Poll: Iranians Losing Confidence in US Compliance with Nuclear Deal
The new poll, the first taken by CISSM since last month’s Parliamentary and Assembly of Experts elections, was conducted among a representative sample of 1,005 Iranians contacted by telephone between March 3 and March 13.
It followed an earlier poll conducted February 15-24 on the eve of the first round of election. The telephone calls, which included some 30 questions, were placed from Toronto. They both had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2%.
Perhaps the most important finding was a decline in enthusiasm for the nuclear deal, also known as Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and in public confidence that Washington will ever live up to its commitments.
Although overall approval of the JCPOA remains strong at 71%, the percentage of respondents who said that they “strongly” approved of the deal has fallen steadily from a high of 43% in August (a few weeks after the JCPOA between the P5+1 and Iran was concluded) to 27% in the latest survey.
Confidence that the US will abide by the deal has also slipped – from 45% in a September survey by the Gallup organizations to 29%, according to CISSM.
Although 41% of respondents said in September that they were either “not very” or “not at all” confident about Washington’s compliance, the new poll found that figure had risen to 66%.
The pollsters did not probe the reasons for the increase in skepticism, although it may relate either to the continuing imposition of sanctions as well as coverage of the election campaign here.
Nonetheless, both the decline in support for the JCPOA and the skepticism about US compliance may account for a decline in enthusiasm for Rouhani, according to CISSM.
Those respondents who say they have a “very favorable” view of the president have fallen from 61% last August to 40% this month. This decline may also be related to views of the economy, according to CISSM’s analysis.
In a poll taken last May, 54% agreed with the proposition that the country’s economic situation was good. Only 46% say that now. At the same time, 52% are optimistic that the economy is improving, as opposed to a third who said it is getting worse.
The survey also found majority support for Iran increasing its assistance to groups fighting ISIL (63%) and to the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad (51%).
The poll also found strong support (86.5%) for collaborating with other countries to end the war in Syria, although only 46% said that they approved of Iran’s collaborating with the US in helping the Iraqi government in fighting ISIL. In August, 58% favored such cooperation.
This comes as Supreme Leader of Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei also lashed out at the US for not remaining loyal to its undertakings based on the July nuclear agreement between Tehran and the world powers.
“The Americans did not act on what they promised in the nuclear accord; they did not do what they should have done. According to Foreign Minister (Mohammad Javad Zarif), they brought something on the paper but prevented materialization of the objectives of the Islamic Republic of Iran through many diversionary ways,” Ayatollah Khamenei said on March 20.
Source: Fars news
