by Warren L. Nelson
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi says he is “firmly” behind the ongoing nuclear talks and hopes they will produce an agreement very soon, in the first enthusiastic backing he has given the negotiations.
Until now, he has always endorsed the talks, but always very unenthusiastically and with comments about the unlikelihood of their being successful because of the untrustworthiness of the Americans.
But the mood shifted dramatically last week. Some thought Khamenehi was trying to lay the foundation for Iran accepting an agreement with the Big Six. Others thought he had a more modest agenda geared to reining in hardliners who have concentrated for a year on trying to sabotage the talks.
But the conclusion now must be reached within six weeks. President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry said this week they are not prepared to extend the talks yet again. And Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif also said he saw no reason to extend the talks again.
Obama and Kerry said the core issues must be wrapped up by the Big Six foreign ministers by the end of March—just six weeks away—after which lower level diplomats will draft the actual text and resolve the details. Kerry and Zarif have been meeting more than once a week since mid-January as their paths constantly cross in different cities. It isn’t clear if they are getting anywhere.
The core issues include such things as how many centrifuges Iran will be allowed to operate, the amount of enriched uranium it will be permitted to keep in stock and the timing for the lifting of sanctions.
Khamenehi spoke about the talks Sunday and Obama addressed the talks in response to a question at a news conference Monday.
Khamenehi spoke to the annual assemblage of Air Force personnel who come to see Khamenehi and replicate the iconic photograph of hundreds of Air Force technicians showing their support for Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979. Days later, the monarchy fell.
Khamenehi repeated his laundry list of complaints about the United States and the West. But what everyone noticed instantly was his endorsement of reaching an agreement with the Big Six.
“I am in favor of a nuclear agreement,” he said. In the past he has endorsed the talks, but spoken of how he didn’t expect—and, by implication, want—an agreement to emerge.
So, his comments Sunday stood out. The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), the state-owned news agency, ran that statement as a one-sentence “Flash.” In the news agency business, a Flash is reserved only for the most important news items, like the outbreak of war or an assassination. That IRNA ran Khamenehi’s statement as a Flash underlined just how important the state news agency saw his statement to be.
Khamenehi went on to say, “I agree with the continuation and the progress of the negotiations and clinching a good deal. The Iranian people would definitely not oppose a deal that would encompass respect [for the nation].”
He emphasized that the deal must be good, which was to state the obvious. The way he went about that, however, was most unusual—he quoted Obama. He noted that Obama has said repeatedly, “No deal is better than a bad deal,” and then took the highly unusual step of saying he agreed with Obama.
In his speech, Khamenehi ignored the many redlines he has laid down in previous speeches. Instead, he made two demands, both of which were odd.
First, he complained that the Americans want a two-tier negotiation, agreeing on the key issues by the end of March and then leaving staff to write out the detailed agreement by the end of June. Kerry had just talked about that in detail the previous day.
Khamenehi said he would not accept that because the Americans would then just use the detailed negiotiations to throw up more roadblocks.
“Such an arrangement is not favorable because, taking into account the experiences we have of the other side’s behavior, an agreement reached on mere generalities would become a tool for [the West’s] repeated pretexts with regard to details,” he said.
But Iran agreed to this two-tiered procedure in July—an agreement that Khamenehi approved. Khamenehi’s new objection left people scratching their heads and wondering if he was really paying attention to what was happening in the talks.
Furthermore, the same arrangement was used to draft the interim nuclear agreement in effect for the past year. The Big Six agreed on the major points November 24, 2013. Then, lower-level diplomats drafted the actual text and filled in all the details with the agreement posted two months later on January 20, 2014. Khamenehi did not complain about any American dalliance then.
Second, Khamenehi demanded that all sanctions be lifted simultaneously with the reaching of any agreement. The Western powers would never agree with that. The negotiations are geared to framing a schedule by which sanctions will be suspended one-by-one as Iran fulfills different parts of the final agreement.
But what was head-scratchingly surprising in Khamenehi’s speech was that he contradicted himself on this point in the speech.
