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White House held secret talks with Iran for past year | The Times of Israel.

High-level, face-to-face meetings were kept from Israel and allies

By Bradley Klapper, Julie Pace and Matthew Lee November 24, 2013, 8:34 am

US President Barack Obama speaking to his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani, on Friday Sept. 27, marking the first time the two countries’ leaders engaged each other since 1979. (photo credit: Pete Souza via White House Twitter page)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States and Iran secretly engaged in a series of high-level, face-to-face talks over the past year, in a high-stakes diplomatic gamble by the Obama administration that paved the way for the historic deal sealed early Sunday in Geneva aimed at slowing Tehran’s nuclear program, The Associated Press has learned.

The discussions were kept hidden even from America’s closest friends, including its negotiating partners and Israel, until two months ago, and that may explain how the nuclear accord appeared to come together so quickly after years of stalemate and fierce hostility between Iran and the West.

But the secrecy of the talks may also explain some of the tensions between the US and France, which earlier this month balked at a proposed deal, and with Israel, which is furious about the agreement and has angrily denounced the diplomatic outreach to Tehran.

President Barack Obama personally authorized the talks as part of his effort — promised in his first inaugural address — to reach out to a country the State Department designates as the world’s most active state sponsor of terrorism.

The talks were held in the Middle Eastern nation of Oman and elsewhere with only a tight circle of people in the know, the AP learned. Since March, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Jake Sullivan, Vice President Joe Biden’s top foreign policy adviser, have met at least five times with Iranian officials.

The last four clandestine meetings, held since Iran’s reform-minded President Hassan Rouhani was inaugurated in August, produced much of the agreement later formally hammered out in negotiations in Geneva among the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany and Iran, said three senior administration officials. All spoke only on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss by name the highly sensitive diplomatic effort.

The AP was tipped to the first US-Iranian meeting in March shortly after it occurred, but the White House and State Department disputed elements of the account and the AP could not confirm the meeting. The AP learned of further indications of secret diplomacy in the fall and pressed the White House and other officials further. As the Geneva talks appeared to be reaching their conclusion, senior administration officials confirmed to the AP the details of the extensive outreach.

The Geneva deal provides Iran with about $7 billion in relief from international sanctions in exchange for Iranian curbs on uranium enrichment and other nuclear activity. All parties pledged to work toward a final accord next year that would remove remaining suspicions in the West that Tehran is trying to assemble an atomic weapons arsenal.

Iran insists its nuclear interest is only in peaceful energy production and medical research.

The diplomatic gamble with Iran, if the interim agreement holds up and leads to a final pact preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, could avert years of threats of US or Israeli military intervention. It could also prove a turning point in decades of hostility between Washington and Tehran — and become a crowning foreign policy achievement of Obama’s presidency.

But if the deal collapses, or if Iran covertly races ahead with development of a nuclear weapon, Obama will face the consequences of failure, both at home and abroad. His gamble opens him to criticism that he has left Israel vulnerable to a country bent on its destruction and that he has made a deal with a state sponsor of terrorism.

The US and Iran cut off diplomatic ties in 1979 after the Islamic Revolution and the storming of the US Embassy in Tehran, where 52 Americans were held hostage for more than a year. But Obama has expressed a willingness since becoming president to meet with the Iranians without conditions.

At the president’s direction, the United States began a tentative outreach shortly after his inauguration in January 2009. Obama and Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, exchanged letters, but the engagement yielded no results.

That outreach was hampered by Iran’s hardline former president, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, whose re-election in a disputed vote in June of that year led to a violent crackdown on opposition protesters. The next month, relations seemed at another low when Iran detained three American hikers who had strayed across the Iranian border from Iraq.

Ironically, efforts to win the release of the hikers turned out to be instrumental in making the clandestine diplomacy possible.

Oman’s Sultan Qaboos was a key player, facilitating the eventual release of the hikers — the last two of whom returned to the United States in 2011 — and then offering himself as a mediator for a U.S.-Iran rapprochement. The secret informal discussions between mid-level officials in Washington and Tehran began.

Officials described those early contacts as exploratory discussions focused on the logistics of setting up higher-level talks. The discussions happened through numerous channels, officials said, including face-to-face talks at undisclosed locations. They included exchanges between then US Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, now Obama’s national security adviser, and Iran’s envoy to the world body, the officials said. National Security Council aide Puneet Talwar was also involved, the officials said.

The talks took on added weight eight months ago, when Obama dispatched the deputy secretary of state Burns, the top aide Sullivan and five other officials to meet with their Iranian counterparts in the Omani capital of Muscat. Obama dispatched the group shortly after the six powers opened a new round of nuclear talks with Iran in Almaty, Kazakhstan, in late February.

At the time, those main nuclear negotiations were making little progress, and the Iranians had little interest in holding bilateral talks with the United States on the sidelines of the meeting out of fear that the discussions would become public, the US officials said.

So, with the assistance of Sultan Qaboos, officials in both countries began quietly making plans to meet in Oman. Burns, Sullivan and a small team of U.S. technical experts arrived on a military plane in mid-March for the meeting with the Iranians.

The senior administration officials who spoke to the AP would not say who Burns and Sullivan met with but characterized the Iranian attendees as career diplomats, national security aides and experts on the nuclear issue who were likely to remain key players even after the country’s elections this summer.

The goal on the American side, the US officials said, was simply at that point to see if the US and Iran could successfully arrange bilateral talks — a low bar that underscored the sour state of relations between the two nations.

