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Detente with Iran last option?

WASHINGTON, March 27 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama's policy of engaging the Iranian regime via mutual interests holds promise, but there may be few other alternatives, a review said.

In a stark contrast to the previous administration, Obama delivered a message last week to the Iranian people that lauded the Islamic republic with tones of respect.

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Iranian leaders reacted swiftly, calling for action and not words as the Obama administration had renewed punitive sanctions on Iran just prior to the March 20 statement.

Obama, however, explicitly left out any mention of the controversial Iranian nuclear program while offering the possibility of detente through the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as Tehran's proxies in Lebanon, notes a column in The Economist.

For its part, Iran has lessened its interference in Iraqi affairs while simultaneously re-emerging as a player in a Moscow summit Friday and a later international summit on tackling the problems in Afghanistan.

U.S. officials have diminished expectations that next week's Afghan summit will be a proxy for U.S.-Iranian talks, hoping instead to pursue an engagement strategy following the June presidential elections in Iran.

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But if the policy of engagement should fail to make ground, The Economist noted, the Iranian regime may brush off any further economic pressure, seeing America, crumbling under its own economic might, as a waning power.

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