US senator confirms meeting Iran’s FM in Munich amid Trump’s criticism

NEW YORK, Feb 19 (APP):An American senator belonging to the Democratic Party has confirmed that he met Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif on the sidelines of the recent Munich Security Conference, a move that drew criticism from the Republicans, including President Donald Trump, who suggested that the senator may have violated a law that prohibits U.S. citizens from negotiating with foreign governments.

In a post on Medium, an online publication, Senator Chris Murphy said he wanted to discuss Iranian-backed forces in Iraq, the war in Yemen and U.S. prisoners being held in Iran.

“I have no delusions about Iran,” Murphy wrote on Tuesday about his attendance at the Security Conference in Munich. “But I think it’s dangerous to not talk to your enemies,”
“Discussions and negotiations are a way to ease tensions and reduce the chances for crisis,” he said. “But Trump, of course, has no such interests.”

Murphy’s meeting with Zarif was first reported by The Federalist, a conservative online magazine, on Monday.

Murphy said he had several goals in mind for his meeting with Zarif – with whom he had met on previous occasions, “during both the Obama and Trump Administrations.”

He wanted to talk about reprisal attacks for the killing in a U.S. airstrike of prominent Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani, and to make it “100 percent clear to him that if any groups in Iraq that are affiliated with Iran attack the United States’ forces in Iraq, this will be perceived as an unacceptable escalation.”

(Zarif told the Munich conference earlier that day that “revenge” attacks would likely continue, not instigated by Iran, because Iraqis were angry.)

Murphy said he also wanted to request the Iran’s help in bringing the civil war in Yemen to an end; and to push for the release of Americans incarcerated in Iran.

“I don’t know whether my visit with Zarif will make a difference. I’m not the President or the Secretary of State – I’m just a rank and file U.S. Senator,” Murphy wrote.

“I cannot conduct diplomacy on behalf of the whole of the U.S. government, and I don’t pretend to be in a position to do so.”

“But if Trump isn’t going to talk to Iran, then someone should. And Congress is a co-equal branch of government, responsible along with the Executive for setting foreign policy. A lack of dialogue leaves nations guessing about their enemy’s intentions, and guessing wrong can lead to catastrophic mistakes.”

Former Secretary of State John Kerry, Zarif’s negotiating partner in the marathon talks that produced the 2015 nuclear deal, met privately with the Iranian foreign minister on several occasions after he left office, prompting Trump to charge, more than once, that Kerry had violated the Logan Act.

The 1799 Logan Act prohibits unauthorized persons from negotiating with foreign governments which have a dispute with the United States. No-one has been convicted for violating the act.