Beyond nuclear issues, the officials said the US team at the March Oman meeting also raised concerns about Iranian involvement in Syria, Tehran’s threats to close the strategically important Strait of Hormuz and the status of Robert Levinson, a missing former FBI agent who the U.S. believes was abducted in Iran, as well as two other Americans detained in the country.

Hoping to keep the channel open, Secretary of State John Kerry then visited Oman in May on a trip ostensibly to push a military deal with the sultanate but secretly focused on maintaining that country’s key mediation role, particularly after the Iranian election scheduled for the next month, the officials said.

Rouhani’s election in June on a platform of easing sanctions crippling Iran’s economy and stated willingness to engage with the West gave a new spark to the US effort, the officials said.

Two secret meetings were organized immediately after Rouhani took office in August, with the specific goal of advancing the stalled nuclear talks with world powers. Another pair of meetings took place in October.

Burns and Sullivan led the US delegation at each of those sessions, and were joined at the final secret meeting by chief US nuclear negotiator Wendy Sherman.

The Iranian delegation was a mix of officials the Americans had met in March in Oman and others who were new to the talks, administration officials said. All of the Iranians were fluent English speakers.

US officials said the meetings happened in multiple locations, but would not confirm the exact spots, saying they did not want to jeopardize their ability to use the same locations in the future. But at least some of the talks are believed to have taken place in Oman.

The private meetings coincided with a public easing of US-Iranian discord. In early August, Obama sent Rouhani a letter congratulating him on his election. The Iranian leader’s response was viewed positively by the White House, which quickly laid the groundwork for the additional secret talks. The US officials said they were convinced that the outreach had the blessing of Ayatollah Khameni, but would not elaborate.

As negotiators continued to talk behind the scenes, public speculation swirled over a possible meeting between Obama and Rouhani on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, which both attended in September in New York. Burns and Sullivan sought to arrange face-to-face talks, but the meeting never happened largely due to Iranian concerns, the officials said. Two days later, though, Obama and Rouhani spoke by phone — the first direct contact between a U.S. and Iranian leader in more than 30 years.

It was only after that Obama-Rouhani phone call that the US began informing allies of the secret talks with Iran, the US officials said.

Obama handled the most sensitive conversation himself, briefing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a Sept. 30 meeting at the White House. He informed Netanyahu only about the two summer meetings, not the March talks, in keeping with the White House’s promise only to tell allies about any discussions with Iran that were substantive.

The US officials would not describe Netanyahu’s reaction. But the next day, he delivered his General Assembly speech, blasting Rouhani as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” and warning the US against mistaking a change in Iran’s tone with an actual change in nuclear ambitions. The Israeli leader has subsequently denounced the potential nuclear agreement as the “deal of the century” for Iran.

After telling Netanyahu about the secret talks, the United States then briefed the other members of the six-nation negotiating team, the U.S. officials said.

The last secret gatherings between the US and Iran took place shortly after the General Assembly, according to the officials.

There, the deal finally reached by the parties on Sunday began to take its final shape.

At this month’s larger formal nuclear negotiations between world powers and Iran in Geneva, Burns and Sullivan showed up as well, but the State Department went to great lengths to conceal their involvement, leaving their names off of the official delegation list.

They were housed at a different hotel than the rest of the team, used back entrances to come and go from meeting venues and were whisked into negotiating sessions from service elevators or unused corridors only after photographers left.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.

Trumpeting deal, Iranians say agreement stymies ‘Zionist plot’ | The Times of Israel.

Ultimately, Iran’s foreign minister says, accord will remove all sanctions and allow Iran to pursue nuclear power free of international pressure

By Gavriel Fiske November 24, 2013, 9:31 am

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif speaks to the media at the International Conference Centre of Geneva, Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013, in Geneva, Switzerland. (photo credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster, Pool)

Iranian officials hailed a nuclear agreement signed with six world powers early Sunday, calling it a large success for the regime in Tehran and confirmation of the country’s right to enrich uranium.

The agreement, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said, represented “a big success for Iran” and an indication that “all plots hatched by the Zionist regime to stop the nuclear agreement have failed,” according to a report from state-sponsored Islamic Republic News Agency.

Zarif acknowledged on Sunday that the deal was “only a first step,” according to a Reuters report. “We need to start moving in the direction of restoring confidence, a direction in which we have managed to move against in the past,” he said.

The agreement signed Sunday morning in Geneva after several months of intense talks, including some in secret, amounts to a six-month partial freeze in Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for limited relief on the Western sanctions that have crippled Iran’s economy.

However, Iran has “no trust” in the Obama administration, and the deal is an opportunity for American to “renew the confidence of the Iranian nation,” Zarif told Iranian state news agency Press TV. Iran will, as part of the deal, cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency in order to “minimize the worry,” he added.

Despite signing the deal, a disagreement formed between the US and Iran over whether it included Western recognition of Iran’s right to enrich uranium, as Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Seyyed Abbas Araqchi told the Tehran Times Sunday.

In a briefing with press shortly after the deal was announced, a senior US administration official emphasized that the US does not – and will not – recognize any Iranian right to enrich uranium.

In Geneva on Sunday, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius confirmed at a press conference that the deal recognized Iran’s right to civilian nuclear power.

A reported copy of the interim agreement, posted online by Iran’s Fars News, included recognition of the right to enrichment in a bullet list of goals for a final deal.

