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US Complaints Over Implementation of Nuclear Deal With Iran Irrelevant – Moscow

© Sputnik/ Andrey Stenin
Sputnik – April 20, 2017

US complaints over how the nuclear deal on Iran is being implemented are irrelevant, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control, Mikhail Ulyanov, said Thursday.

On April 19, US President Donald Trump ordered a National Security Council-led interagency review of the JCPOA to evaluate Iran’s compliance with the deal, with US State Secretary Rex Tillerson stating that the nuclear deal “fails to achieve the objective of non-nuclear Iran.” Tehran, in its turn, stressed that the deal was an international treaty and cannot be changed, adding that Iran was fulfilling its obligations under the JCPOA.

“If the deal does not work, then specific complaints should be made regarding its functioning. The Americans cannot do this. The IAEA, an independent participant in this process, confirms that the Iranians are implementing everything. Therefore, any claims are irrelevant here, it seems to me,” Ulyanov said.

Ulyanov noted that it was necessary for Tillerson to separate the notions of terrorism and the nuclear deal, which have nothing in common.

The JCPOA was signed by Iran and the P5+1 countries — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States plus Germany in July 2015, ensuring the peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear program in return for the gradual lifting of sanctions against Tehran. The deal came into force on January 16, 2016, after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that Iran was ready to implement the program to reduce its nuclear potential. However, the United States imposed new sanctions against Iran in February 2017 after a medium-range ballistic missile test has been carried out by Tehran in late January.

April 20, 2017 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Iran complying with commitments under nuclear deal: Tillerson

Press TV – April 19, 2017

The Donald Trump administration has notified Congress that Iran has been compliant with its commitments under the 2015 nuclear agreement, and that the administration is reviewing whether a continued suspension of the sanctions serves the national interests of the United States.

In a letter to Rep. Paul Ryan, speaker of the House of Representatives, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the administration has undertaken a full review of the nuclear accord known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

“President Donald J. Trump has directed a National Security Council-led inter-agency review of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that will evaluate whether suspension of sanctions related to Iran pursuant to the JCPOA is vital to the national security interests of the United States,” Tillerson said in a statement Tuesday.

The White House must send certification of Iran’s compliance with the JCPOA to Congress every 90 days, and it was the first issued by the Trump administration.

Tillerson, however, accused Iran of being “a leading state sponsor of terror, through many platforms and methods,” and noted the administration would review the nuclear deal with that in mind.

Similar accusations leveled by US officials have in the past drawn strong reactions from Iranian authorities. Early this month, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qassemi advised US Defense Secretary James Mattis against making such “unwarranted and malicious accusations against Iran.”

He said Washington should instead oblige its regional allies to halt their widespread financial, ideological, and military support for the terrorist outfits that have been plaguing several countries.

As a candidate in the 2016 presidential election, Trump frequently criticized the JCPOA as “the worst deal ever negotiated,” but offered conflicting opinions on whether he would try to scrap it, renegotiate its terms or keep it in place.

Iran and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council – the US, France, Britain, Russia and China plus Germany – sealed the JCPOA in July 2015 following 18 months of intense negotiations.

Under the deal, which took effect in January last year, Iran undertook to put limits on its nuclear program in exchange for the removal of nuclear-related sanctions imposed against the Islamic Republic.

Iran has warned that it would restore its nuclear activities to the pre-JCPOA level, if the US fails to keep its end of the bargain.

At an international conference on nuclear policy in Washington last month, European Union Foreign Policy Chief Federica Mogherini strongly defended the JCPOA, pointing out that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had confirmed Iran’s compliance five times.

Opponents of the JCPOA, including Israel and its allies in the US Congress, accuse Iran of pursuing nuclear weapons and insist that the deal would not guarantee that the country was not striving to that end any longer.

Iran has always said that it seeks to allay international concerns about its nuclear program which is peaceful and civilian.

