June 20-2014
RELAX — The nuclear talks aren’t all work. Here the entire Iranian delegation in Vienna gathers to watch the Iran-Nigeria World Cup match.
Two senior members of the House of Representatives have written President Obama suggesting a deal with Iran restricted only to its nuclear program is not enough for Congress to lift sanctions.
The letter appears to be an effort to throw a spanner into the ongoing negotiations.
The senior Democrat and Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee—Republican Chairman Ed Royce of California and Ranking Democrat Eliot Engel of New York—wrote the letter. The bipartisan nature makes it a deeper threat.
The interim agreement reached last November said that, when a permanent agreement is agreed to, the West will lift all “nuclear-related” sanctions, but not sanctions imposed for other reasons, such as human rights violations and terrorism.
The Jerusalem Post, which obtained a copy of the letter, said the letter states, “The concept of an exclusively defined ‘nuclear-related’ sanction on Iran does not exist in US law. Almost all sanctions related to Iran’s nuclear program are also related to Tehran’s advancing ballistic missile program, intensifying support for international terrorism, and other unconventional weapons programs.”
The letter says, “Iran’s permanent and verifiable termination of all of these activities—not just some—is a prerequisite for permanently lifting most congressionally-mandated sanctions.”
The letter notes that, in recent testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, US Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged any deal with sanctions relief would require congressional consent “by law.”
But administration officials approached by The Jerusalem Post took issue with the letter and said sanctions are adequately demarcated based on human rights abuses, sponsorship of terrorism, drug trafficking and proliferation of unconventional weapons.
Last Thursday, at a hearing held by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Dennis Ross, a former diplomat in the Clinton, Bush and Obama Administrations now with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said he considered it unlikely that any agreement would be reached with Iran.
“Ali Khamenehi either is not prepared to roll back Iran’s nuclear program or doesn’t believe he will have to do so in order to produce a serious roll-back in the sanctions regime,” Ross said, adding, “The Iranian negotiators at this point have given no indication of being able to accept such a roll-back.”
Ross suggested that Israel would “welcome” a deal that precludes the Iranians from being able to turn a civil nuclear program into a nuclear weapons capability, but not the Saudis.
“Unlike the Saudis, the measure for the Israelis is what kind of deal is reached. The Saudis will be suspicious of any nuclear deal; for the Israelis, it depends on the deal.”