Obama breaks new sanctions push, gives Iran extra time and money to produce nuclear weapon(Jpost).
"The president underscored that, in the absence of a first step, Iran will continue to make progress on its nuclear program by increasing its enrichment capacity, continuing to grow its stockpile of enriched uranium, installing advanced centrifuges, and making progress on the plutonium track," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters at a briefing.
WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama personally lobbied key members of the Senate on Tuesday not to move forward with
new sanctions legislation against Iran, just a day before the third round of negotiations begin in Geneva over the Islamic Republic's controversial nuclear program.
The meeting came shortly after Iranian parliamentarians warned that, should new sanctions proceed through the US Congress, Iran would pull its diplomats from the negotiating table.
The long, detailed White House meeting focused on the technicalities of the prospective "first step" deal being forged in Switzerland between Iran and the P5+1 – the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, China, France and Germany – and not on
rising tensions between the White House and Israel's government over how best to proceed.
In a prepared statement released after the meeting, the White House said that the discussion, which lasted over two hours, included a lengthy explanation by the president as to why a six-month interim agreement – temporarily halting key aspects of Iran's nuclear program in exchange for marginal sanctions relief – is in the national security interest of the US.
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The President noted that the relief we are considering as part of a first step would be limited, temporary, and reversible, and emphasized that we will continue to enforce sanctions during the 6-month period," the statement read.
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The President is determined to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and firmly believes that it would be preferable to do so peacefully. Therefore, he has a responsibility to pursue the ongoing diplomatic negotiations before pursuing other alternatives."
The White House added that the president "dispelled the rumors that Iran would receive $40 or $50 billion in relief, noting those reports are inaccurate," in a reference to figures first floated by
Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz last week.
After meeting with the president, Senator Bob Corker – the highest-ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – implied that any new legislative push was on hold for the time being.
"Let's face it," Corker said to CNN's Wolf Blitzer. "At the end of the day, there aren't going to be new sanctions put in place" before Geneva. And "Senator Reid has filled the tree," he added, describing the Senate majority leader's ability to prevent new amendments from getting floor time for consideration.
"Congress has no say on the easing of sanctions," Corker added. "The president has full waiver authority."
One source familiar with the legislation told The Jerusalem Post that progress on the new sanctions bill is "unlikely" before December – if at all this year, should negotiators clinch an interim deal this weekend.
But that has not stopped lawmakers in both chambers from urging the Obama administration to toughen the deal, going into talks on Wednesday.
A bipartisan group of senators, many of whom met with the president on Tuesday, wrote to US Secretary of State John Kerry that the deal being considered in Geneva allowed up to $10 billion in sanctions relief - too high a price for too few concessions, they assert.
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While the interim agreement may suggest that Iran could be willing temporarily to slow its pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability, it could also allow Iran to continue making some progress toward that end under the cover of negotiations," the senators wrote. "
This does not give us confidence that Iran is prepared to abandon unambiguously its nuclear weapons pursuit altogether, as it must."
The group included Senators Robert Menendez, John McCain, Bob Casey and Charles Schumer, among others.
Over at the House of Representatives – which already passed its version of the sanctions bill last summer – Congressmen Ed Royce (R-CA), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Eliot Engel (D-NY), Ranking Member of the Committee, sent a letter to the president on Tuesday cautioning against a deal that would allow Iran to continue progressing its nuclear program in any capacity.
"Mr. President, the United States cannot allow Iran to continue to advance toward a nuclear weapons capability while at the same time providing relief from the sanctions pressure we worked so hard to build, and the Administration has worked to enforce," the congressmen wrote.
In his interview with CNN, Corker said that the administration does not see the deal as a "fait accompli" going in to talks on Tuesday, describing the interim agreement as far from certain.
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman flew to Geneva on Tuesday to lead the US negotiating team. Her first meeting on Wednesday will be with EU High Representative Catherine Ashton, the State Department said.
Responding to concerns aired repeatedly and publicly by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that the Geneva deal is shaping up poorly for Israel, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said that it was his "prerogative" to express his opinion as negotiations continued.
"I think you can both respect concerns and also disagree with them," Psaki said. "I certainly don't refute the notion that there's a difference of opinion... One of the reasons we're pursuing this is because of Israel's security."
Psaki said that US diplomats entering the third round of talks were "hopeful about the path forward."
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There's either a diplomatic path, or a path toward aggression. We continue to believe that," Psaki added. "If this does not work, we will be leading the charge for more sanctions."