April 19, 2017 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

IAEA satisfied by Iran commitment to nuclear deal: Amano

Press TV – December 18, 2016

During a visit to Tehran, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog has expressed satisfaction with Iran’s commitment to its obligations under the 2015 nuclear accord with world powers.

“Iran has been committed to its obligations and this is an important matter,” the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s Director General Yukiya Amano said on Sunday at a joint press conference with Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI).

The nuclear accord, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was signed between Iran and the P5+1 group of countries — the US, Britain, Russia, France and China plus Germany — last year in Vienna.

The IAEA is tasked with monitoring the technical implementation of the nuclear deal.

Since January, when the JCPOA took effect, the agency has confirmed Iran’s compliance in several reports.

“We are satisfied with the trend of the JCPOA’s implementation, and hope for this trend to continue,” added Amano, who is in Tehran on a one-day visit at the invitation of Salehi.

Concerning his meeting with Salehi, he said the two had discussed a range of issues, including heavywater, enriched uranium, Iran’s uranium stockpiles as well as research and development in the field of nuclear energy.

Among other topics in the talks was a recent order by President Hassan Rouhani to the AEOI to plan work on nuclear propulsion devices to be used in sea transport, Amano added.

The Iranian chief executive issued the decree in response to the recent violation of the multilateral nuclear deal by the United States. The US Congress recently voted to extend Iran Sanctions Act (ISA), Washington’s sanctions law against Iran, for another 10 years. This is while Iran had all its nuclear-related sanctions removed on the back of the JCPOA.

Salehi, in turn, said he had addressed cooperation with the IAEA on the JCPOA’s implementation.

He urged the IAEA to “act as an impartial international authority, whose reports do not reflect leverage or influence peddling by any party,” the Iranian official asserted, thanking the agency for “acting in such a manner so far” in its reports on the JCPOA’s implementation.

He said the two had addressed the presidential decree and how to implement it as well as Tehran’s obligations under the IAEA’s Nuclear Safeguards Agreement during the JCPOA’s implementation process.

Salehi also touched on Washington’s extension of the Iran Sanctions Act, saying Tehran “is ready to take whatever proportionate measure upon the decision of the Iranian establishment’s authorities.”

Later in the day, Amano sat down for talks with the Iranian president, who likewise called on the agency to produce impartial and technical reports on Iran.

“We expect that this international institution perform its responsibility in the area of technical cooperation, the transfer of peaceful nuclear technology, and nuclear trade, too,” President Rouhani said.

He said the JCPOA’s sustainability hinged on compliance by all parties, and added, “The Islamic Republic will honor its commitments as long as other parties honor theirs.”

Rouhani said some recent measures by the US, including the extension of the ISA, contravened the nuclear agreement. “The course the United States has taken vis-à-vis Iran will lead to the reduction of international confidence in the US government,” he said.

Amano, for his part, reiterated that Iran had lived up to its contractual obligations since the accord’s implementation. “The JCPOA was a big achievement, whose implementation the IAEA will support with all its might.”

December 18, 2016 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

US Mulls Pulling Out of Iran Deal

By Peter KORZUN | Strategic Culture Foundation | 06.12.2016

The US Senate voted on December 1 to extend the Iran Sanctions Act (ISA) giving the president the authority to impose sanctions on Iran for another decade. The bill had already passed the house of Representatives. The ISA was enacted in 1996 (as the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act), reauthorized in 2006 and 2011, and is set to expire on Dec. 31, if not renewed. GOP lawmakers have unanimously opposed the agreement. Some Democratic senators reconsidered their stances, expressing support for extending the presidential authority to counter Iran’s «aggressive behavior.» President Obama is not expected to veto the motion because the scale of support indicates a veto would be easily overridden.

The measure ensures that the president could easily restore the sanctions, if Iran breached the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The deal reached in July 2015 required Iran to cap its nuclear program in exchange for lifting of sanctions against it.

Iran has complied significantly reducing its nuclear infrastructure. It’s important to note that the implementation of the JCPOA began January 16 after the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) certified that Iran was meeting all its obligations under the deal. Other parties to the agreement – Russia, the UK, China, France, Germany and the European Union – have largely lifted the sanctions since the deal became effective. Non-nuclear sanctions have also been dropped, partially ushering Iran back into the global economy.

