The battle over the Iran nuclear agreement is set to move to Washington as the Obama administration begins a three-month campaign to stop the hard-won deal being derailed by congressional US Republicans.
The deal — reached in a Vienna hotel early on Tuesday morning after prolonged talks between foreign ministers — binds Iran, the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China to a series of undertakings stretching over many years. Iran is to dismantle much of its nuclear infrastructure, while the UN, US and EU are to remove a wall of sanctions built around Iran over the last nine years.
Republicans and some Democratic hawks in Congress, who have long argued that there should be no nuclear program on Iranian soil whatsoever, are determined to find ways to sabotage an agreement that they argue seeks to manage rather than prevent an Iranian nuclear program and endangers Israel.
Illustration: June Hsu
The struggle to win over wavering Democratic votes in the Senate is likely to pit some US allies against others. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signaled that he would intervene assertively in the debate on Capitol Hill in an attempt to kill the deal, which grants sanctions relief to Iran in return for its acceptance of long-lasting curbs on its nuclear program. In that debate, Israel is likely to be assisted by the Gulf Arab monarchies.
On the other side, the UK, France and Germany — all parties to the historic agreement — might be called on to support the administration’s argument that the agreement protects America and its friends in the region.
In a statement to coincide with the announcement of the deal, known officially as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), US President Barack Obama said: “I am confident that this deal will meet the national security interest of the United States and our allies. So I will veto any legislation that prevents the successful implementation of this deal.”
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said a new phase had begun in Iran’s relations with the rest of the world, while Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who led his country’s delegation in Vienna, described the agreement as a “win-win” solution, but not perfect.
“I believe this is a historic moment,” he said. “We are reaching an agreement that is not perfect for anybody but is what we could accomplish. Today could have been the end of hope, but now we are starting a new chapter of hope.”
EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini said the agreement would “open the way to a new chapter in international relations” and show that diplomacy can overcome decades of tension. “This is a sign of hope for the entire world,” she said.
Netanyahu, who has faced mounting criticism at home over his handling of the diplomacy around Iran, denounced the deal even before the details had emerged.
Heading a chorus of condemnation from Israeli politicians — including many members of his right-wing coalition — he said the agreement was a capitulation and a mistake of historic proportions. The hardline former-Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman described it as “a total surrender to terror.”
Yesh Atid Party Chairman Yair Lapid said Netanyahu’s campaign over Iran had been a “colossal failure.”
The Obama administration has a few days to present the agreement to the US Congress, which then has 60 days to review it. Another 22 days is set aside for an initial vote, in which the US Republican majority is likely to reject the deal and then a second vote in which there is a presidential veto.
The US Republicans have to win over just a handful of US Senate Democrats to ensure a congressional vote of disapproval is not blocked by a filibuster. They would have to peel off 12 Democrats or independents to override Obama’s veto, an uphill task.
US Republicans were vociferous in denouncing the JCPOA.
One of the party’s presidential hopefuls, former US governor Mike Huckabee said: “Shame on the Obama administration for agreeing to a deal that empowers an evil Iranian regime to carry out its threat to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ and bring ‘death to America.’”
Other US Republicans echoed the near apocalyptic rhetoric consistently used by Netanyahu in denouncing the deal.
The Democratic frontrunner, former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, supported the deal, calling it “an important step which puts a lid on Iran’s nuclear programs.”
However, Democratic US Senator Chuck Schumer, who is likely to become the Senate minority leader, was non-committal. He said he would “go through this agreement with a fine-tooth comb... Supporting or opposing this agreement is not a decision to be made lightly, and I plan to carefully study the agreement before making an informed decision.”
Speaking in the Austrian capital, US Secretary of State John Kerry, who led the US negotiating team, said: “If Congress were to veto the deal, the United States of America would be in non-compliance with this agreement and contrary to all of the other countries in the world. I don’t think that’s going to happen. I really don’t believe that people would turn their backs on an agreement which has such extraordinary steps in it with respect to Iran’s program as well as access and verification.”
British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, who was in Vienna for many of the last critical days of negotiations, said the US administration “is confident that it will win the argument with Congress.”
“[The agreement] will give the international community the confidence it needs that Iran will not have the capability to go for a bomb,” Hammond said. “There is an opportunity now for an opening that will allow us to understand each other better, get behind some of the mythology and hopefully create a new dynamic in the region where Iran can play a more constructive and transparent role in regional affairs.”
Hammond said the UK fought hard in the last days of bargaining to ensure an arms embargo on Iran would remain in place for five years, with restrictions on the transfer of missile technology remaining for eight years. Those measures were essential to “reassure Iran’s neighbors in the region.”
Under the terms of the agreement, a UN Security Council resolution is to be passed later this month, codifying the JCPOA, which would be an attachment to the resolution. The agreement, however, would not come into effect for 90 days, allowing time for domestic review processes in Washington and Tehran.
Iran would then take a series of steps to reduce the scale of its nuclear program, which would be verified by the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, which Hammond said had been given “excellent access provisions, so that we can be highly confident that the obligations that Iran is entering into will be complied with.”
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