US Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, US Secretary of State John Kerry and U.S. Under Secretary
for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman (L-3rd L) meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad
Javad Zarif (2nd R) at a hotel in Vienna, Austria, June 27.
International negotiations with Iran to curtail its nuclear program in exchange for lifting harsh economic sanctions
have been extended past today's originally scheduled deadline until July 7. Various sources report the participants—Iran, the United States, China, Russia, France, Great Britain and Germany—remain upbeat that they will conclude an agreement, a Comprehensive Joint Plan of Action. The arrival in Vienna of additional top-level diplomats and officials over the weekend are an indication that everyone knows the endgame has been reached. Unlike in the past, nobody is talking about a longer extension of the talks.
Meeting the new deadline could make a difference in how successful President Obama will be in persuading U.S. lawmakers to support a final agreement. If it is completed by July 9, Congress will only have 30 days to review it, during which period Obama could not waive or suspend any congressionally mandated sanctions against Iran.
If the agreement isn't finished until after that date, Congress will have 60 days for review. Foes will thus get extra time for dredging up opposition to the pact if it is perceived to fall short. Among Republicans, there is significant resistance to signing any agreement. Some prominent Democrats also are highly skeptical of the deal as outlined nearly three months ago. But to become law, a Senate resolution of disapproval would take 60 votes to pass and 67 to override a presidential veto. That's a high hurdle, but given the hawkishness of some prominent Democrats, getting that many votes would not be impossible.
With just a week left to finish negotiations that have been underway at some level for nearly two years, several key issues remain unresolved, although numerous sources agree that substantial progress has been recently made. For instance, a major sticking point all along has been whether the agreement would mandate that U.N. inspectors obtain access to Iran's military bases to determine whether they are engaged in nuclear activities. This is crucial to verify that Iran won't secretly violate the agreement, critics have said. On the other hand, Iran says opening all its military bases is a non-starter. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has spoken directly on the matter, telling military officers that the bases would never be opened for inspection:
U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, who has participated in the technical aspects of the negotiations, in April called for “anywhere, anytime access” after a senior Iranian said that inspectors “will not even be permitted to inspect the most normal military site in their dreams.”
And why would a sovereign state provide unfettered access to military sites? “No state that isn’t either occupied or facing a mortal threat would agree to it, especially after Iraq’s experience with UNSCOM inspections that included security people who could report back to the CIA about possible targets for attack,” Hans Blix, the former head of the IAEA [the International Atomic Energy Agency], wrote in an email, referring to the U.N. inspections efforts in Iraq.
Why, indeed? Certainly, a call to open all U.S. military bases for inspection would be greeted with snarls at the Pentagon, Congress and among most of the U.S. population. On such matters, America is not exceptional.
You can read more about the Iran talks below the fold.
To get around Iran's unwillingness to allow inspection of all its bases, negotiators have reportedly come up with language for accessing bases that they hope Iran will accept:
“We have worked out a process that we believe will ensure that the IAEA has the access it needs,” the administration official told reporters in Vienna. “The entry point isn't, we must be able to get into every military site, because the United States of America wouldn't allow anybody to get into every military site, so that's not appropriate.”
Somebody obviously gets it.
Every issue in the agreement is complex. The Jerusalem Post reports:
Each of those provisions, one official said, includes “a hundred details,” from the fate of heavy water in Iran’s plutonium facility in Arak to the precise language of a United Nations Security Council resolution that will codify the deal.
There are innumerable interwoven details, the official said, “not least of all, what technical experts tell us is real or not.”
Among other issues not yet resolved:
• What will Iran be required to say about the past? On the one hand, the Americans and French have been the most adamant of the negotiators that Iran should give an accounting of its past nuclear activities because Tehran has been caught lying about such activities at three facilities—Natanz, Fordow and Kalaye. Without an accounting of what was secretly done in the past, say critics, it would be harder for inspectors to uncover what Iran might do in the future. Iran has been been just as adamant in rejecting such a provision in the agreement.
• How soon will sanctions be removed? Tehran wants the nuclear-related economic sanctions lifted as soon as an agreement is signed. That's something the Russians and Chinese would probably accept. But the U.S. and other negotiators want a gradual phasing out of sanctions as Iran shows it is doing what the agreement will say it must. They also want the sanctions to "snap back" into place if inspections or other evidence show Iran is cheating.