After taking office, Donald Trump may continue signing waivers to be reissued every 120 to 180 days or he may change the policy. The waiver related to nuclear sanctions remains in place under the reauthorized ISA but the deal is in jeopardy. US President-elect Donald Trump has said many times that he would scrap the nuclear agreement, calling it the «stupidest deal of all time». He said that dismantling it would be his «No. 1 priority» as president. The deal allows any of the countries that negotiated the deal to cancel it within 30 days, without a vote by the United Nations Security Council, if they flag a violation.

Non-nuclear sanctions related to terror-sponsorship, human rights abuses and ballistic missile activities are intended to remain in place under the JCPOA.

The GOP lawmakers support the idea of introducing new sanctions on Iran over human rights violations and terrorism, including the support of Hezbollah. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, calls for a review of the current policy on Iran.

Iran has threatened to resume its nuclear program if the bill goes through. The Iranian government described the Senate vote as a violation of the agreement. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said recently the extension would be viewed in Tehran as a breach of the nuclear accord and threatened retaliation.

A US Senate vote to extend the Iran Sanctions Act (ISA) for 10 years shows the world that Washington cannot be relied upon to act on its commitments, said Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. Iranian lawmakers said they want to introduce a measure to make the government resume nuclear activity.

Indeed, the prospect of US ultimate withdrawal from the JCPOA is not to be taken lightly. Congress can vote to reintroduce sanctions not waived or vetoed by the new president. President Trump may not renew waivers. The US could merely declare that Washington was no longer bound by the non-binding multilateral agreement based on the UN Security Council resolution. The United States can sneak out of the deal if the Congress overrides a presidential veto of a joint congressional resolution disapproving the JCPOA.

The consequences of Congress stopping the deal would be grave. The deal has the support of European parties to the JCPOA. The US will face a big problem trying to bring them to its side. If not, some sanctions will remain lifted and the West’s unity will be broken. It would put into question the ability of the United States to lead the reshaping of the world order on Western terms, by alienating Washington’s European allies. The move will rob Europe of any illusions about their ally at a time when support for the US is already low. The EU will face a big challenge trying to convince the US and Iran not to leave. It will have a slim chance to succeed.

Russia and China will adhere to the JCPOA provisions. Defying other global powers will make Washington the odd man out while the rest of the world would continue to trade with Iran.

Slate cites Jeffrey Lewis, an expert on nuclear nonproliferation at Middlebury College and founder of the Arms Control Wonk blog, who says, «If the unity of the countries that negotiated the deal falls apart, all of the safeguards that the IAEA has put in place under the deal will go away.» According to him, «The IAEA access will drop, and they will say that they are no longer in a position to verify the peaceful nature of Iran’s program. They just won’t have the access. You could end up with a situation in which there are no sanctions, and we have no idea whether they’re building a bomb or not. And by the time we figure it out, it might be too late.»

As a party to the Iran deal talks, Russia is a member of the Joint Commission established to monitor the implementation of the agreement and resolve any disputes that may emerge. As such, it can influence the process of compliance. Moscow has the right to co-decide on the sanctions imposed by the Security Council and the unilateral sanctions adopted by the United States. This right is envisioned by the JCPOA.

No matter what the US does, Russia retains the right to export weapons to Iran on condition that contracts are reported to and verified by the UN Security Council. It has already sold S-300 air defense systems to Tehran.

A decision to tear up the deal will most certainly provoke Iran into reviving its nuclear weapons [sic] program. It could lead to a regional arms race. Saudi Arabia has already made known its intention to acquire nuclear capability. Israel – a US skittish regional ally – may consider striking Iran – a decision fraught with grave implications.

Donald Trump has said many times his prime goal in the Middle East is ousting Islamic State (IS). This stance has vast support in Congress. Iran is a member of the coalition fighting the extremist group. If the US joins Russia in fighting IS – something the US president-elect said many times he wanted to do – it will need Tehran onside.

