Rouhani is in Ankara with delicate timing

As Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani starts his two-day official visit to Ankara today hosted by President Abdullah Gül of Turkey, high rank delegations from the U.S. and Iran will meet in Geneva for two days of nuclear talks in the first direct diplomatic contact since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

So far, the talks have been carried out through the European Union’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton on behalf of the U.N. Security Council Permanent Members: the U.S., Russia, China, U.K., France, plus Germany (P5+1), but with no official American participation in delegations. The outcome, which seemed unthinkable a year ago, was possible when Rouhani, after defeating Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the August 2013 elections, responded positively to U.S. President Barack Obama’s extended hand.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif will accompany Rouhani in his first visit to Turkey since he assumed office, but he will be in continuous contact with his deputy Abbas Araqchi in Geneva to feed the president for talks. Araqchi will be meeting there with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns and Helga Schmid, Ashton’s deputy.

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu, on the other hand, will not be in Ankara during Rouhani’s visit. Being the counterpart of both Burns and Araqchi, he will start his weeklong contacts in the U.S. and be reporting to Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu in Ankara about his work there, an interesting diplomatic traffic.

The agenda of the talks in Geneva is likely to cover both Iran’s capability to meet the July 20 deadline for the first phase of the talks and whether it is possible to ease sanctions over Iran, which are damaging its economy based on oil...