At another point in his speech, Khamenehi said that during the discussions with the Big Six, the Iranian negotiators are seeking to secure the removal of hostile sanctions against Tehran. However, he said, if they fail to do so, there are numerous ways for Iran to blunt the impact of the sanctions.
“Our negotiators are trying to thwart sanctions, which the West is using as a weapon against the Iranian nation. If they succeed, [it would be] so much the better. However, if not, there are other ways to make sanctions ineffective,” he explained.
At one point in his speech, the immediate lifting of all sanctions was an essential element of any agreement, while at another point it didn’t really matter what the agreement said about sanctions.
Perhaps the key point of what Khamenehi said was meant to be heard by hardline critics who insist that conceding any point to the Americans is a deadly blow to the Islamic revolution. Khamenehi pointedly said, “Mr. Rohani has correctly pointed to an important issue that negotiation means reaching common points and decisions. This means no side should expect all its expectations to be realized in the deal.”
The next day at the White House, President Obama was queried at a news conference about the Iran talks and said flatly that he opposed another extension. Only a few weeks ago, Antony Blinken, the new deputy secretary of state, told Congress the Administration might need to extend the talks again.
Obama’s reversal seems to be tied to the problems he has in Congress with sanctions legislation. Democrats in the Senate agreed not to vote for new sanctions legislation until the late March deadline for reaching an agreement on key points has expired. That appears to have made the end of March a hard deadline that cannot now be extended.
Obama said, “The issues [in the negotiations with Iran] now are sufficiently narrowed and sufficiently clarified where we’re at point where they [Iran] need to make a decision. We are presenting to them … a deal that allows them to have peaceful nuclear power, but gives us the absolute assurance that is verifiable that they are not pursuing a nuclear weapon.
“And if, in fact, what they claim is true — which is they have no aspiration to get a nuclear weapon, that, in fact, according to their Supreme Leader, it would be contrary to their faith to obtain a nuclear weapon — if that is true, there should be the possibility of getting a deal. They should be able to get to yes. But we don’t know if that’s going to happen. They have their hardliners; they have their politics.”
Then he said, “At this juncture, I don’t see a further extension being useful if they have not agreed to the basic formulation and the bottom line that the world requires to have confidence that they’re not pursuing a nuclear weapon.
“Now, if a framework for a deal is done, if people have a clear sense of what is required and there’s some drafting and t’s to cross and i’s to dot, that’s a different issue. But my view—and I’ve presented this to members of Congress—is that we now know enough that the issues are no longer technical. The issues now are, does Iran have the political will and the desire to get a deal done?”
Obama then suggested that the failure to reach an agreement next month could lead to war between the United States and Iran. He phrased that indirectly and it wasn’t noted by most in the media.
Obama said, “If we can’t get a deal, then we’ll have to make a set of decisions, and, as I’ve said to Congress, I’ll be the first one to work with them to apply even stronger measures against Iran. But what’s the rush?—unless your view is that it’s not possible to get a deal with Iran and it shouldn’t even be tested. And that I cannot agree with because, as the President of the United States, I’m looking at what the options are if we don’t get a diplomatic resolution. And those options are narrow and they’re not attractive.”
As the Iran Times went to press, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi was due to arrive in Tehran. The United States has presumably already talked to him in Beijing to urge him to tell the Iranian leadership the Big Six powers stand together and Iran should not expect China to oppose the staggered lifting of sanctions and stiff verification requirements. China has a strong national interest in opposing nuclear proliferation. How clearly Wang makes that point could be crucial in the next round of talks.
In a footnote to the talks, the Reuters news agency Sunday said “three senior Iranian officials” had told it Zarif had warned Kerry in several meetings that failure to reach an agreement would likely mean Rohani’s political demise.
Zarif swiftly called that an “outright lie.” And a senior US official told Reuters Zarif had never issued any such warning about Rohani’s fate.
Meanwhile, in the last week, only two more senators have signed on as sponsors of the proposed Iran sanctions bill. Both Republicans, they are Deb Fischer of Nebraska and Jerry Moran of Kansas. The bill now has 40 co-sponsors in the 100-seat Senate.