* * *

The US Congress has taken a step to destroy a deal enshrined in a United Nations resolution. «Say goodbye to the Iran deal», said Richard Nephew, a former US negotiator with Iran now at Columbia University. «There is very little likelihood that it stays, either because of a deliberate decision to tear it up by Trump, or steps that the US takes which prompt an Iranian walk back.»

The move entails harsh consequences. The Senate vote has undermined the US credibility as a reliable partner. Some of them mentioned above definitely prove that Congress does a disservice to its country reducing its national security and international standing.

December 6, 2016 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | 4 Comments

Will America’s War with Iran Continue?

By Donald Liebich | American Herald Tribune | December 2, 2016

The United States has been at war with Iran for over thirty five years. Sometimes the war has been hot, sometimes cold, sometimes overt, and sometimes covert. Throughout this time period relations between the two countries have been hostile with very little diplomatic contact between officials of the two governments. In 2008, Barack Obama ran against Hillary Clinton on a platform of diplomatic engagement with Iran in opposition to her statements of being able to “totally obliterate Iran”.

Upon entering office, Obama, continuing America’s penchant for coercive diplomacy, doubled down on sanctions against Iran hoping that by causing economic hardship for ordinary Iranians he could pressure Iran to change its policies, particularly with respect to the development of nuclear capabilities. The strategy failed as Iran not only continued its peaceful nuclear development, but in many ways accelerated it. By his second term Obama, prioritizing addressing the nuclear proliferation issue, began negotiations with Iran on the nuclear issue in conjunction with Germany, France, United Kingdom, Russia and China. (EU3 + 3) The negotiations resulted in the signing in July 2015 of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) which limited Iran’s nuclear program in return for removal of economic sanctions. The agreement was endorsed by the UN Security Council in an action that requires member states to carry out the agreement.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has affirmed on numerous occasions that Iran has largely lived up to its obligations under the JCPOA. Obama has taken some executive action to live up the JCPOA by loosening the impact of the sanctions. The administration has approved the sale of aircraft and aircraft parts to Iran by Boeing and this week the US approved a license for Airbus to sell over 100 aircraft to Iran. However, the basic legal structure of sanctions remains in place. Obama has not moved as aggressively as he did in Cuba to increase U.S. business involvement in Iran, a step which would make the nuclear deal more difficult to reverse by engaging the business lobby in the issue.

With the current sanctions authorization legislation set to expire on December 31, 2016, House of Representatives and the Senate passed the Iran Sanctions Extension Act by an overwhelming majorities (419 -1 and 99-0). Opponents of the JCPOA in the U.S. have argued in justifying this action, which is a clear violation of the JCPOA, that Iran has engaged in other “nefarious” activities, such as supporting the Assad in Syria, supplying arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthi tribe in Yemen, developing ballistic missiles and in general resisting U.S. influence in the Middle East. The Senate has said that it will take up this bill in the rump session of Congress in December. Although Obama has indicated that he will veto the bill, the bipartisan support in Congress for sanctions extension means that a veto override is likely. Obama’s best option for preserving the nuclear deal is to fight a delaying action to “kick the can” down the road to the next administration where a Republican controlled Congress may be reluctant to create a big foreign policy problem for President Trump so early in his administration.

As on many issues, it is unclear what President Trump’s position will be on the JCPOA. During the campaign he condemned the JCPOA as a “horrible contract”, but acknowledging that it was a contract, vowed to renegotiate it. Renegotiating the agreement is probably not possible. The JCPOA is the result of complicated, intertwined negotiations over a long period of time. Reopening talks in an atmosphere of mistrust and recriminations likely means that the whole agreement would collapse. A number of senior Congressmen and potential officials in a Trump led government, having received large speaking fees, are closely tied with the Mujahidin-e-Khalq (MEK), an exiled Iranian opposition group with an odd Islamist/Marxist ideology. The MEK, having allied with Saddam Hussein during Iran-Iraq war, has the distinction of being more unpopular in Iran than the U.S. They will push a hard line approach under a Trump administration..

