Russian Negotiator Says Iran Nuclear Deal Imminent In Next Few Days
Iran's chief negotiator Ali Bagheri-Kani (L) meeting Russia's Ulyanov.
Russia’s chief negotiator in the Vienna nuclear talks told reporters that an agreement will be signed in the next few days in the presence of Iranian and US foreign ministers.
Iran International correspondent in Vienna reported that Mikhail Ulyanov said a definite day has not been decided yet, but it could be Saturday, Sunday or Monday.
In a tweet which is being interpreted as a sign of an imminent deal, French chief negotiator Philippe Errera on behalf of E3 negotiators, thanked their teams for their efforts in past 11 months.
Earlier on Thursday, Iran's lead nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani, who flew to Tehran last week for consultations about the final draft of the deal, met with the European Union's Enrique Mora, who coordinates the talks in Vienna.
It has been weeks that pundits and diplomats are talking about the end of the negotiations, but all sides keep expressing uncertainties about the conclusion of the talks. This time however it seems different as reports about the endgame are pouring in from both opponents and proponents of the agreement.
Ali Akbar Salehi, a former foreign minister and head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, told IRIB on Thursday that “It seems that the talks are reaching a conclusion, and I am very hopeful regarding it”.
The head of the UN nuclear watchdog Rafael Grossi will travel to Tehran on Saturday to discuss unresolved safeguards issues as nuclear talks reach an endgame.
The head of the UN nuclear watchdog Rafael Grossi will travel to Tehran on Saturday, to discuss unresolved safeguards issues as nuclear talks reach an endgame.
Nour news in Tehran said, which has in recent months several times broke news regarding the Vienna nuclear talks, said, Grossi was looking to help to restore the 2015 Iran nuclear with "a roadmap to resolve existing safeguard issues."
According to Nour News, which is close to Iran's Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), Grossi will meet with the head of Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and possibly other officials.
"Safeguards issues between Iran and the IAEA have turned into one of the main factors in slowing the Vienna talks," Nour News said. "Interactions between Iran and the IAEA are noticeably improving."
In recent days, the outstanding issue of Iranian nuclear work before 2003, a “safeguards issue” rather than one directly linked to the 2015 deal, has reportedly emerged as a sticking-point in Vienna, where Iran’s talks with world powers since last April are striving to revive the 2015 deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action). Iran has “safeguards” commitments as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty.
Backing off
The IAEA has sought explanations from Tehran over uranium traces found at four undeclared sites, with some analysts linking the issue to equipment supplied by Pakistani scientist AQ Khan previously used in the Pakistani nuclear program.
Nour News claimed that Grossi was backing off from pressing the issue, which Tehran has said is politically motivated. This was, Nour suggested, "one of the signs of improvement in the process of the said interactions.”
Grossi told reporters in Vienna Wednesday that the agency was "working very hard" on its next quarterly report. He visited Tehran immediately before the agency's last quarterly report in November. After his visit he said his talks had been inconclusive in resolving the pre-2003 issues.
Sources close to the negotiations told Iran International Wednesday that Tehran had demanded western powers ask the IAEA to drop the matter. Grossi said Wednesday the issue could be resolved "without politicizing" the matter or making it conditional on other issues.
Diplomatic opportunities
The lead negotiator of the United Kingdom – one of three western European powers in the Vienna talks – has portrayed the pre-2003 work as unrelated to reviving the JCPOA, saying the UK stance if supported by France and Germany. "With our partners, the E3 fully supports the independence of the IAEA and the professional efforts of DG [director-general] Grossi. Safeguards are a fundamental part of the non-proliferation system and are separate to the JCPOA," Stephanie Al-Qaq tweeted Tuesday.
Ali Shamkhani, secretary of the SNSC, tweeted Thursday that time was running out to revive the JCPOA. "Strategy of active resistance defeated Trump's policy of maximum pressure confessing by current US administration,” he wrote. “If Vienna Talks do not lead to a good deal, current US administration will feel defeated in near future due to lack of timely use of diplomatic opportunities.”
