“It’s pretty hard-nosed.” He’s seeking to persuade skeptical lawmakers that the deal is in the U.S. national security interest.
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If congress rejects the agreement now, it would be “a great big green light for Iran to double the pace of its uranium enrichment, proceed full speed ahead with a heavy water reactor, install new and more efficient centrifuges, and do it all without the unprecedented inspection and transparency measures that we have secured”, he said.
The work that we’ve done with respect to sanctions now offers Iran a choice.
But Kerry, peering wearily over a pair of wire-rim glasses, encountered a tsunami of skepticism from Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, during a marathon four-and-a-half-hour hearing.
On April 6, he said, “Under this deal, you will have anywhere, anytime, 24/7 access as it relates to the nuclear facilities that Iran has”.
The deal still faces a vote in Congress, although it is unclear whether Republicans and some Democrats who object to the deal will actually be able to override the decision – and Obama has threatened to veto any attempt to reject the accord.
Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, a Republican presidential candidate, said the “next president is under no legal or moral obligation to live up to” the deal, which he described as “terrible”.
He says “the deal is not built on trust”. James E. Risch of Idaho.
“The agreement conveyed this message to the world: Never threaten an Iranian anymore. Iran’s path is a path of moderation”.
In his opening statement, a noticeably combative and defensive Kerry shot back against critics of the deal, claiming that any agreement in which Iran would have “completely capitulated “a “unicorn scenario” and a “fantasy”.
More than that, he said, “he is the only president who has developed a weapon capable of guaranteeing that”.
Iran’s procedures for ratifying the accord are not known in any detail.
In Jeddah, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told reporters that his country hoped the deal would curb rather than expand “Iran’s interference in the region’s affairs”.
This was not the impression the Obama administration left in April, after the White House announced it had the framework for a deal with Iran.
Iran denies the nuclear program aims to produce weapons.
Obama’s achievement in bringing together a coalition to force Iran to the negotiating table can not be understated, and the resultant deal is too important to be destroyed by Republicans who have no viable alternative to diplomacy save a war nobody wants to fight but them. The agreement restricts Iran’s development of advanced machines for developing nuclear fuel for 10 years, but those restrictions fall away gradually after that. But even head U.S. negotiator John Kerry might not know what’s in the side deals.
Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz(moh-NEES’) is defending the Iran nuclear deal saying it is “pretty hard-nosed” and wasn’t what Tehran had envisioned in the final deal. Officials in President Barack Obama’s administration have promised to share the contents of those documents in a classified setting.
Hollande “expressed the wish for Iran to contribute positively to the resolution of crises in the Middle East”, it added.
Kerry was testifying publicly on Capitol Hill for the first time since the UN Security Council on Monday unanimously endorsed the Iran agreement, paving the way to the lifting of punishing economic sanctions.
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Kerry reached the agreement with Iranian Foreign Minister Javid Zarif, as well as other foreign diplomats.