Araqchi, who served as lead Iranian negotiator in the talks, had emphasized earlier that Iran would not accept an agreement that did not recognize the right of the Islamic Republic to continue to enrichment uranium.

Speaking to Press TV, Zarif said the nuclear crisis is now “abating,” and, as part of the deal, no new sanctions will be imposed on Iran during the six-month interim period before final negotiations.

“In the final step, the (uranium) enrichment process will be accepted and at the same time all the sanctions will be lifted,” he said, according to a New York Times translation. Tehran seeks to have a nuclear program that will be “free of international pressure,” he added.

In Tehran, people were optimistic over the deal, Al Jazeera reported.

“They are waking up to the news in a much more positive mood than at any other time during any of these talks,” the news channel’s correspondent in Tehran said.

Israeli officials have heavily criticized the agreement, with Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman telling Israel Radio that it was the greatest achievement for Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Israel denounces Iranian nuclear deal, says it will review options | JPost | Israel News.

11/24/2013 08:13

Bennett: “Israel does not see itself as bound by this bad, this very bad agreement that has been signed.”

JERUSALEM – Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s government denounced world powers’ nuclear agreement with Iran on Sunday as a “bad deal” to which Israel would not be bound.

Yet Israeli officials stopped short of threatening unilateral military action that could further isolate the Jewish state and imperil its bedrock alliance with Washington, saying more time was needed to assess the agreement.

“This is a bad deal. It grants Iran exactly what it wanted – both a significant easing in sanctions and preservation of the most significant parts of its nuclear program,” an official in Netanyahu’s office said.

Aimed at ending a dangerous standoff, the agreement between Iran and the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia was nailed down after more than four days of negotiations in the Swiss city of Geneva.

A senior US official said the agreement halted progress on Iran’s nuclear program, including construction of the Arak research reactor, which is of special concern for the West as it can yield potential bomb material.

It would neutralize Iran’s stockpile of uranium refined to a fissile concentration of 20 percent, which is a close step away from the level needed for weapons, and calls for intrusive UN nuclear inspections, the official said.

The Islamic republic – which denies its nuclear program has hostile designs – has also committed to stop uranium enrichment above a fissile purity of 5 percent, a US fact sheet said.

But that still appeared to fall far short of Netanyahu’s demand for a total rollback of the Iranian nuclear program.

“You stand and shout out until you’re blue in the face, and you try to understand why they’re not listening. The world wanted an agreement,” Finance Minister Yair Lapid, a member of Netanyahu’s security cabinet, told Israel’s Army Radio.

“We also said that a diplomatic accord would be good. A diplomatic accord is certainly better than war, a diplomatic accord is better than a situation of permanent confrontation – just not this agreement.”

Lapid said that in the Israel had to pore over the deal: “For example, we still don’t understand exactly what stepping up the monitoring (on Iran’s facilities) means. This is a detailed matter. God really is in the small details.”

Economic Minister Naftali Bennett, another security cabinet member, told Army Radio in a separate interview: “Israel does not see itself as bound by this bad, this very bad agreement that has been signed.”

Neither minister would be drawn on how Israel might respond. Israel, which is widely assumed to have the Middle East’s sole atomic arsenal, sees a mortal menace in a nuclear-armed Iran and has at times threatened to launch a preemptive war against its arch-foe.

Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said the Geneva deal required the Netanyahu government to conduct a strategic review.

Asked on Israel Radio whether he felt cheated by the United States for its role in the deal, Lieberman said: “Heaven forbid.

Top Israeli officials lambaste ‘self-delusional’ Iran nuclear deal | The Times of Israel.

Foreign Minister Liberman says agreement will force Israel to make ‘different decisions’; Intel Minister Steinitz decries world celebrations, says Israel won’t take part; Prime Minister’s Office pans deal as giving Iran exactly what it wants

By AP and Times of Israel staff November 24, 2013, 7:54 am

From left, Germany’s Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, US Secretary of State John Kerry, and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius greet each other and shake hands at the United Nations Palais, Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013, in Geneva, Switzerland, at the Iran nuclear talks. (photo credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster, Pool)

Two top ministers harshly criticized the nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers early Sunday, with Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman saying the agreement had shifted the status quo in the Middle East.

“This brings us to a new reality in the whole Middle East, including the Saudis. This isn’t just our worry” he told Israel Radio. “We’ve found ourselves in a completely new situation.”

When asked if this would lead to an Israeli military strike on Iran, Liberman said Israel “would need to make different decisions.”

Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz, who is responsible for monitoring Iran’s nuclear program, said there is no reason for the world to be celebrating. He said the deal, reached in Geneva early Sunday, is based on “Iranian deception and self-delusion.”

“Just like the failed deal with North Korea, the current deal can actually bring Iran closer to the bomb,” Steinitz said. “Israel cannot take part in the international celebrations based on Iranian deception and self-delusion.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to discuss the matter with his Cabinet later Sunday. He is also expected to speak by phone with US President Barack Obama, Reuters reported.

An unnamed source in the Prime Minister’s Office called the agreement a “bad deal that gives Iran exactly what it wants,” according to Israel Radio.

The deal, announced early Sunday morning, limits continued Iranian enrichment of uranium to 5 percent in exchange for eased sanctions.

Diplomats refused to spell out details of the talks, but a senior Obama administration official said that the West had not conceded an Iranian right to produce nuclear fuel through uranium enrichment, a key sticking point in previous negotiations.