On Wednesday Gabriel Noronha, a US State Department official under former president Donald Trump, who withdrew the US from the JCPOA in 2018, launched a series of tweets attacking Rob Malley, US special envoy for Iran, for allegedly preparing to lift ‘terrorism’ sanctions on Iran. He said unnamed US and EU officials has asked him to reveal details about concession Malley made to Iran.
Iranian officials and media on Thursday remained silent about Noronha’s claim.
A Republican member of the US House of Representatives says US envoy for Iran, Rob Malley, may be taking advantage of the Ukraine crisis to give Iran whatever it wants in the Vienna talks.
In a tweet on Wednesday, Claudia Tenney asked, “Is Robert Malley really trying to use the Ukraine Crisis as cover to give the radicals in Iran everything they've been asking for?” in the negotiations to revive the 2015 JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) which the US left in 2018.
“That's the allegation and if true, it would be illegal”, she stressed, adding that “any deal with Iran must be submitted to Congress for review and approval; that’s the law”.
After Malley gave a classified briefing to members of Congress on talks in Vienna in February, Tenney said that his briefing had left her with "more questions than answers" and demanded the envoy testify openly to give details of what the US was “offering” in Vienna.
Gabriel Noronha, Former Special Advisor for the Secretary's Iran Action Group in the Trump administration in a series of tweets on Wednesdayquoted State Department, National Security Council and European Union unnamed officials as having authorized him to reveal that Malley is preparing to make concessions to Iran that are damaging to US national security.
US chief envoy in Iran nuclear talks, Rob Malley, is preparing to lift sanctions imposed on Iranians tied to terrorism, a former State Department official has revealed.
Gabriel Noronha, Former Special Advisor for the Secretary's Iran Action Group in the Trump administration in a series of tweets on Wednesdayquoted State Department, National Security Council and European Union unnamed officials as having authorized him to reveal that Malley is preparing to make concessions to Iran that are damaging to US national security.
Noronha said these current officials hope that by revealing details of the concession they hope to prompt the US Congress to act “to stop the capitulation.”
He also charged that Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s chief envoy in the talks, has been the main architect of the deal. Noronha said that his contacts said, “What is happening in Vienna is a total disaster.”
Earlier, “concessions and other misguided policies have led three members of the US negotiating team to leave,” Noronha said in one his tweets.
Republican Senator Jim Inhofe tweeted later that “There is no limits to what @USEnvoyIran will offer Tehran to return to the failed nuclear deal.”
Noronha further said, “US has promised to lift sanctions on some of the regime’s worst terrorists and torturers, leading officials in the regime’s WMD infrastructure, and is currently trying to lift sanctions on the IRGC itself.”
Iran has long demanded that all post-2018 sanctions should be lifted – not just nuclear related sanctions. There are many terrorism and human rights related sanctions. The Biden Administration has insisted that it is willing to lift only nuclear sanctions.
Following Noronha’s revelations, a State Department spokesperson responded to Iran International’s questions, saying, “We are in the final days of a complex negotiation. We are prepared to lift JCPOA-related sanctions in order to end the nuclear and regional crises prompted by our withdrawal.Beyond that, we are not going to respond to specific claims about what sanctions we would be prepared to lift as part of a mutual return to full implementation of the JCPOA.”
According to Noronha, President Biden’s team “is preparing to rescind the Supreme Leader’s Office Executive Order (E.O. 13876) as soon as coming Monday, and lift sanctions on nearly every one of the 112 people/entities sanctioned…”
Top Islamic Republic officials facing serious accusations or evidence of involvement in acts of terrorism are also apparently slated to be de-listed.
Reuters reported last month reported some details about a draft agreement being prepared in Vienna, which did not mention these details. It appeared that the US was moving cautiously, with gradual lifting of economic sanctions.
