5 Problems with the Nuclear Talks with Iran
The Obama administration was forced to punt once again at the talks on Iran’s nuclear program when the Iranians refused to budge on their maximal demands on uranium enrichment and sanctions relief.
When they failed to strike a deal by Monday’s deadline, Iran and the P5 +1 (five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany) extended the negotiations for another seven months, until June 30, 2015.
There are five major problems with the negotiations, as currently structured:
1. Iran has been able to legitimize its once-covert nuclear program.
Tehran has won the acceptance of the P5 + 1 for illicit uranium enrichment activities at Natanz and the heavy water reactor at Arak, capable of functioning as a plutonium bomb factory, that Iran sought to hide from International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors before they were exposed in 2002. Other nuclear proliferators will demand the same lax treatment if they are caught red-handed in the future.
2. Iran has won sanctions relief disproportionate to its relatively minor concessions.
Tehran has pocketed significant economic benefits from sanctions relief, about $700 million per month, as part of the interim Joint Plan of Action. As the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., has noted: “The Obama administration’s Iran nuclear negotiations have done little to advance the security of the United States and our allies, but they have benefited Iran. As these negotiations drag on, Iran continues to enrich uranium, is free to pursue some nuclear-related R&D, and has been handed access to previously frozen assets and an easing of sanctions. At the same time, the United States has received little in return but a promise to keep talking.”
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