Khamenei Says Sanctions Must Lift When Nuclear Deal Is Signed
Thomas Erdbrink, David Sanger, NYT, Apr 9 2015
TEHRAN — Iran’s supreme leader on Thursday challenged two of Pindostan’s bedrock principles in the nuclear negotiations, declaring that all economic sanctions would have to be lifted on the day any final agreement is signed and that military sites would be strictly off limits to foreign inspectors. The assertions by Ayatollah Khamenei could be tactical, intended to give both the negotiators and himself some political space to get Iran’s hardliners accustomed to the framework deal reached a week ago with the P5+1 (ya think? – RB). But they sharply illustrated the difficult hurdles that lie ahead as Jackass Kerry and a large team of diplomats, energy experts and intelligence officials try to reach a Jun 30 deadline that would assure that Iran could not race for a bomb for at least a decade, and would establish a permanent inspection regime to catch any cheating. In his remarks, Khamenei added several stinging criticisms of Saudi Arabia, calling its new leaders “inexperienced youngsters,” a sign of rising regional tensions that could pose another threat to the negotiations, even as diplomats strive to keep the issues on separate tracks. King Salman, the country’s newly installed leader, is 79, though many around him are a generation younger. The developing civil war in Yemen is fast becoming a major source of regional instability, drawing in Pindo-backed Saudi Arabia on one side and Iran on the other, and leading Jackass to warn Tehran this week to back off. Khamenei’s comments also provided a new round of ammunition to the deal’s many congressional critics. One of the most persistent critics, Senator Mark Kirk, said:
As each new day reveals a new disagreement, it’s increasingly clear that Iran, in fact, failed to reach agreement with Pindostan and its partners on a political framework that addresses all parameters of a comprehensive agreement. At best, Iran agreed to disagree with Pindostan on key nuclear weapons-related issues.
The comments marked the first time that Khamenei has discussed the framework that emerged from the nuclear talks last week in Lausanne. His pronouncements are considered vital because they shape the “red lines” for Iranian negotiators, though they have often showed considerable flexibility in working out details that seem to adhere to his literal meaning while still accommodating some Western demands. For example, he had previously required that no nuclear facilities could be closed, but under the framework accord one of them, the underground enrichment site at Fordo, is being converted to a research center where fissile material is banned. Another, a heavy-water reactor, is being redesigned to prevent it from making bomb-grade plutonium. On Tuesday night, DCI Brennan said he believed Khamenei had been persuaded over the past two years that an accord was necessary to avoid an economic free fall in Iran. But the ayatollah himself said Thursday that he saw no need to make a clear pronouncement on the deal, because no signed agreement yet existed. He said:
There is no need to take a position. The officials are saying that nothing has been done yet and nothing is obligatory. I neither agree nor disagree.
But he emphasized his longstanding position about the sanctions, saying:
Sanctions should be lifted all together on the same day of the agreement, not six months or one year later. If lifting of sanctions is supposed to be connected to a process, then why do we negotiate?
Pres Rouhani, who spoke at a different event on Thursday, echoed the supreme leader’s remarks but with a potentially crucial difference, saying the sanctions have to be lifted on the day a deal is put in place, potentially months after a signed agreement. Rouhani said during a ceremony for Iran’s nuclear technology day, which celebrates the country’s nuclear achievements:
We will not sign any agreement unless all economic sanctions are totally lifted on the first day of the implementation of the deal.
While the Jun 30 deadline is still months away, the ayatollah’s comments pose some significant potential challenges to Jackass and his negotiating team. Jackass and Obama have been saying that sanctions would be suspended in phases, as Iran complies with its obligations. That is critical to Pindosi leverage in making sure that Iran follows through on its commitments to vastly reduce its uranium stockpile, a process that will take months, if not longer, and decommissions centrifuges, placing them in storage. Jackass said on PBS NewsHour on Wednesday night that in any final agreement, Iran would also have to resolve outstanding questions with the IAEA over suspected “Possible Military Dimensions” (PMD) of the nuclear program. He said:
It will be part of a final agreement. It has to be.
