The reason is simple: Ahmadinejad's administration requires a positive outcome, at least on paper, so that the U.S., its European allies and the United Nations Security Council lift the debilitating economic sanctions targeting the Islamic Republic. So despite last week's stalemate, the latest of many, Ahmadinejad is dangling the carrot of compromise to lure the West back to the table. In doing so, he has little to lose and much to gain. After all, for the West, signing a deal with Iran is only the first hurdle -- enforcing it within Iran will be an even greater battle. Ahmadinejad's expectation seems to be that, if only he can get both the P5+1 and his domestic political rivals to go along with a deal, he can have his Yazdi cookie -- the Iranian equivalent of the proverbial cake -- and eat it too.

So, on Jan. 23, Iran's semi-official Mehr News Agency quoted public statements by both Ahmadinejad and Supreme National Security Council Secretary Saeed Jalili, who represented Tehran in Istanbul on Jan. 21-22, as saying that the meeting should not be seen in a negative light. They cast the outcome as simply one more maneuver in ongoing multilateral discussions. Ahmadinejad announced to a crowd at the Caspian port city of Rasht, "Future rounds of talks between Iran and the [P5+1] could yield a good agreement." 

Interestingly, the same news report also provided the bluntly negative assessments of the talks made by Western representatives. European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, British Foreign Secretary William Hague, French Foreign Minister Michele Alliot-Marie, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle and anonymous U.S diplomats were all cited condemning Iran's intransigence. The critical voices of prominent international figures are rarely if ever conveyed by Iranian state-supervised media.

The story was then reprinted the following day by the Tehran Times. Clearly intended for both domestic and foreign readerships, these two stories and an increasing number of similar ones in recent months, push the Iranian executive branch's position that a nuclear compromise is necessary for Iran to flourish again. Use of the local news media is one very public means by which Ahmadinejad and his inner circle are trying to steer the competing powerbrokers in Iran's parliament, judiciary and office of the supreme leader toward agreeing to an accommodation with the U.N. Security Council and the U.S.

But Iran's president and his allies also need to appear strong at home so that a deal will not be torpedoed by the mullahs and their xenophobic supporters. Hence Ahmadinejad's speech, like subsequent comments by Jalili and others associated with the nuclear program, featured the usual bluster for which Iranian politicians are well-known.

Ahmadinejad knows it will be difficult to convince his internal rivals that it is in everyone's interest to settle the nuclear standoff. So, following his lead, the Iranian news media has begun repeating -- indeed broadcasting for the world to hear -- that complex issues take time to resolve. The gist of this message has found an external voice as well in Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Wu Hailong, who remarked, "The nuclear issue is complicated and sensitive, and obviously cannot be comprehensively resolved through one or two rounds of dialogue." Support for continued dialogue also has come from Turkish President Abdullah Gul, who announced, "My country will exert more efforts with an eye to ensure that the negotiations continue and that they yield concrete results . . . despite attempts [by the P5+1] to downplay initiatives coming from Turkey." 

But Ahmadinejad's term of office expires in July 2013, which means that his window of opportunity to turn Iran around on domestic and international fronts is closing. That explains the urgency with which he and his appointees are publicizing their willingness to negotiate further until a deal acceptable to all parties is reached. This is also the main reason for their constant insistence that sanctions be lifted forthwith.

The P5+1's strategy of negotiating while tightening the net over the Islamic Republic could indeed eventually lead to an Iranian compromise. However, over the long term, whether Iranian leaders will live up to any deal is open to debate. Their track record suggests pessimism is in order.

The Iranian government has gone to great lengths since the late 1980s to conceal the development of the country's nuclear program and to hinder oversight (.pdf) by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Even new nuclear storage and enrichment facilities -- like one near Qom -- have been revealed to the IAEA by Western intelligence services rather than by Iran. Iranian officials continue to attempt to build networks of suppliers for dual-use technologies and raw materials despite a U.N. Security Council embargo on those items. The Persian language even has a word for such activity --taqiyya, translated as "tactical dissimulation" or, more bluntly, "deception."

As a result, few if any of Iran's neighbors trust that its nuclear intentions are entirely peaceful. A general consensus has arisen among world leaders that they cannot "believe a word of what the Iranians have to say" on the nuclear issue, as Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak put it. Without the intense pressure of sanctions, it is unlikely that Iranian officials would have attended the summits in Geneva and Istanbul, let alone proposed further discussions.

Consequently, even if an agreement is eventually struck before Iran tests and deploys nuclear weapons, the West must make it clear that the sticks of sanctions and other overt and covert actions remain ready for redeployment. It is unfortunate but true that keeping Iran's leaders under economic, electronic and military threat is the only way to encourage them to take the straight and narrow path of nuclear transparency and nonmilitarization.

**Jamsheed K. Choksy is professor of Iranian, Central Eurasian, and international studies and former director of the Middle Eastern Studies Program at Indiana University. He also is a member of the National Council on the Humanities at the U.S. National Endowment for the Humanities. The views expressed are his own.