Iran nuclear talks resume

April 20, 2015


Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (L) walks in a courtyard at the Beau Rivage Palace Hotel in Lausanne, March 28, 2015. (photo by REUTERS/Brendan Smialowski)

WASHINGTON — Negotiators from Iran and six world powers resume talks in Vienna this week for the first time since the reaching of a framework deal April 2 that has set off debate and some confusion over seemingly conflicting interpretations about the provisional accord.

US and Iran officials have expressed confidence that the understandings reached to date are solid, even as they acknowledge the parties choose to present them differently given domestic political considerations. They also stress there are still a couple issues yet to be resolved, including the timetable for lifting sanctions, and access and procedures for monitoring aspects of Iran’s program under a final deal.

“How sanctions are lessened, how we snap back sanctions if there’s a violation, there are a lot of different mechanisms and ways to do that,” President Barack Obama told journalists at the White House April 18. “Part of John [Kerry’s] job and part of the Iranian negotiators’ job … is to sometimes find formulas that get to our main concerns while allowing the other side to make a presentation to their body politic that is more acceptable.”

In a demonstration of the kind of creative diplomacy Obama recognized as being necessary to conclude a deal acceptable to domestic constituencies on both sides, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif seemingly smoothed over what some interpreted as an Iranian insistence that all sanctions be terminated on day one of a final deal, while distancing himself from a US fact sheet on the framework deal.

“On the day that we agree, we will go to the Security Council and the Security Council will adopt a resolution which will terminate all the previous resolutions and will set the stage for termination of all sanctions,” Zarif told Euronews in an April 17 interview. “This is very clear, there won’t be phased, there won’t be suspensions, it is very clear in the agreement that we announced.”

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