Iranian Foreign Minister said the deal did recognize Iran’s right to enrich, an assessment Liberman agreed with.

The White House official said the deal included an agreement that Iran would halt progress on its nuclear program, including a plutonium reactor at the Arak facility. The deal also calls on Iran to neutralize its 20-percent-enriched uranium stockpiles. Tehran has also agreed to intrusive inspections under the terms of the deal.

However, Liberman slammed the deal as not going far enough, since it does not dismantle the nuclear facilities.

“They have enough uranium to make a few bombs already,” he said.

Israel believes Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon.

In recent weeks, Israel had warned the emerging deal would give Iran too much relief from economic sanctions without halting Iran’s march toward a nuclear bomb.

Geneva talks yield nuclear deal with Iran – Israel News, Ynetnews.

After months of anticipation, rounds of talks, Iran, world powers reach deal. According to details, Iran will continue low-level enrichment but would neutralize stockpiles. Netanyahu dubs deal ‘bad’ while Obama claims will block Iran from proliferating

Ynet

Iran and six world powers reached a breakthrough deal on Sunday to curb Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for limited sanctions relief.

Aimed at ending a dangerous standoff, the agreement between Iran and the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia was nailed down after more than four days of negotiations in the Swiss city of Geneva, much to the disappointment of Israeli officials.

The accord was designed as a package of confidence-building steps to ease decades of tensions and confrontation and banish the specter of a Middle East war over Tehran’s nuclear aspirations.

European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who has been coordinating talks with Iran on behalf of the major powers, said it created time and space for talks aimed at reaching a comprehensive solution to the dispute.

“This is only a first step,” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told a news conference.

“We need to start moving in the direction of restoring confidence, a direction in which we have managed to move against in the past,” he said, adding Tehran would expand cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN nuclear watchdog, to address what he called some concerns.

Speaking later Sunday morning in Iran’s Press TV, Zarif further claimed that the powers recognized Iran’s nuclear program and in a final “step” all sanctions on the Islamic republic would be lifted.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government denounced the deal Sunday as a “bad deal” that Israel did not regard itself as bound by. “This is a bad deal,” an official in Netanyahu’s office said.

“Israel does not see itself as bound by this bad, this very bad agreement that has been signed,” Economic Minister Naftali Bennett, a member of Netanyahu’s security Cabinet, told Israel’s Army Radio.

In Washington, President Barack Obama said the deal was an important first step towards a comprehensive solution to Iran’s nuclear program and its provisions were key to preventing Iran from proliferating. “Simply put, they cut off Iran’s most likely paths to a bomb,” Obama told reporters.

A senior US official said the agreement halted progress on Iran’s nuclear program, including construction of the Arak research reactor, which is of special concern for the West as it can yield potential bomb material.

It would neutralize Iran’s stockpile of uranium refined to a fissile concentration of 20 percent, which is a close step away from the level needed for weapons, and calls for intrusive U.N. nuclear inspections, the official said.

Iran has also committed to stop uranium enrichment above a fissile purity of 5%, a US fact sheet said. Refined uranium can be used to fuel nuclear power plants – Iran’s stated goal – but also provide the fissile core of an atomic bomb if refined much further.

The deal has no recognition of an Iranian right to enrich uranium and sanctions would still be enforced, the US official added.

Iran will get access to $4.2 billion in foreign exchange as part of the accord, and is also expected to receive limited sanctions relief on gold, petrochemicals and autos, a Western diplomat said.

Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz, who is responsible for monitoring Iran’s nuclear program, says there is no reason for the world to be celebrating. He says the deal, reached in Geneva early Sunday, is based on “Iranian deception and self-delusion.”

It was the first Israeli reaction to the deal. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to discuss the matter with his Cabinet later Sunday as well as hold a phone conversation with US President Obama.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a Twitter message that it was an “important and encouraging” first-stage agreement with Iran, whose nuclear program “won’t move forward for 6 months and parts rolled back.”

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said the deal only confirmed Iran’s right to civil nuclear power.

“After years of blockages, the agreement in Geneva on Iran’s nuclear program is an important step to preserving security and peace,” Fabius said in a statement.

New horizons

US Secretary of State John Kerry and foreign ministers of the five other world powers joined the negotiations with Iran early on Saturday as the two sides appeared to be edging closer to a long-sought preliminary agreement.

Diplomacy was stepped up after the landslide election of Hassan Rohani, a relative moderate, as Iranian president in June, replacing bellicose nationalist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

On a Twitter account widely recognized as representing Rohani, a message said after the agreement was announced, “Iranian people’s vote for moderation & constructive engagement + tireless efforts by negotiating teams are to open new horizons.”

The OPEC producer rejects suspicions it is trying covertly to develop the means to produce nuclear weapons, saying it is stockpiling nuclear material for future atomic power plants.

The Yeshiva World Transcript of President Obama’s Iran Speech « » Frum Jewish News.

Today, the United States – together with our close allies and partners – took an important first step toward a comprehensive solution that addresses our concerns with the Islamic Republic of Iran’s nuclear program.

Since I took office, I have made clear my determination to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.  As I have said many times, my strong preference is to resolve this issue peacefully, and we have extended the hand of diplomacy. Yet for many years, Iran has been unwilling to meet its obligations to the international community.  So my Administration worked with Congress, the U.N. Security Council and countries around the world to impose unprecedented sanctions on the Iranian government.