The agreement, however, is not totally dependent on the U.S. Even if the U.S. withdraws from the agreement, Iran, under the administration of President Hassan Rouhani, and Russia, China and the EU have indicated that they will continue to abide by it. As it has in the past, the U.S. will likely use secondary sanctions on European companies to deter them from conducting business with Iran. This strategy will probably not be effective with Russia, India and China who have taken steps to disconnect their economy from the U.S. dominated and dollar denominated neo-liberal economic system. It remains to be seen how U.S. allies in Europe will react to being pressured to act against their own national interest.

The political situation in Iran will also have an influence on how U.S./Iran relations play out. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has said that if sanctions are extended Iran will “respond”. What the response will look like depends, in large measure, on the outcome of the May 2017 presidential elections. Incumbent President Rouhani has maintained a position that engagement with the West will benefit Iran diplomatically and economically. Because sanctions have, in large measure, remained in place and because Iran has been slow to reform its economic system, the benefits have not met public expectations. The opposition have attacked the policy of engagement with the West. Faced with these political threats, Rouhani may be forced to tack to the right and abandon the JCPOA, kick out the IAEA inspectors and expand the nuclear program. In that case the undeclared war with Iran will continue with all of the uncertainties and potential for disastrous consequences.

Don Liebich spent his work career with the US Navy Nuclear Submarine service and Sysco Corp. He and his wife, Marcia, have traveled to the Middle East numerous times in the past ten years. Mr. Liebich has conducted seminars and taught courses on Islam: God and his Prophet, Christian Fundamentalisms, US Middle East foreign policy and Iran. Don & Marcia live in Hailey, ID.

December 2, 2016 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Open Letter to Samantha Power, US Ambassador to UN

By Kaveh L. Afrasiabi | CASMII | October 18, 2015

US Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, has made serious errors of law by insisting publicly that Iran’s recent missile test “was a clear violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1929.” But, this reflects a basic ignorance of the UN-backed Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which clearly states that with the new UN Security Council resolution endorsing the JCPOA, all the previous UN Security Council resolutions on Iran “will be terminated.”

Indeed, it is quite odd, and highly uncommon, that a top US diplomat should display such a grave ignorance of the content of an international agreement that has been endorsed by her government and in effect codified by the UN through the UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which was prefigured and explicitly anticipated by the JCPOA. According to the JCPOA’s “Annex on Implementation” (18.1),

“In accordance with the UN Security Council resolution endorsing the JCPOA, the provisions imposed
in UN Security Council resolutions…1929 (2010) will be terminated.”

In essence, this means that with the passage of Resolution 2231 (July, 2015), all the previous resolutions including 1929 have been rendered moot and, from the prism of UN laws, cannot be invoked by any UN member state, simply because those resolutions have been superseded by the new post-JCPOA resolution. Ambassador Power may need to consult with the law dictionary on the legal definition of “supersede”: Supersede “means to take the place of, as by reason of superior worth or right. A recently enacted statute that repeals an older law is said to supersede the prior legislation.”

Unfortunately, Ambassador Power’s errors are not limited to the careless oversight of the JCPOA’s content and extends to the new UNSC resolution as well. In her public statements denouncing the October 10th Iranian missile test, Ambassador Power has given the erroneous impression that the resolution 1929 “remains valid” until the JCPOA “goes into effect.” The mere fact that resolution 2231 has endorsed the JCPOA, which as stated above renders moot the previous resolutions including 1929, flatly contradicts this position of the US Ambassador, which reflects a serious oversight of the primacy of UN and international law. With the legal significance of resolution 2231 thus escaping her attention, Ambassador Power has clung to an untenable position that in effect makes a mockery of the Security Council and undermines its legitimacy.

According to the veteran US missile expert, professor Theodore Postol of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the US’s claim against Iran is “technical nonsense… We know the White House has made technically false statements about Iran in the past and it is astonishing that the US keeps engaging in this pattern that undermines US’s credibility.”

