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Iran Nuclear Deal

How Biden Helped Hardliner Raisi Win Iran Election

June 23, 2021 Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies, Popular Resistance. , , , ,
It was common knowledge that a U.S. failure to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal (known as the JCPOA) before Iran’s June presidential election would help conservative hard-liners to win the election. Indeed, on Saturday, June 19, the conservative Ebrahim Raisi was elected as the new President of Iran.   Raisi has a record of brutally cracking down on government opponents and his election is a severe blow to Iranians struggling for a more liberal, open society. He also has a history of anti-Western sentiment and says he would refuse to meet with President Biden. And while current President Rhouhani, considered a moderate, held out the possibility of broader talks after the U.S. returned to the nuclear deal, Raisi will almost certainly reject broader negotiations with the United States.

Iran Says US Has Yet To Offer Enough Sanctions Relief

May 8, 2021 Dave DeCamp, AntiWar.com. , , ,
The fourth round of talks aimed at reviving the Iran nuclear deal kicked off in Vienna on Friday. Iran’s top negotiator said he believes the US is “serious” about returning to the agreement but that it has not yet offered adequate sanctions relief. “The information transferred to us from the US side is that they are also serious on returning to the nuclear deal and they have so far declared their readiness to lift a great part of their sanctions,” Iranian negotiator Abbas Araqchi said. “But this is not adequate from our point of view and therefore the discussions will continue until we get to all our demands,” Araqhi added. Over in Washington, President Biden was asked if he believed the Iranian side was serious about reviving the JCPOA.

The Leaked Zarif Tape: What Western Media Heard And What He Actually Said

May 7, 2021 Navid Zarrinnal, Mintpress News. , , ,
Tehran, Iran - On April 25, the Saudi-funded and U.K.-backed “Iran International” released a leaked audio recording of Iran’s foreign minister, Javad Zarif, in conversation with Iranian economist Saeed Laylaz for what appeared to be an oral history project. Immediately, the three-hour-plus conversation generated a great deal of controversy in Iran and plenty of commentary abroad. In the course of the conversation, Zarif spoke about his diplomatic posts, before and during the Rouhani administration, and his future political ambitions (or lack thereof). He ruminated on his relationship with President Hassan Rouhani, the late General Qasim Soleimani, and the leader of the Islamic Republic, Sayyid Ali Khamenei. He also highlighted his political philosophy on Iranian sovereignty and on international relations, as he discussed relations with the U.S., Russia, and Saudi Arabia, among other nations.

For JCPOA Re-entry, Biden Must Tear Down This Sanctions Wall

April 15, 2021 Tyler Cullis and Trita Parsi, Responsible Statecraft. , , ,
It was clear from the outset: Returning to the Iran Nuclear Deal was not a matter of nuclear technicalities or diplomatic savvy. It was and remains primarily a matter of political will and political capital.  Though all eyes will be on the start of formal talks in Vienna this week, the real test will take place in Washington D.C. where President Joe Biden must muster the political will to tear down the “sanctions wall” his predecessor put in place for the sole purpose of preventing an American return to the nuclear agreement, lest the talks in Vienna will be for naught.  With only two months left until the Iranian elections, Washington and Tehran find themselves in agreement on at least one issue: There is no time for a lengthy negotiation on how the two can return to full compliance with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the JCPOA).

Meeting To Revive Iran Nuclear Deal Begins In Vienna

April 7, 2021 Telesur English. , , ,
The Joint Commission of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)—the Iran nuclear deal—resumed talks in Vienna on Tuesday, with the lifting of sanctions on Iran and nuclear implementation measures at the center of the agenda. Representatives from Iran, China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the European Union met for an hour. Although not at the session, the US envoy remained a few meters away from the venue, which was understood as a gesture of willingness to rescue the agreement. Several participants qualified the meeting as positive, including Russia's permanent representative to international organizations in Vienna, Mikhail Ulyanov, who stressed the "success" of the meeting.