These sanctions have had a substantial impact on the Iranian economy, and with the election of a new Iranian President earlier this year, an opening for diplomacy emerged.  I spoke personally with President Rouhani of Iran earlier this fall.  Secretary Kerry has met multiple times with Iran’s Foreign Minister.  And we have pursued intensive diplomacy – bilaterally with the Iranians, and together with our P5+1 partners: the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia, and China, as well as the European Union.

Today, that diplomacy opened up a new path toward a world that is more secure – a future in which we can verify that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful, and that it cannot build a nuclear weapon.

While today’s announcement is just a first step, it achieves a great deal. For the first time in nearly a decade, we have halted the progress of the Iranian nuclear program, and key parts of the program will be rolled back.  Iran has committed to halting certain levels of enrichment, and neutralizing part of its stockpile. Iran cannot use its next-generation centrifuges—which are used for enriching uranium. Iran cannot install or start up new centrifuges, and its production of centrifuges will be limited.  Iran will halt work at its plutonium reactor.  And new inspections will provide extensive access to Iran’s nuclear facilities, and allow the international community to verify whether Iran is keeping its commitments.

These are substantial limitations which will help prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon. Simply put, they cut off Iran’s most likely paths to a bomb.  Meanwhile, this first step will create time and space over the next six months for more negotiations to fully address our comprehensive concerns about the Iranian program. And because of this agreement, Iran cannot use negotiations as cover to advance its program.

On our side, the United States and our friends and allies have agreed to provide Iran modest relief, while continuing to apply our toughest sanctions.  We will refrain from imposing new sanctions, and we will allow the Iranian government access to a portion of the revenue that they have been denied through sanctions.  But the broader architecture of sanctions will remain in place and we will continue to enforce them vigorously.  And if Iran does not fully meet its commitments during this six month phase, we will turn off the relief, and ratchet up the pressure.

Over the next six months, we will work to negotiate a comprehensive solution. We approach these negotiations with a basic understanding: Iran, like any nation, should be able to access peaceful nuclear energy.  But because of its record of violating its obligations, Iran must accept strict limitations on its nuclear program that make it impossible to develop a nuclear weapon.

In these negotiations, nothing will be agreed to until everything is agreed to. The burden is on Iran to prove to the world that its nuclear program will be for exclusively peaceful purposes. If Iran seizes this opportunity, the Iranian people will benefit from rejoining the international community, and we can begin to chip away at the mistrust between our two nations. This would provide Iran with a dignified path to forge a new beginning with the wider world based on mutual respect. But if Iran refuses, it will face growing pressure and isolation.

Over the last few years, Congress has been a key partner in imposing sanctions on the Iranian government, and that bipartisan effort made possible the progress that was achieved today.  Going forward, we will continue to work closely with Congress.  However, now is not the time to move forward on new sanctions – doing so would derail this promising first step, alienate us from our allies, and risk unraveling the coalition that enabled our sanctions to be enforced in the first place.

That international unity is on display today.  The world is united in support of our determination to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.  Iran must know that security and prosperity will never come through the pursuit of nuclear weapons – it must be reached through fully verifiable agreements that make Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons impossible.

As we go forward, the resolve of the United States will remain firm, as will our commitment to our friends and allies – particularly Israel and our Gulf partners, who have good reason to be skeptical about Iran’s intentions.

Ultimately, only diplomacy can bring about a durable solution to the challenge posed by Iran’s nuclear program.  As President and Commander in Chief, I will do what is necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. However, I have a profound responsibility to try to resolve our differences peacefully, rather than rush towards conflict. Today, we have a real opportunity to achieve a comprehensive, peaceful settlement, and I believe we must test it.

The first step that we have taken today marks the most significant and tangible progress that we have made with Iran since I took office. Now, we must use the months ahead to pursue a lasting and comprehensive settlement that would resolve an issue that has threatened our security – and the security of our allies – for decades.  It won’t be easy.  Huge challenges remain ahead.  But through strong and principled diplomacy, the United States of America will do our part on behalf of a world of greater peace, security, and cooperation among nations.

Israel Minister: Iran Deal Based on ‘Deceit’ – ABC News.

Israel on Sunday harshly criticized the international community’s nuclear deal with Iran, accusing the world of “self-delusion” and saying the agreement would not halt Tehran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapon.

Israel has long accused Iran of trying to develop a nuclear weapon, and in the weeks leading up to Sunday’s agreement, had warned the emerging deal was insufficient. It had called for increased pressure on Iran, and warned that any relief from economic sanctions would make Iran less willing to compromise down the road.

Israel’s Cabinet minister for intelligence issues, Yuval Steinitz, said the last-minute changes to the deal were “far from satisfactory” and did nothing to change Israel’s position.

“This agreement is still bad and will make it more difficult than before to achieve an appropriate solution in the future,” he said. Instead, he compared it to a failed 2007 international deal with North Korea and said it “is more likely to bring Iran closer to having a bomb.”

“Israel cannot participate in the international celebration, which is based on Iranian deception and (international) self-delusion,” said Steinitz, whose responsibilities include monitoring Iran’s nuclear program.

Israel considers a nuclear-armed Iran a threat to its very survival, citing Iranian calls for Israel’s destruction, its development of long-range missiles capable of striking Israel and Iran’s support for hostile militant groups along Israel’s borders. It dismisses Iranian claims that the nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

Israel has repeatedly threatened to carry out a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities if it concludes international diplomacy has failed to curb the Iranian nuclear program.

