by The Guardian said:

“The initial optimism that came with Rouhani’s win is definitely wearing off. When he released a group of prominent political prisoners before his UN trip hope went up that he was going to free [former presidential candidates Mehdi] Karoubi and [Mir Hossein] Mousavi and his wife [from house arrest] and when he didn’t do that . . . they were hoping that would legitimise an election they had taken part of.”

Packed house for tonight's Iran debate as our panel discusses the changes we have seen in the country pic.twitter.com/8JuPBJPuYW

— Frontline Club (@frontlineclub) January 28, 2014

Shashank Joshi, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), said that the nuclear deal, which was implemented on 20 January, would be the start of Iran becoming more economically viable internationally, but it is not the end:

“The so called ‘Joint Plan of Action’ . . . it was the biggest breakthrough for 10 years in the nuclear dispute. . . . [But] going from an interim deal to a final deal is very, very hard. . . . The one thing that unites those who hate the deal and those who love the deal is that both have a propensity to see this as the thin end of a wedge to a bigger rapprochement. . . . [Rouhani’s] mandate is to ease reconciliation for economic reasons, economic renewal, it is not a mandate for unconditional friendship with the west.”

@shashj on converging strategic interests btwn the West and #Iran: "Iran never easy to deal with even with mutual interests" @frontlineclub

— Julia Macfarlane (@juliamacfarlane) January 28, 2014

Iran’s success depends on economic success but the west has a dilemma. Former British ambassador to Iran (2002–06) Sir Richard Dalton said:

“The outside world . . . has got a genuine dilemma because the Iranian regime is not one which one would want to see strengthened. One would want to see aspects of the way it treats its own people and the way it behaves in the region weakened, frankly. . . . But at the same time, non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and above all ensuring that the Iranian programme will not be misused in future is such a high priority issue that there are certain features that are going together with a solution which include boosting Iran’s growth rate. . . . In justification, an Iran that is prospering is an Iran that is more likely to reform long term.”

How much domestic pressure is there for the government to affect change, Palmer asked. Arron Reza Merat of the Economist Intelligence Unit said:

“Your question presupposes that there is a strong . . . democratic apparatus to press politicians to do anything and in Iran . . . the elite run Iran, the elections though do have some democratic elements in them are really just changing fractions within the original systems.”

An audience member asked whether the reformists have any hope in having an effect on the system. Merat said that there was hope in Rouhani’s relationship with the Supreme Leader and political hardliners:

“The one hope I think that the reformists have is that they’ve got a reformist-backed president who has the support of not only the reformists but the hardliners and this hasn’t happened since [former president Akbar Hashemi] Rafsanjani’s first term [in 1989]. . . . Ever since then Iran has been utterly polarised . . . nothing happens in Iran unless you have both sides on board.”

Sir Richard Dalton, Arron Reza Merat and Elizabeth Palmer discuss change in Iran

A final question from the audience asked what would be the significance of having Mousavi and Karoubi released? Dalton said:

“From my perspective I can’t imagine the streets of Tehran would be filled with people supporting them the day they came out. People are a lot more practical than that at the moment.”

Navai said:

“It is symbolic. It will signal that Rouhani has the power to change, the power to release them. . . . They are still perceived as a threat . . . it’s a fear apparently that if they do release them that the reformists, however dormant they are, will be strengthened before the parliamentary elections [in 2016] and of course the hardliners are very keen that Rouhani doesn’t gain ground in the parliamentary elections.”

Watch or listen back here:

By Will Spens

The continued release from WikiLeaks and several major newspapers including The Guardian, Der Spiegel and The New York Times of 251,287 leaked US embassy cables is causing a flood of headlines across the world. Last night at the Frontline Club author and broadcaster Tom Fenton chaired a heated discussion with an expert panel including WikiLeaks spokesperson Kristinn Hrafnsson.

With Interpol having issued a red notice for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange his current location is being kept secret. Representing WikiLeaks was spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson. Asked whether Assange being in hiding was evidence of WikiLeaks’ own lack of transparency, Hrafnsson responded that ‘to equate Julian remaining in hiding with the lack of transparency seen from governments is completely unfounded’.

With him was James Ball, a data journalist who has been working with WikiLeaks since the Iraq War Logs were released. Asked what this new release means, Ball said that it was ‘an incredibly significant trove of material’ which could have real ‘geopolitical consequences’.  He went on to say that ‘secrecy in diplomacy should be the exception, not the norm’ and justified the release by saying that the public ‘can only make an informed vote if [they] know what is happening’.

Professor Colleen Graffy, the former US Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy held the view that the leaking of previously confidential cables will lead to ‘complications for communications for diplomats in future.’ If people were not able to speak freely to diplomats without fear of being exposed this would have a ‘chilling effect’ on the international community. She was also adamant that secrecy was essential for allowing sensitive, behind the scenes diplomacy to take place. ‘How many years is it going to put back reunification with Korea?’ was her impassioned response to the recently leaked revelation that China seems no longer to view North Korea as useful leverage on the world stage.

She was joined in much of her advocacy for diplomatic confidentiality by Sir Richard Dalton, a former UK Ambassador to both Libya and Iran. Asked whether he thought that the release would have repercussions for, or alter the foreign policy of the US, he responded that ‘the facts of diplomacy will remain the same as they always have’ but asserted ‘the material does not belong in the public domain’. He said that both the Afghan and Iraq War Logs were ‘perhaps a clearer case of public interest’ than confidential diplomatic cables, but then went on to say that once the material was released, it was always going to be printed and therefore the notion that WikiLeaks should be shouldering the blame is perhaps unnecessary.