Iran Nuclear Deal with World Powers

Iran, world powers aim for final nuclear deal

Iran and world powers embark Tuesday on the Herculean task of transforming an interim nuclear deal into a long-term accord satisfying all sides and silencing talk of war for good.

After a decade of failure and rising tensions, US president has put the chances of such an agreement at not more than 50-50 while Iranian foreign minister has predicted difficult discussion.

It comes after foreign ministers struck a deal in Geneva on November last year of 2013 and saw Iran agree to curb – for six months – some of its nuclear activities in exchange for minor relief from painful sanctions.

The agreement which came  into force on January this year 2014 extends the theoretical break out time needy by Iran which denies seeking the bomb to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon.

In return Iran is due to get over the six months some billion of money in sanctions relief including 3$ billion in assets frozen in overseas bank accounts.

Iran’s nuclear freeze is  only temporary although it can be extended and the bulk of UN and Western sanctions remain continuing to deprive Iran of billions of dollars in oil revenues every week.

Under the comprehensive deal now being sought which the parties aim to conclude and commence implementing by November the powers will want Iran to scale back its activities permanently.

In exchange Iran would see  all UN Security council , US and EU sanctions lifted.

The deal might include the closure of Iran’s facility slashing the number of centrifuges enriching uranium cutting its stockpile of fissile material and altering a new reactor being built Arak.

This plus tighter UN inspections would not remove entirely Iran’s capability to get the bomb but would make it substantially more difficult. According to US president it would be impossible.

But how such a deal goes down  with hardliners in the United States and in Israel, the Middle East’s sole if undeclared nuclear power and also with Sunni Arab monarchies in the Gulf remains to be seen.

I think both sides would be willing to make compromises to meet the bottom lines of the other side. The trouble is that both sides have hard men outside the negotiating room who have to be satisfied.

Iranian President called last week for the talks to be fair and constructive, while Tehran has laid out a series of red lines including refusing to close down any nuclear facilities or to stop medium level enrichment.