Speaking to reporters on Monday, Nasser Kanaani, a spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, said the time had ended in which the United States was the global hegemon, calling the shots the world over.
“We are witnessing a change in the balance of power in the globe and there is no unipolar world anymore. The issue of the US being a superpower has been over,” Kanaani said at a news conference.
He noted that despite Western attempts to isolate Iran and turn it into a global pariah, the southwest Asian state has always been “influential.” He added that going forward, “Iran won’t limit its foreign relations to a specific region.”
Last year, Iran finalized its membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a Eurasian bloc for coordinating trade, security, and political cooperation between nine major countries, with more than a dozen other observer and partner nations. Together, the SCO members constitute over 40% of the world’s population and more than 30% of global gross domestic product (GDP).
More recently, Iran has patched up relations with its regional rival, Saudi Arabia, thanks to both nations growing friendship with China, another SCO member. The BRICS bloc of rapidly developing non-
Western nations has also weighed expanding its ranks, with China and Brazil recently voicing support for the effort; Iran is one of the contenders for membership.
All this has happened as US sanctions on Iran have continued to grow and Israeli threats of military action against the Islamic Republic have continued to mount.
The sanctions were reimposed in 2018 after a three-year hiatus created by the signing of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Washington claimed without evidence that Tehran had secretly violated the terms of the deal, which included abandoning any kind of nuclear weapons program and accepting strict limitations on the quality and quantity of uranium the country could refine and store.
While the Biden administration has claimed a desire to restore the agreement, two years of talks have so far failed to do so, and sanctions have remained.
While before 2015 those sanctions had been effective and destructive, after they were reimposed in 2018, many nations refused to abide by them except under threat of US action, and Iran had secured a lifeline via Russia and China that has only grown stronger as US sanctions have expanded to include both nations as well. However, in the shorter term, US sanctions did cause acute economic problems and made addressing the COVID-19 pandemic much more difficult.
The Pentagon has claimed in its recent strategy documents that Russia and China pose a threat to the “rules-based international order,” or the US-led global order that emerged after World War II, and identifies Iran and North Korea as nations cooperating with that effort. These claims have underpinned a marked shift in US strategic thinking toward what Washington calls “great power competition,” justifying an even more massive military buildup amid plans for war on multiple fronts.
While the US sanctions are ostensibly being used to try and isolate those nations and others from the global community, they are having the opposite effect, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, noted last November.
“The dimensions and nature of the new order are not exactly known, but its layout can be drawn,” he said. “The first basic line of the new order is ‘the isolation of the US’. Unlike in the past, when the Americans considered themselves the only dominant power in the world, the US does not have an important position in the new order and is isolated. It will have no choice but to stop interfering in various parts of the world.”
Changing Global Dynamics
Kanaani's comments reflect the shifting power dynamics in today's world, as the US no longer dominates global politics as it did in the past. The rise of countries like China, Russia, and India has led to a more multipolar world, where power is distributed among multiple nations, rather than concentrated in one superpower.
Implications for International Relations
The move away from a unipolar world has significant implications for international relations, as countries navigate a more complex global landscape. The shift has led to increased cooperation among nations in various regions, as well as the emergence of new regional powers. It has also prompted some countries to reevaluate their relationships with the United States and seek new alliances to protect their interests.
Highlighting the Iranian administration’s efforts to make the most of the new conditions to fulfill its national interests and strengthen regional convergence, the spokesman added, “Iran won’t limit its foreign relations to a specific region.”
Dismissing the notion that Tehran has connected its foreign policy to the 2015 nuclear deal, Kanaani explained that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) is only one of the subjects in Iran’s foreign policy agenda.
The Iranian administration will not tie the economy and the livelihood of people to the fate of the JCPOA although it remains committed to the negotiating table, he added, stressing that Iran has great capacities for the promotion of foreign relations in various fields.
In remarks in November 2022, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei highlighted the signs of change in the world order and the emergence of a new world order. “The dimensions and nature of the new order are not exactly known, but its layout can be drawn. The first basic line of the new order is ‘the isolation of the US’. Unlike in the past, when the Americans considered themselves the only dominant power in the world, the US does not have an important position in the new order and is isolated. It will have no choice but to stop interfering in various parts of the world.”
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