With respect to Ambassador Power’s categorical claim that Iran’s missile test represents a “violation of its international obligations,” suffice to say the following: First, Iran is among 30 nations in the world today that possess missile technology and no one ever accuses the other nations of flouting international norms and obligations by exercising their right of self-defense through missiles. Second, Ambassador Power has ignored the subtle language of resolution 2231 that imposes an 8-year ban on nuclear-related missile activity on Iran’s part and in Annex B calls upon Iran “not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology.” Even the veteran US nuclear expert Anthony Cordesman has indirectly taken issue with Power’s position by admitting that the language of the new resolution is specific and raises the issue of purposeful design for nuclear warheads.

Indeed, the nub of the problem with the US’s condemnation of Iran’s missile test is that there is no tangible empirical and physical evidence to corroborate the accusation that Iran’s ballistic missiles are designed to be capable of carrying nuclear payload. As various Western nuclear experts have readily admitted, substantial technical modifications are necessary in order to substitute nuclear warheads for conventional warheads on Iran’s missiles. As the US’s own experience with the conventional modifications of the Trident missiles has shown, this is a formidable, and costly, task that requires a nuanced technical conceptualization — that is sadly lacking in the Iran-bashing discourse of Ambassador Power and other US officials who have made a giant leap of faith by misrepresenting Iran’s flight-test of its new generation of Emad conventional missile as “inherently nuclear-capable.” Attaching the latter label is clearly a clever public relations ploy rather than an apt, and sustainable, diplomatic move. Resolution 2231 Revisited Clearly, this resolution remains the new foundation of the UN’s approach to the Iran nuclear issue. The US’s interpretation led by Ambassador Power holds that the resolution requires a complete halt of all Iranian ballistic missile tests. Yet, this is not consistent with, nor mandated by, a straightforward reading of the text. If the Security Council is now poised, as a result of the US complaint, to revisit the provisions of resolution 2231, important evidence and interpretive tools on how that resolution should be read need to be examined. For one thing, the US interpretation omits the drafting history of JCPOA, that triggered the 2231, and was strictly narrow-focused on the nuclear issue and did not extend to the issue of Iran’s conventional arms (and their delivery systems). Also, parallel language in other UNSC resolutions, such as 242, can be used to shed light on the meaning of resolution 2231.

Specifically, this resolution’s nuanced and unambiguous language on the ballistic missiles “designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons” suggests that the text has a fixed meaning, in light of the fact that “designed” is synonymous with a purposeful activity. In fact, what is lacking in the US claim against Iran above-mentioned is a “plain meaning” interpretation of resolution 2231 — that refers to deliberate design of any nuclear-capable missile. There is a full array of UN precedents and opino juris that supports Iran’s position that the resolution’s prohibition on missile tests is not absolute. In other words, the mere allegation that Iran’s conventional missiles can be, technically speaking, converted to nuclear-capable missiles, is not sufficient. By using unambiguous wording, the resolution has clearly implied a distinction between conventional missiles and those that are deliberately designed to be nuclear-capable, yet somehow this important yet delicate difference has evaded the US diplomats, whose arguments are based mostly on an illicit inference, one that generalizes a specific prohibited activity.

But, because Iran’s conventional missiles are not brared under international norms and require flight tests as part of routine upgrade, they do not fall under the prohibitions of nuclear-related tests envisioned in the new UNSC resolution. Any attempt to deprive Iran of its important missile defense capability would not only be illegal, from the prism of international law, it would also be a stab at regional stability, given the crucial role of Iran’s missiles in the context of regional arms race and the imbalances resulting from the sanctions on Iran and the huge arms sales to Iran’s Arab neighbors in Persian Gulf. Iran’s new precision-guided missiles represent a qualitative improvement in terms of the responsiveness, range, speed, precision, lethality, and freedom of maneuver, which cannot possibly be achieved without conducting flight-tests. As important and vital components of the nation’s strategic deterrence, these missiles cannot be put on the UN’s black list simply because a Western superpower might dislike their deterrent value and seek to target them through the UN machinery.

