Conflict de-escalation and avoiding war with the Iranian regime are critical foreign policy objectives. But this should not mean that the P5+1 world powers that are negotiating with Tehran over a new nuclear agreement should see it as essential to strike any deal with the Islamic Republic. The argument that any deal, even a bad one, is better than no deal has severe consequences for peace and stability. The Islamic Republic wants to return to the 2015 nuclear agreement, but it also has five additional demands, according to the state-run Iran newspaper. The first of these demands is that the Tehran regime will not permit any discussion of its missile program or regional role during the negotiations. Second, the US must immediately lift all sanctions imposed by the Trump and Obama administrations. Third, the US must compensate the Iranian government and pay reparations of about $70 billion. Fourth, Iran will return to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action only after it has verified that sanctions are lifted and it can export oil without facing hurdles. Finally, the US should give the Islamic Republic a guarantee that it will not abandon the deal in the future. The first problem is that a bad deal would allow Iran to advance its ballistic missile program, which is a core part of its nuclear program, without any restrictions. The regime’s expansion of its ballistic missile program poses a threat to the stability of the region and the national interests of other countries for several reasons. For example, the regime has not been shy about showing off its ballistic missile capabilities and threatening other governments. Iran’s expanding ballistic missile program and repeated tests will inevitably lead to further destabilization, militarization and an arms race in the region. It is worth noting that the Iranian regime has the largest and most diverse ballistic missile arsenal in the Middle East. Its ballistic missile capability is one of the most critical pillars of the regime’s national security policy. Ballistic missiles can be used for offensive or defensive purposes, but sophisticated missiles are mainly developed as delivery vehicles for nuclear weapons. Secondly, a bad deal would most likely fail to detect Iran’s clandestine nuclear activities. The original 2015 nuclear deal did not stop Tehran from advancing its nuclear program, partially due to the fact that the International Atomic Energy Agency did not have access to the Parchin military site, which is believed to be a location where Iran is attempting to weaponize its nuclear program. And, in 2018, several reports, later proven to be accurate, warned that Iran was conducting secret nuclear activities. Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pointed out in his speech to the UN General Assembly in 2018 that it had a “secret atomic warehouse for storing massive amounts of equipment and material from Iran’s secret nuclear weapons program.” At the same time, two nonpartisan organizations based in Washington released detailed reports about Iran’s undeclared clandestine nuclear facilities. A bad deal would empower the regime to suppress its population more unsparingly than ever. Dr. Majid Rafizadeh Thirdly, a bad deal would help the flow of funds to the treasury of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. This would help the IRGC and its elite branch, the Quds Force, provide more financial, military and intelligence assistance to their militia and terror groups in several countries in the region, including Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Syria. On top of that, a bad deal would empower the regime to suppress its population more unsparingly than ever. For example, after the signing of the 2015 deal, the empowered regime escalated its human rights violations. Human Rights Watch reported at the time that Iran’s judiciary “continued to execute individuals at a high rate,” including women and children. “Iranian courts, and particularly the revolutionary courts,” Human Rights Watch added, “regularly fell short of providing fair trials and used confessions obtained under torture as evidence in court. Authorities routinely restrict detainees’ access to legal counsel, particularly during the investigation period… Scores of human rights defenders and political activists remain behind bars for their peaceful activism… authorities in the security apparatus and Iran’s judiciary continued to target journalists, online media activists, and human rights defenders in an ongoing crackdown, in blatant disregard of international and domestic legal standards.” It is clear that no deal is better than striking a bad deal with the Iranian regime. A bad deal would endanger peace and security in the region, empower the Iran-backed militias and terror groups, and help the Iranian leadership to more powerfully crack down on its population and commit more egregious human rights violations. • Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a Harvard-educated Iranian-American political scientist. Twitter: @Dr_Rafizadeh Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News" point-of-view