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Shakeup at United Nations' Iran Mission Stewart Stogel UNITED NATIONS -- NewsMax has learned that Iran's longtime representative to the United Nations, Dr. Javad Zarif, will "retire" from that post at the end of March. The move by Iran was first reported by NewsMax on Feb. 3.
Officially, the reason for the shift was that Dr. Zarif was overdue to be "rotated." He has held the post for the past five years. Iranian diplomats tell NewsMax the U.N. ambassador's post "normally" has a 4-year term.
Iranian sources would only explain that another veteran diplomat, a "Mr. Khzaee," would succeed Zarif, but offered no additional details.
The move does come at a critical time for Iranian, United Nations and United States diplomatic relations.
Zarif, a veteran diplomat who has spent more than 30 years living in the United States, intends to join the faculty of Tehran University.
Story Continues Below The Iranian diplomat, a career foreign service official and a political moderate (by Iranian standards) had previously served as deputy foreign minister and as Tehran's deputy U.N. ambassador in the late 1980s.
Educated in the United States, Zarif holds academic degrees from the Universitiy of San Francisco and the University of Denver.
Unofficially, the Iranian diplomat had also been an important channel between the Bush White House, several senior officials on Capitol Hill and the government in Tehran.
The diplomatic personnel shift comes as Tehran faces the imposition of sanctions by the U.N. Security Council over its nuclear power program.
President George W. Bush insists Iran is secretly moving toward building an atomic weapon, an accusation repeatedly denied by the government in Tehran.
The White House also recently fingered the Islamic Republic (through a special military faction called the al Quuds force)as providing aid to Iraqi insurgents attacking U.S. forces.
The Security Council has an impending deadline of February 23 for Iran to comply with its demands to suspend "enrichment" of uranium fuel.
While enrichment is a common step in fueling nuclear power reactors, it can also provide material for a military weapon.
Diplomats at the U.S. mission to the United Nations in New York City tell NewsMax they were unaware of the personnel changes by the Iranians and offered no immediate comment.
© NewsMax 2007. All rights reserved.
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