October 18, 2015 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , | 1 Comment

Iran’s Growing Questions About The Sanctions

By Kaveh L. Afrasiabi | Eurasia Review | September 5, 2015

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, has instructed the Parliament (Majlis) to review and vote on the nuclear deal reached between Iran and the world powers in July, and has also questioned the parts of the deal, known as Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that refer to the suspension rather than annulment of Iran sanctions.

Khamenei’s latest statement, raising questions about the JCPOA, comes at a time when various US officials devote most of their energy assuring the skeptics about the “snap back” and the like, instead of clarifying the nature and timeline of their removal of Iran sanctions; this is not to mention the unpleasant language of military threat that has resurfaced in full fury since the breakthrough agreement in Vienna.

With respect to Iran’s parliamentary approval, Ali Larijani, the powerful speaker of Majlis who was recently in New York for an inter-parliamentary meeting, told an Iranian audience that he foresees a more energetic role by Majlis on the nuclear issue in the near future. Larijani, who backs the deal and is considered an important ally of President Hassan Rouhani, will have his work cut out for him, in light of the strong reservations toward the deal by the majority faction known as the Principalists, some of whom have clashed with the members of the negotiation team who have testified at Majlis.

Henceforth, while President Obama has declared victory by securing the Congressional votes that safeguards the nuclear deal from any derailment by the opponents of the deal, the situation in Iran is turning more complicated and casts a cloud of uncertainty on the JCPOA’s future.

One of the thorny issues is the separate agreement between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is confidential and is key to resolving the disputes over the so-called “Possible Military Dimension” (PMD) issues and concerns raised by the agency. Since this agreement is confidential, it is unclear if the members of Majlis will be privy to information about it, which might be essential to their ultimate verdict on the agreement.

According to the head of IAEA, Yukiya Amano, the PMD agreement is moving forward with Iran’s submission of substantial new information, and the issue is set to be resolved before the year’s end, assuming a smooth progress. Should the IAEA press for access to certain military sites, then this would certainly complicate the prospect of PMD’s resolution in the next three months. And since the IAEA’s certification of Iran’s compliance is key to the removal of sanctions, the whole issue has raised concerns in Iran that the IAEA might be manipulated by certain powers to refrain from giving Iran a ‘clean bill of health’ in order to linger the cloud of suspicion on Iran’s head and also to delay the sanctions’ relief, which is badly needed for the struggling Iranian economy, in light of the declining oil prices.

From Tehran’s vantage point, it is imperative that the other side provides further guarantees that it will stick to the terms of its obligations under the JCPOA and avoid bad-faith implementation that would erode the trust-building between the two sides. Tehran is certainly disquieted by the “liberal imperialist” American discourse that reinterprets the JCPOA as a means of “containing Iran” and uses it as a hammer to knock down Iranian power in the region.

The earlier expectations of the JCPOA as a prelude for the normalization of US-Iran relations has been to some extent evaporated, replaced instead by a new mood of mutual hostility — that is disfunctional for the vested interests of both sides, given the potential for incremental improvement and even select US-Iran cooperation on regional issues provided by the landmark agreement. Khamenei has questioned the hawkish anti-Iran pronouncements of US officials and former officials, which some view as directed for “domestic consumption” only, stating that such statements carry consequences and must be rebuffed by Iran.

In light of the above-said, the adoption and implementation of JCPOA faces many hurdles including in Iran, where the coming parliamentary elections have added sprinkles of political factionalism to the issue. While it remains to be seen how the critics of JCPOA inside the Majlis will utilize the green light by the Supreme Leader, what is clear however is that U.S. policy-makers have yet to jailbreak from the confines of “containment” strategy and its binary divisions, as a result of which the prospects for a genuine evolution of Iran-U.S. relations continues to remain suspended.

September 6, 2015 Posted by | Deception, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

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