He did not say whether satisfying the inspectors would be a requirement before sanctions are lifted. In his remarks Thursday, Khamenei seemed to rule out any inspections inside military bases or compounds, saying:
The country’s military officials are not permitted at all to allow the foreigners to cross these boundaries, or stop the country’s defensive development under the pretext of supervision and inspection.
His reference to military sites could become problematic. While Jackass and Obama have said the inspection requirements they have negotiated would be among the most intrusive in history, they have not said whether they would extend to military sites. Several of the sites that Pindostan USrael is most concerned about in Iran are on military bases, including Fordo. Inspectors have visited the site regularly, and the IAEA has periodically been allowed onto other military bases. Similarly, the timing of sanctions relief is far more complicated than simply setting a date. Even with cooperation from the Iranian side, the technical issues are so complex that IAEA officials say resolving them will be a lengthy process. Moreover, suspending sanctions is a complex process. Obama can suspend some of the Pindosi sanctions with the stroke of a pen, but actually terminating them would require congressional action, which is almost impossible to imagine in an atmosphere in which Congress is threatening new sanctions. Other sanctions are based on UNSCRs. Jackass said in Lausanne last week that under a final deal, if one is reached, a new set of resolutions would be passed, ending many of the sanctions but keeping proliferation controls in place. Even if sanctions are legally eliminated, major corporate players may initially be reluctant to do business in Iran. Banks have been heavily fined for violations and would want assurances about the new rules. Investors may fear that sanctions could “snap back” if there is a dispute between Iran and the West, leaving their investments stranded. Khamenei may have thrown another new factor into the equation by suggesting there was plenty of time to consider a deal and review the actions of opponents, and saying the deadline of Jun 30 was in no way sacred. He said:
They might say that we have only three months left. Well, if three months becomes four months the sky won’t come falling down, just like when the other side pushed the negotiations back by seven months (from Nov 2014 – RB).
However, Jun 30 is the date at which the current extension of negotiations runs out. So unless it is renewed, something both sides have previously rejected, the temporary limits on Iran’s enrichment activities would terminate that day. And after Jun 30, Congress has threatened to impose new sanctions if a satisfactory deal is not in place. Khamenei did not criticize those details of the framework that had already been agreed to, even though some of them, if put in place, would represent big compromises from all parties, including Iran. He repeated that while he was not optimistic about negotiating with the P5+1, and especially with Pindostan, he did support the talks and Iran’s diplomatic team, saying on to his official website, Khamenei.ir:
I have agreed to this particular instance of negotiations, and I support the negotiators.
In recent days, almost all major figures in the Iranian establishment have come out in support of the framework agreement, while adding the usual caveat that Iran’s rights must be guaranteed. Most, including Friday Prayer leaders and military commanders, have said they supported the talks. Yet, speaking to an audience of religious chanters in his Tehran office, the ayatollah said the government should allow critics of the deal to speak their minds, “as it will help unity” in the country. He said:
It must be clear that the negotiations do not go beyond the nuclear field. But if the other side refrains from its usual bad actions, this will become an experience that we can continue on other issues. If we see that once again they repeat their bad actions, it will only strengthen our experience of not trusting Pindostan.
With the ayatollah’s unusually strong remarks about the Saudis on Thursday, the sectarian-tinged fighting in Yemen seemed potentially to be developing into yet another wedge between Washington and Tehran. Pindostan is providing military and logistical support to the Saudi-led coalition that is bombing Yemen, where Iran has long supported Houthi rebels. Lately, Washington has begun to criticize Iran more emphatically, saying Tehran’s support for the Houthis is far more substantial than it has disclosed or the world has previously known.
