Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif shouts to journalists as he stands on the balcony of
Palais Coburg, the venue for nuclear talks, Austria, July 13, 2015. Like other negotiators,
he noted that he's sleepy and overworked.
On Sunday and much of Monday, the hints from negotiators in Vienna trying to hammer out an agreement that will lift economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program were that an agreement might be soon announced. Indeed, Iranian media
reported that President Hasan Rouhani would address the nation Monday night about the agreement. His official English-language Twitter account stated:
“#IranDeal is the Victory of diplomacy and mutual respect over the outdated paradigm of exclusion and coercion. And this is a good beginning.” But that was soon deleted and replaced with “If #IranDeal, victory of diplomacy and mutual respect over outdated paradigm of exclusion and coercion. And this will be good beginning.”
As the 17th straight day of talks at the ministerial level nears the midnight hour in Vienna Monday, it appears there are still issues to be worked out. The chief one is Tehran's demand that the embargo on exports of arms and ballistic missiles be lifted along with the other sanctions it wants removed once an agreement is accepted by the Islamic Republic and the six world powers engaged in the negotiations: the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France plus Germany, the P5+1. There are also issues around the timing for removing other sanctions. Carol Morello reports:
Part of the delay is the ponderous process of taking a draft agreement that runs close to 100 pages with its annexes, making sure it says the same thing in Persian that it does in English to minimize misunderstandings later on, and getting approval from leaders in the seven capitals. [...]
The United States and its European partners say the arms embargo should remain in place, at least for the time being, because they fear an Iran flush with cash from a deal would use the money to support proxy groups elsewhere in the Middle East. Iran, supported by Russia and China, argues it should be lifted entirely, since it is part of a nuclear resolution that a deal would render moot.
Head below the fold for more on this story.
Iran Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif hinted Monday that talks could drag on for days. Meanwhile, Zack Beauchamp at Vox took note of one prominent naysayer under the headline "Benjamin Netanyahu is freaking out about the Iran deal":
[Israel Prime Minister] Netanyahu declared, on Monday morning, that some of the negotiating countries (a clear reference to the Americans) were "willing to make a deal at any price."
He has no real evidence for this: Little information about the deal's terms has come out since April, when the countries reached an initial deal on the broad contours that was favorable to the US. Netanyahu's "proof" is that negotiations continued after Iran's latest annual Quds Day rally, in which a relatively modest number of ralliers in Tehran chanted "death to America." He said, "If the concessions continue even after 'death to America' chants in Tehran, then it is clear that some are willing to make a deal at any price."
When a deal is finally announced, and the odds of that happening now seem far better than the 50-50 chance President Obama suggested for them last week, we can expect many members of Congress—not all of them on the Republican side of aisle—to parrot Netanyahu's claims. Congress will have 60 days to review any agreement presented to it before September 9. After that, it will only have 30 days for review, a quirk of the legislation it passed on the matter in April.