Tehran Treaty: Winners and Losers in Geneva Nuclear Deal

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/how-the-nuclear-deal-with-tehran-could-change-the-world-a-936620.html



The Geneva nuclear treaty with Tehran offers the West new opportunities and could change the world. But secret documents suggest it is the hardliners in Iran who stand to profit the most from the new opening. The clear losers are Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Tehran Treaty: Winners and Losers in Geneva Nuclear Deal
By SPIEGEL Staff
December 02, 2013 – 12:16 PM

Rarely has an international agreement triggered such widely divergent reactions as the Iran deal reached in Geneva, with proponents touting it as a solution to the world's problems while opponents paint doomsday scenarios. Still, it is only a temporary, six-month deal.

Russian President Vladimir Putin called it a "breakthrough." United States President Barack Obama said that for the first time in years "we have halted the progress of the Iranian nuclear program. And key parts of the program will be rolled back."

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An enthusiastic crowd all but crushed chief negotiator Mohammad Zarif upon his return to Tehran, after a deal had been reached with the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany. The foreign minister deserved a gold medal for his diplomatic skills, the Iranian newspaper Arman Daily wrote enthusiastically, noting that the world had come a step closer to global peace "without Iran having to abandon its principles."

The deal evoked a completely different reaction in Saudi Arabia and Israel. Abdullah al-Askar, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the influential Shura Council, spoke darkly of what he called Iran's "evil agenda." Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fumed that the deal was a "historic mistake," saying: "the most dangerous regime in the world has taken a significant step toward attaining the most dangerous weapon in the world."