No Talks Needed For US Return To Iran Nuclear Deal

April 3, 2021 Oleg Burunov, Sputnik News. , , ,
Last month, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei announced that Tehran is in "no hurry" to return to its obligations under the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, and is prepared to wait until the US lifts its illegal sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has stated that a possible US decision to rejoin the 2015 nuclear deal, also known asthe Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), does not require any talks. Speaking to the deal's remaining signatories during a virtual meeting on Friday, Araqchi added that "Iran will suspend its steps [scaling back compliance with the deal's terms] as soon as [US] sanctions are lifted and this is verified".

Is Biden Committing Diplomatic Suicide Over The Iran Nuclear Agreement?

February 17, 2021 Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies, Popular Resistance. , , ,
As Congress still struggles to pass a COVID relief bill, the rest of the world is nervously reserving judgment on America’s new president and his foreign policy, after successive U.S. administrations have delivered unexpected and damaging shocks to the world and the international system.    Cautious international optimism toward President Biden is very much based on his commitment to Obama’s signature diplomatic achievement, the JCPOA or nuclear agreement with Iran. Biden and the Democrats excoriated Trump for withdrawing from it and promised to promptly rejoin the deal if elected. But Biden now appears to be hedging his position in a way that risks turning what should be an easy win for the new administration into an avoidable and tragic diplomatic failure.

Nuclear Agreement: Biden Wants To Strike A ‘Better Deal’ With Iran

January 29, 2021 Ekaterina Blinova, Sputnik News. , , ,
Washington re-joining the Iran nuclear deal, formally known as the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), won't happen overnight and will require consultations with Israel and Gulf states, signalled then Secretary of State-designate Tony Blinken during last week's confirmation hearings. Former US President Donald Trump withdrew from the multilateral agreement in May 2018, prompting the Islamic Republic of Iran to gradually roll back its commitments on uranium enrichment since 2019. Now that Joe Biden has assumed office, Tehran is calling upon the White House to make the first step and lift all sanctions on Iran "unconditionally", warning against "extracting concessions" from the Islamic Republic...

Iran Wants The Nuclear Deal It Made

January 23, 2021 Mohammad Javad Zarif, Foreign Affairs. , , ,
The new administration in Washington has a fundamental choice to make. It can embrace the failed policies of the Trump administration and continue down the path of disdain for international cooperation and international law—a contempt powerfully evident in the United States’ decision in 2018 to unilaterally withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal, that had been signed by Iran, China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the European Union just three years earlier. Or the new administration can shed the failed assumptions of the past and seek to promote peace and comity in the region.

Assassination Strengthens Iranian Hardliners

November 30, 2020 Medea Benjamin and Ariel Gold, Consortium News. , , ,
Israel used all four years of Trump’s presidency to entrench its systems of occupation and apartheid. Now that Joe Biden has won the U.S. election, the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist, likely by Israel with the go-ahead from the U.S. administration, is a desperate attempt to use Trump’s last days in office to sabotage Biden’s chances of successful diplomacy with Iran. Biden, Congress and the world community can’t let that happen.   On Friday Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, was assassinated in the Iranian city of Absard outside of Tehran.

The NYT’s Trump Iran ‘Attack’ Story

November 23, 2020 Ben Armbruster, Responsible Statecraft. , , ,
The New York Times published a major story this week, reporting that President Trump recently sought options for a military strike on Iran’s nuclear program in response to a new International Atomic Energy Agency report finding that Iran had significantly increased its stockpile of low-enriched uranium.  The utility of this leak cannot be understated, given that a military attack on Iran in the waning days of the Trump administration would not only be an enormously costly endeavor (to put it mildly), but, as the article notes, it would all but derail President-elect Biden’s stated intent to rejoin the 2015 nuclear agreement and engage diplomatically with Iran on that and other issues. 

Hands Off Iran

October 24, 2019 The US Peace Council. , , ,
Deeply concerned and distressed, we raise our voices against the increasing tensions in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman, and express our opposition to war against Iran and the extensive propaganda aimed at justifying it. Since the September 11 catastrophe, the neocons in control of the United States Government, in pursuit of their strategy for total world domination, have expanded the power and military presence of the United States in the regions that are critical to securing their domineering position. They have been attacking and invading countries that have been resisting their strategic plans; now targeting Iran after having caused extensive destruction in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria. The Trump administration has unilaterally withdrawn from Iran Nuclear Deal in violation of UN Resolution 2231...
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