But Steinitz indicated an Israeli attack is not in the works for the time being.

“Despite our disappointment, we will remain steadfast in our position and work with our friends and allies in the United States and the rest of the world in an attempt to achieve a comprehensive solution which includes a full and genuine dismantling of Iran’s military

Iran, world powers reach historic nuclear deal with Iran – The Washington Post.

By Anne Gearan and Joby Warrick, Published: November 23 | Updated: Sunday, November 24, 6:05 AM

GENEVA — Iran and six major powers agreed early Sunday on a historic deal that freezes key parts of Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for temporary relief on some economic sanctions, diplomats confirmed.

The deal was reached after four days of marathon bargaining and an eleventh-hour intervention by Secretary of State John F. Kerry and foreign ministers from Europe, Russia and China, the sources said.

The agreement, sealed at a 3 a.m. signing ceremony in Geneva’s Palace of Nations, requires Iran to halt or scale back parts of its nuclear infrastructure, the first such pause in more than a decade.

“We have reached an agreement,” Michael Mann, spokesman for European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, said in a Twitter posting that was echoed by a separate posting by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

The deal, intended as a first step toward a more comprehensive nuclear pact to be completed in six months, freezes or reverses progress at all of Iran’s major nuclear facilities, according to Western officials familiar with the details. It halts the installation of new centrifuges used to enrich uranium and caps the amount and type of enriched uranium that Iran is allowed to produce.

Iran also agreed to halt work on key components of a heavy-water reactor that could someday provide Iran with a source of plutonium. In addition, Iran accepted a dramatic increase in oversight, including daily monitoring by international nuclear inspectors, the officials said.

The concessions not only halt Iran’s nuclear advances but also make it virtually impossible for Tehran to build a nuclear weapon without being detected, the officials said. In return, Iran will receive modest relief of trade sanctions and access to some of its frozen currency accounts overseas, concessions said to be valued at less than $7 billion over the six-month term of the deal. The sanctions would be reinstated if Iran violates the agreement’s terms.

Speaking at the White House after the deal with announced, President Obama praised the negotiators. “We have pursued intensive diplomacy,” he said. “Today that diplomacy opened up a new path toward a world that’s more secure.” he said.

“For the first time in nearly a decade we have halted parts of Iran’s nuclear program.”

The agreement is a long-sought victory for the Obama administration, which from its earliest days made the Iranian nuclear program one of its top foreign policy priorities. The administration, helped by its overseas allies as well as Congress, achieved unprecedented success in imposing harsh economic sanctions that cut Iran’s oil exports in half and decimated the country’s currency. It was hoping to quickly finalize an agreement in the face of threats by Congress to impose additional economic sanctions on Iran.

The deal is also a victory for Kerry, who traveled to Geneva twice in two weeks to participate in the negotiations.

Still, the agreement is likely to face heavy opposition from key allies — chiefly Israel and Saudi Arabia — as well as congressional skeptics who have demanded much greater concessions from Iran, including the dismantling of its enrichment program.

In a posting on Twitter, Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), outspoken on foreign and military affairs, expressed his concerns about a deal, saying, “Unless the agreement requires dismantling of the Iranian centrifuges, we really haven’t gained anything..”

Moments later, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) suggested the diplomatic agreement was designed to distract from domestic troubles for President Obama: “Amazing what WH will do to distract attention from O-care.”

The marathon discussions with Iran were described by Western diplomats as “very difficult” and “intense,” and several officials had sought to lower expectations that a resolution could be reached before Sunday, when Kerry and the other foreign ministers were due to depart. Negotiations over the deal had remained snarled late into Saturday evening, with the foreign ministers of Britain, France, Germany, China, Russia, the European Union and the United States huddled in a hotel conference room.

Several of the diplomats met earlier in the day with Iran’s Zarif, who told reporters that the parties remained divided on key details of the six-month deal.

Kerry, Zarif and Ashton met late Saturday, but the session ended with no announcement of progress. Instead, Iran’s deputy foreign minister hardened his position on what he called Iran’s right to enrich uranium, a matter of deep national pride.

Although “98 percent” of the deal was done, Iran said it could not accept any agreement that does not recognize enrichment rights, Abbas Araghchi told reporters.

“Any agreement without recognizing Iran’s right to enrich, practically and verbally, will be unacceptable for Tehran,” Araghchi said, according to Reuters.

Western officials have balked at recognizing a legal right to uranium enrichment, hoping instead to craft language that acknowledges the right of all countries to pursue nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Zarif appeared to endorse that approach publicly this month.

The sides also continued to haggle over details of the limited sanctions relief to be offered in return for Iran’s scaling back its nuclear program, diplomats said.

The most painful sanctions, affecting Iran’s oil and banking sectors, would remain until the end of the deal’s first phase, and any relaxation of them was dependent on Iran’s willingness to accept permanent curbs on its nuclear program, Western officials said.

Still another obstacle was Iran’s partially completed heavy-water reactor in the city of Arak. The agreement freezes construction of the reactor’s core, which could, if completed, give Iran a path toward obtaining plutonium for nuclear weapons.

Kerry decided to intervene in the talks after negotiators reportedly made progress in overcoming key obstacles to a deal. Kerry joined Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who arrived in Geneva on Friday, as well as British and French counterparts who traveled to Switzerland early Saturday. Diplomats and technical teams from Iran and the six major powers had been meeting privately since Wednesday to resolve a number of sticking points.

