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Foreign ministers arrive amid crucial weekend for Iran nuclear talks Foreign ministers arrive amid crucial weekend for Iran nuclear talks
(about 4 hours later)
LAUSANNE, Switzerland — Foreign ministers from nations negotiating a nuclear deal with Iran joined talks Saturday as grim-looking negotiators suggested they are still far from bridging their differences. LAUSANNE, Switzerland — Diplomats from Germany and France joined the United States in frenetic talks with Iran on Saturday, amid indications that negotiations were foundering with only days left before a deadline for an agreement.
Secretary of State John F. Kerry was scheduled to have a working lunch with the French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, who arrived late Saturday morning, and his counterpart from Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier. The foreign ministers from Britain, Russia and China are expected later this weekend. The French and German foreign ministers arrived around midday, in time for a working lunch with Secretary of State John F. Kerry. He updated them on the state of negotiations since he convened the latest round of talks Thursday, officials said. The foreign ministers of Britain, Russia and China were expected to arrive sometime Sunday.
The French and German diplomats made clear that they had come to Lausanne not just to formalize an agreement that was nearing completion but to help with negotiations that are floundering. With a deadline of midnight Tuesday for an agreement scaling back Iran’s nuclear ambitions in exchange for easing international sanctions, the negotiators should be finalizing the last details. Instead, they are far from bridging substantive disagreements.
“I am coming here with the desire to move towards a robust agreement,” Fabius told reporters on his arrival. “We have made progress on certain issues but not enough on others.” The negotiators met, and then regrouped for more meetings in varied configurations — the United States and Iran, then the United States and the Europeans, then the Europeans and the Iranians, then all the parties together. In early afternoon, Kerry took a break for a bike ride.
Steinmeier said the talks are in their “decisive days.” Kerry hinted at the large amount of work to be done. Before he and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz met for a third day with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Iran’s nuclear energy chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, Kerry said they would be working into the evening.
“The endgame of the long negotiations has begun,” he said. “And here, with a view of the Swiss mountains, I’m reminded that as one sees the cross on the summit, the final meters are the most difficult but also the decisive ones. That’s what has to be done here in the coming hours and days. I can only hope that in view of what has been achieved over the last 12 months that the attempt for a final agreement here will not be abandoned.”
Kerry and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz met for a third day with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Iran’s nuclear energy chief, Ali Akbar Salehi. They wryly hinted at the long road ahead of them.
When a reporter asked just before the talks began if they were expecting a good day in negotiations, Kerry replied, “We’re expecting an evening today.”
Zarif, on the other side of the table, chimed in, “Evening, night, midnight, morning.”Zarif, on the other side of the table, chimed in, “Evening, night, midnight, morning.”
The negotiators are facing a deadline of midnight Tuesday for reaching a broad agreement that would outline the conditions for a final deal on limits to Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for easing international sanctions. An interim agreement does not expire until June 30, so they have three more months to iron out many details. Later in the day, Zarif tweeted that Iran was ready to make a deal and suggested that the other parties were not compromising enough for Tehran’s satisfaction.
[A framework? A deal? The semantics of the talks] “In negotiations, both sides must show flexibility,” he wrote. “We have, and are ready to make a good deal for all. We await our counterparts’ readiness.”
Since this round of talks began in earnest almost 1 1 /2 years ago, the negotiators have talked up to the deadlines and beyond, only to conclude by announcing an extension of the interim agreement and a new deadline. President Obama has said there will be no extension this time, although failure to reach an agreement leaves the interim deal intact for three months. If there is no deal, it would be up to Obama to decide what steps to take next. The French and German diplomats made clear that they had come to Lausanne not just to formalize an agreement but also to help salvage negotiations.
The talks are snagged over a number of fundamental “gaps,” including how much nuclear research and development Iran would be permitted and the pace at which international sanctions against it could be lifted. “I am coming here with the desire to move towards a robust agreement,” French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters on his arrival. “We have made progress on certain issues but not enough on others.”
[Obama, Britain’s Cameron warn Congress on Iran sanctions] “Iran has the right to civil nuclear power,” he added, “but the atomic bomb, no.”
Iran wants to continue research so it can modernize its uranium-enriching centrifuges, which use 1970s technology. It insists that its nuclear program is for civilian purposes alone, and its leaders say Islam forbids them to build nuclear weapons. German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said the talks are in their decisive endgame.
Iran also wants to see sanctions eased and lifted fairly swiftly. The United States and its negotiating partners are holding out for a gradual easing of sanctions, linked to the pace at which Iran allows international inspections of its uranium facilities, mines and mills, and otherwise complies with an agreement. Comparing the job ahead with scaling the snowcapped Alps rising from the far side of Lake Geneva where the talks are being held, he added, “the final meters are the most difficult but also the decisive ones. That’s what has to be done here in the coming hours and days.”
Kerry wants to return to Washington with an agreement that the administration can defend before skeptics in Congress, showing that the considerable effort his office has invested in the talks produced a long-lasting, verifiable deal to ensure that Iran does not build nuclear weapons. Hopes for a deal have been raised after months of talks, particularly between Iran and the United States. At almost every round, negotiators have reported making progress.
The United States is adamant that any deal provide a one-year “breakout” time, meaning that, through limitations and open inspections, the agreement ensures that it would take at least a full year for Iran to amass enough weapons-grade materials to build a bomb. Many factors are involved in that, including the number and efficiency of centrifuges, and negotiators say any compromise on one factor requires an offset elsewhere. Though Iran insists its nuclear program is only for civilian purposes, many in the West and in the Middle East fear that Tehran is intent on building nuclear weapons some day. So the negotiators are trying to ensure a one-year “breakout” period, the time they estimate it would take to build up enough material to construct a bomb.
Any deal is expected to last for at least 10 years, although the French want a longer time frame. French diplomats have said they would prefer to keep negotiating even if they do not have an agreement by Tuesday. As long ago as last November, Iranian news sites reported that Tehran had agreed to operate 6,000 uranium-enriching centrifuges, less than a third of the centrifuges they have on hand. But that number is just one factor in determining the breakout time, and is subject to change.
The negotiators also have been discussing how much research and development Iran can conduct for more modern, faster centrifuges, the future use of uranium enrichment facilities at Fordow and Natanz, and the pace at which sanctions will be lifted.
But Zarif told reporters that the parties were still making progress and predicted that they would reach an agreement.
“We’re moving forward,” he said. “I think we can in fact make the necessary progress to be able to resolve all the issues and start writing them down in a text that will become the final agreement.”
Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.
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