If what Noronha has reported based on information that he says he has received from current officials is true, Iran would achieve almost everythingit has been demanding in 11 months of negotiations.
Republicans and some Democrats in Congress have warned the Biden Administration about making concessions to Iran. It is not clear how they would act to demand accountability from the White House.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett Wednesday discussed developments in Ukraine and the Iranian nuclear talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who was visiting Israel.
The visit comes as Russia's assault on Ukraine continued for a seventh day, and as Western countries have rallied together against the incursion.
"Our duty as leaders is to do everything to stop the bloodshed," Bennett said at a joint press conference.
Bennett also said Israel was watching with concern as Germany, Britain, France, Russia and China negotiate to revive the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, which was left in tatters after the US withdrew in 2018.
He said Israel was concerned the deal would not adequately rein in Iran's nuclear program.
Scholz said he understood Israel's worries, but said it was time to move forward on a deal.
In the decades following the Holocaust, in which Nazi Germany killed 6 million Jews, Germany and Israel have become staunch allies.
The countries' Cabinets hold regular joint sessions, and Germany is Israel's most important trade partner in the European Union.
But Germany, like much of Europe, is at odds with Israel when it comes to the Palestinian issue.
Germany has called for a Palestinian state alongside Israel and opposes Israel's settlement activities in the West Bank. Germany is also among world powers negotiating with Iran over its nuclear program.
With the Vienna nuclear talks spilling into March, Tehran’s search for ‘guarantees’ and for ending probes into past nuclear work appear to be sticking points.
The United States and the three western European countries in the Vienna talks – France, Germany, and the United Kingdom – have argued that they should not ‘interfere’ in any IAEA investigation. Apparently confirming the Iranian demand, the lead British negotiator Stephanie Al-Qaq wrote on Twitter: “Safeguards are a fundamental part of the non-proliferation system and are separate. We will always reject any attempt to compromise IAEA independence.”
Iran has long argued that the IAEA should drop its repeated questioning over Tehran’s past nuclear work, but it is only in recent days that the issue has emerged as a contentious part of the Vienna talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action).
Rafael Mariano Grossi, the IAEA chief, told reporters Wednesday that such outstanding issues needed clarification regardless of “any other external process,” presumably meaning that he wanted answers over the pre-2003 work regardless of what happened with the JCPOA. But Iran’s view that Grossi’s pursuit of the issue is ‘politicized’ might have encouraged it to raise the matter in Vienna.
Western frustrations
Although restoring the JCPOA would extend IAEA inspections and monitoring of the Iranian nuclear program, the western European powers are showing frustration at the last stages of the Vienna talks.
In Israel Wednesday German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said agreement on reviving the JCPOA "cannot be postponed any longer…Now is the time to make a decision…Now is the time to finally say yes to something that represents a good and reasonable solution."
As Iran International reported Saturday, Iran is also still dissatisfied at proposals to ease United States sanctions in return for Tehran returning its nuclear program to JCPOA limits. Iran’s search for ‘guarantees’ that the US would not once again leave the JCPOA, as it did in 2018, has of late been cited less than disagreements over which US sanctions are incompatible with the 2015 deal.
‘Economic guarantees’
Ahmad Ali-Beighi (Ali-Baygi), a member of parliament, Sunday cited parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf (Qalibaf) that “economic guarantees” were part of Iran’s demands. Iran International has also quoted sources close to the Vienna talks that Tehran is seeking the delisting of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) by the US, given their economic role, and the removal of the 2019 US presidential executive order allowing the administration to sanction anyone linked to the office of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei – an order used to sanction then foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and then judiciary chief and now president, Ebrahim Raisi (Raeesi).
Ali Shamkhani, Iran’s top security official, said Monday that “bitter experience” with America had left Tehran with no choice but to seek “guarantees and a balanced agreement.” Mohammad Morandi, advisor to Iranian negotiators in Vienna, told Press TV Tuesday that Iran “can’t be pushed into a bad deal or an incomplete deal or a problematic deal.”