Israel, a close U.S. ally, opposes the deal as too generous to an enemy it sees as a mortal threat. Israel is not a party to the talks.

The Obama administration has been unable to reassure Israel or another partner, Saudi Arabia, that the arrangement would make the Middle East safer.

Talks were meant to end Friday. But they were extended as foreign ministers joined lower-level negotiators Saturday for what appeared to be final rounds of talks.

A spokeswoman for Kerry had said he would leave Sunday for other diplomatic meetings. Because Kerry is considered an essential player in finalizing the pact, that set an unofficial deadline to either strike a deal or announce that this round came close, but not close enough.

Zarif and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani have pushed for a deal in the past three months, an about-face after years of unproductive talks. These negotiations were the first extended talks between senior U.S. and Iranian diplomats in more than 30 years.

© The Washington Post Company

Iran agrees to interim deal completely halting nuclear progress | JPost | Israel News.

By MICHAEL WILNER

11/24/2013 04:27

After negotiations spill into a fifth day, Iranian FM Javad Zarif announces agreement has been reached; Obama deems deal “most significant and tangible progress” since he took office; Rouhani applauds agreement.

WASHINGTON — Iran has agreed to terms of an initial bargain set by world powers in the hopes of pausing a standoff with the United States and Europe over its nuclear program.

“Diplomacy opened up a new path toward a world that is more secure,” US President Barack Obama said in a late-night address from the White House, characterizing the deal as the “most significant and tangible progress” since the beginning of his presidency.

“For the first time in nearly a decade, we have halted the progress of the Iranian nuclear program,” Obama said. “And key parts of the program will be rolled back.”

Iran’s decision on Sunday morning to comply with the deal — characterized in recent days by the Israeli government as “very, very bad” — was hailed in Geneva, Switzerland, as the “first step” toward a peaceful solution to the decade-old crisis.

“Because of this agreement, Iran cannot use negotiations as cover to advance its program,” Obama said, adding that the deal “cuts off [Iran’s] paths to a bomb.”

Germany and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council — the United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia and China — announced the interim agreement after the chief diplomat of each nation descended on Geneva, where talks were in their third round since October, in order to secure the deal.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Sunday congratulated Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif and the six world powers involved in reaching an interim agreement after four long days of negotiations in Geneva.

“Iranian people’s vote for #moderation & constructive engagement (plus) tireless efforts by negotiating teams are to open new horizons,” he posted on Twitter, after re-Tweeting Zarif’s announcement of the deal.

US Secretary of State John Kerry said in the early hours of Sunday morning that the historic deal “enlarges the breakout time” Iran would need to develop fissile material for a nuclear device.

“The purpose of this is very simple: to require Iran to prove the peaceful nature of its program,” Kerry said, “and to ensure that it cannot build a nuclear weapon.” The ” first step ” imposes a limit on Iran’s enrichment capabilities and dilutes existing stockpiles of uranium, effectively halting parts of the program that are most worrisome to the international community. The deal specifically addresses the enrichment of uranium to weapons-grade quality, spun in centrifuges to such a degree that the material has no practical civilian purpose.

Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif said at a Sunday morning press conference in Geneva that Iran will never stop enriching uranium. He told reporters that enrichment will continue and “will be a part of any agreement now and in the future,” although halting it is a significant portion of the agreement. Although many restrictions will be implemented over the next 6 months, it will not completely cease.

When asked about Israel’s potential reaction to the deal, Zarif avoided naming the country, but said that there is no reason to react negatively. “The deal is geared toward resolving a problem that has cast its shadow cast over entire world, and this region. I do not see any justification to be concerned about the resolution of a problem.”

“We are trying to move forward with the international community,” he added. “They must accept fact that threat of war is illegal. War is unnecessary,imprudent and illegal. If we can prevent that, it is an accomplishment. The force option is no longer on the table.”

International monitors will be granted unfettered access to Iran’s largest nuclear facilities, including Fordow, a uranium enrichment plant burrowed deep inside a mountain in the holy city of Qom and kept clandestine until 2009.

In his statement on Sunday morning, Kerry recalled the revelation of the Fordow facilities the basis for suspicion that led to such harsh sanctions against Iran in the first place.

Additionally in the deal, three-quarters of all centrifuges already installed at Fordow, and half of those at Natanz — another major facility — will be rendered inoperable within the coming months.

Iran will not be allowed to install new centrifuges, but will be required under the agreement to freeze all enrichment beyond 20 percent — a key step towards weaponization. The Iranian government will also be required to “dilute” all uranium already enriched above 5 percent into a form “not suitable for further enrichment,” the White House said on Saturday night.

But Iran may continue enriching uranium to 3.5 percent, and is required to dismantle any existing enrichment infrastructure.

The heavy-water plutonium reactor in Arak — which provides the Islamic Republic with another path to a nuclear warhead — will not be commissioned, fueled or further expanded.

In exchange for these concessions from Tehran, world powers will provide the Islamic Republic with sanctions relief valued up to $10 billion, including $4.2 billion in direct foreign exchange. The sanctions adjustments are “limited and reversible,” says the US government.

The White House released a list of sanctions that would remain in place immediately after the announcement of the deal, which includes those against the Central Bank of Iran, Iran’s oil sector and restricted access to the US financial system.