Iran: No signing final nuclear deal unless economic sanctions are lifted
Faith Karimi, Deirdre Walsh, CNN, Apr 9 2015
Iran will sign a final nuclear agreement only if economic sanctions against the nation are removed on the first day of the deal’s implementation, Pres Rouhani said Thursday. Ayatollah Khamenei, meanwhile, told state-run media outlets he is neither in favor nor against the proposed deal because it isn’t final, and he’s not certain it will become binding because he has “never been optimistic about negotiations with Pindostan.” Pindostan has stressed that if a final deal is reached with Iran, the removal of any sanctions will come in phases. But work on the agreement isn’t finished. Negotiators have until Jun 30 to come up with a final deal. Khamenei said he supports the negotiators, but in several not-so-subtle shots at Pindostan, he noted it is too soon to celebrate the proposed deal. Khamenei said in a Thursday address, according to Press TV:
Everything lies in the details. The other side, which is known for backpedalling on its commitments, may want to corner our country when it comes to the specifics.
What has been hashed out so far is no guarantee that the deal will become final, he said, and according to the IRNA, he said he can’t support or oppose the deal, especially when it’s possible “the other disloyal party intends to limit our country.” Some have asked why Khamenei hasn’t taken a position on the talks, and the reason is simple, he said, according to IRNA:
There is no need to take a position. Officials say nothing has been done yet, and that nothing is binding. I am neither in favor nor against it. Any final deal must ensure the interests and dignity of the nation. I will support an agreement that will safeguard national interests and dignity. I’d rather see the agreement fail than make a deal that jeopardizes Iran’s interests. What has happened so far will neither guarantee the agreement itself, nor its content. It will not even guarantee completion of the negotiations. Therefore, it is meaningless to congratulate me or others about it.
Rouhani said at a ceremony to mark National Nuclear Technology Day in Tehran, according to Press TV:
My government will not surrender to bullying, sanctions and threats. We will not sign any deal unless on the very first day of its implementation all economic sanctions against Iran are lifted – all of them, and at once.
Obama faces an uphill battle selling the deal to Congress, which has threatened to impose new sanctions on Iran. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, a nuclear physicist and negotiator with Iran, estimated it would take six months after a final deal is signed for the sanctions to be lifted. He told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour that it was a “ballpark” figure contingent on a lot of work the Iranians will have to do beforehand. He said:
The core nuclear provisions must be satisfied, the provisions that give us our confidence. It’s in the hands of the Iranians to fulfill steps such as reducing stockpiles and lowering the number of operating centrifuges. It will depend on their ability to execute those moves.
Asked if the Iranians were aware of that time-frame during the negotiations, before Rouhani called for the immediate lifting of sanctions, Moniz said:
Oh, yes, for sure.
Rep Steve Scalise, the #3 House Republican leader, said in a radio interview with WWL in New Orleans on Wednesday that a bill to ease any sanctions does not stand much of a chance in either the House of Representatives or the Senate. He said:
The sanctions that were put in place, again, very bipartisan sanctions passed by Congress years ago that were effective, the only way to get rid of them completely would be for Congress to vote to ease those sanctions. We haven’t had that vote. I don’t see that passing out of the House. I don’t even think it would pass out of the Senate right now.
Diplomats announced last week that they’d come up with the framework for an agreement after a marathon stretch of late-night negotiations in Lausanne, Switzerland. The framework includes the easing of Pindo and UN sanctions on Iran if it takes certain steps to curb its nuclear program. Iran would reduce its stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 98% for 15 years and significantly scale back its number of installed centrifuges, according to the plan. In exchange, Pindostan and the EU would lift sanctions that have crippled the country’s economy. Obama said after it was announced Apr 2:
It is a good deal, a deal that meets our core objectives. This framework would cut off every pathway that Iran could take to develop a nuclear weapon. It would include strict verification measures to make sure Iran complies.
Pindostan and Iran have a long history of strained relations, which made the negotiations more significant. Just two years ago, the two countries had not talked with each other officially in nearly four decades.
Niqnaq 