The agreement will be in effect for six month s, during which time the P5+1 powers will attempt to forge a conclusive, final-status agreement that will end the nuclear impasse.

“Nothing will be agreed to unless everything is agreed to,” Obama said.

“The burden is on Iran.” The US government has said its goal is to “put time on the clock” in order to stave off military conflict between itself, and its allies, and the Iranian government.

US officials have characterized an alternative strategy popular on Capitol Hill — not to strike an interim deal with Iran, but rather to sanction its government even further — as equivalent to ordering a march to war.

“This deal appears to provide the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism with billions of dollars in exchange for cosmetic concessions that neither fully freeze nor significantly roll back its nuclear infrastructure,” said Senator Mark Kirk (R-Ill), who favors new sanctions against Iran and lobbied against the deal. “Furthermore, the deal ignores Iran’s continued sponsorship of terrorism, its testing of long-range ballistic missiles and its abuse of human rights.” Kerry canceled a trip to Israel earlier in the week in order to clear his schedule for the weekend, expecting his presence would be required in Geneva.

The secretary will fly on from the Swiss city to London to meet with UK Foreign Secretary William Hague on Iran, and other matters, including Syria and the Middle East peace process.

The international community has refused to accept Iran’s production of fissile material since 2003, when George W. Bush called the Iranian government part of an “axis of evil” for its attempts to build weapons of mass destruction.

The US and Europeans give Iran a deadline of Saturday night for concluding a nuclear deal.

The big Iranian nuclear sale

American and European negotiators have given Iran until Saturday night, Nov. 23, the fourth day of negotiations in Geneva, to reach agreement on an interim nuclear deal, debkafile’s sources report. After that deadline, those delegations plan to cut the talks short and leave. Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif retorted that his government would not bow to threats. The US-EU deadline indicated that Washington, Paris, London and Berlin had reached the limit of their concessions to Iran. UK Foreign Secretary William Hague said when he arrived in Geneva that the two difficulties encountered two weeks ago still remained.  The Russian and Chinese foreign minister have refrained from comment.

See debkafile’s earlier report on this date.

Both sides were pumping up an atmosphere of optimism as the foreign ministers of all six powers facing Iran made tracks for Geneva Saturday morning, Nov. 23, Day Four of the marathon negotiations for an accord on a six-month freeze on Iran’s nuclear program.

Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Hassan Araghchi said the six powers had agreed to respect his country’s right to enrich uranium, so removing a major hurdle in the path of an accord, whereas Foreign Minister Javad Zarif remained silent.

Sergey Lavrov was the first foreign minister to arrive Friday night, followed by Secretary of State John Kerry early Saturday. Both were said to have come to try and narrow the gaps holding up an accord. The Chinese, British, French and German foreign ministers were due in Geneva Saturday morning, after bilateral sessions between Zarif and the other six delegates failed to produce enough progress for them to adjourn to formal negotiations around the same table, least of all reach the signing stage.

This time round, the Iranian team borrowed the Western tactic of constantly maintaining that a deal is within reach. This tactic aims at weakening the resistance of the opposite side by presenting it as dragging out the nerve-wracking talkathon beyond reason. This tactic didn’t work for the Western delegations in the first round of nuclear talks on Nov. 11, which France blew up on the fourth day. The second round had reached the same touch-and-go point by Saturday morning, when none of the six delegations confirmed they had agreed to a clause respecting Iran’s right to enrich uranium as Araghchi had claimed.
This point is pivotal to both sides because it is absent from the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which merely specifies that countries are allowed “to pursue peaceful nuclear energy.”

Rewording this provision to cover the right to uranium enrichment would cut the ground from under the entire treaty by throwing the door open for all its signatories to enrich uranium at will.

Tehran’s goal in making this demand is more than legitimacy for its own weapons program. It is also seeks to deprive the big powers of the prerogative to determine the rights of smaller nations.
On this point, therefore, both Iran and the six powers are digging in their heels.

The other major hurdle facing a deal is the Arak heavy water reactor Iran is building.  Tehran refuses to halt construction of this reactor arguing that like any other nation, Iran is entitled to build nuclear reactors for peaceful purposes. They shoot back at any suggestion that the Arak reactor is designed to produce plutonium as fuel for nuclear weapon, along with enriched uranium, with a charge of discrimination, and declare, “Tehran is not going to sign an agreement that permanently put Iran in an outcast category,”

The Iranians have adopted a negotiating strategy of relegating the vital technical aspects of the draft accord to a lower priority while hammering away at issues pertinent to national respect. Iran is fighting in Geneva for international respect as a legitimate and equal nuclear power on the world stage.
This strategy also has a by-product: By the time they get around to the key technical clauses, the negotiators on the other side of the table are too worn down to cope with a new set of Iranian objections.
The biggest obstacle to a deal, however, is to be found in Tehran in the person of the tough, autocratic Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He will have the final word on whether the second round to talks in Geneva produce an accord – not the American or Russian presidents, and certainly not the foreign ministers assembling there.

Khamenei has boosted his heft by making himself unapproachable – even to Iran’s president Hassan Rouhani.  So no one can influence him or even find out where he stands until the text is ready for signing. Even then, Zarif and Araghchi may be told at the last moment to withhold their signatures over some point and return home for further consultations. The six powers will then have to decide whether it is worth taking the negotiations to a third round, as the Congress in Washington fights back by enacting tighter sanctions against Iran.