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TOP STORIES
President Donald Trump plans to tell Congress this month
that the Iran nuclear deal is not in America's national interest, but
he will stop short of urging lawmakers to reimpose crippling economic
sanctions on Tehran. The move would put both Iran and European allies
on notice that the Trump administration will insist on a new
agreement with Tehran to address what it sees as shortcomings in the
original 2015 deal, especially the fact that key restrictions on
Iran's nuclear program will end in 10 years, sources familiar with
the administration's deliberations told Foreign Policy. Additionally,
the administration is concerned about Iran's destabilizing role in
the region, and especially its continued development of long-range
missiles.
Officials say President Donald Trump is planning to
deliver an Iran policy speech next week, and he is expected to say
that the landmark 2015 nuclear deal is no longer in the U.S. national
security interest. U.S. officials say the White House has tentatively
scheduled Trump's speech for Oct. 12 in Washington. The officials
spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to
publicly discuss planning for the event. Trump faces an Oct. 15
deadline to notify Congress whether Iran is still complying with the
nuclear accord and that the deal serves American interests.
The Trump administration is expected to announce next
week that it will not formally certify Iran as in compliance with the
landmark nuclear agreement, a move that could kill the agreement and
set the stage for Congress to reimpose harsh economic sanctions on
the Islamic Republic, according to multiple U.S. officials and
sources familiar with the situation... The final nail in the coffin,
these sources said, was the recent admission by the International
Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, that it cannot fully assess whether
Iran is working on sensitive nuclear explosive technology due to
restrictions on inspections and specific sites in the Islamic
Republic. This disclosure has roiled congressional opponents of the
deal and is said to have finally pushed the Trump administration to
stop certifying Iran as in compliance with the deal, a decision which
must be made by Oct. 15.
UANI IN THE NEWS
Former Independent Sen. Joe Lieberman told Newsmax he is
urging the president "not to recertify" the Obama
administration's controversial deal with Iran. "Every 90 days
that the agreement stays on the book is not in the national security
interests," said Lieberman, who caucused with the Democrats and
was the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee. He now heads a
bipartisan group known as "United Against a Nuclear
Ira[n]"... [R]emember - all foreign businesses want to do
business with the U.S.," Lieberman told me, "and it might
be wise to limit the ability of foreign countries to do business in
this country when they business with Iran."
(03:38 - 04:02): Yes, tensions are high. There's a lot
of speculation the President will decertify the nuclear deal, but
that doesn't necessarily mean the United States is withdrawing from
the deal. It essentially kicks the can to Congress and Congress, if
it decides to reimpose the nuclear-related sanctions on Iran, that
would basically be an abrogation of the international agreement.
IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL
Should Trump walk away from the deal? Probably not. But
he should make its 90-day continuance contingent on implementation of
all parts of the deal, no matter what objections the Kremlin may
voice, and on the rapid inspection of Iranian military bases where
nuclear weapons work might continue. Not only the deal is at stake, but
the IAEA's relevance. At the same time, he must prepare for the day
that Iran either walks away from the deal, or the JCPOA sunsets.
Because, far from eliminating Iran's pathway to a bomb, Obama and
Kerry simply kicked the can down the road. Alas, the U.S. and Iran
are heading far more quickly to its dead-end than diplomats blinded
by projection, wishful thinking, and the temptation of trade realize.
As a candidate, President Trump denounced the
"catastrophic" Iran nuclear deal and vowed to tear it up.
He gets his next chance in 10 days - but evidence is mounting that he
won't do so. Yet he's not leaving it perfectly intact, either.
Multiple reports say he's pursuing a middle strategy: Decertifying
Iran's compliance by the Oct. 15 deadline, but urging Congress not to
reimpose sanctions lifted by the accord - not yet, anyway. Then Team
Trump will work with both Congress and Europe to bring new pressure
on Tehran to strengthen the deal.
The International Atomic Energy Agency describes the
transcontinental monitoring program it operates as the toughest and
most technologically advanced inspections regime put in place to
prevent a country from developing an atomic bomb. But some Trump
administration officials and outside experts argue that the
organization - the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency - is not
inspecting Iranian facilities aggressively enough. And they say that
the 2015 agreement, under which Iran accepted limits on its nuclear
activities in exchange for relief from crippling sanctions, has not
reined in its provocative behavior elsewhere - including testing
ballistic missiles, imprisoning Americans and allegedly arming Shiite
Muslim rebels in Yemen.
President Donald Trump will be presented with multiple
options regarding the future of the Iran nuclear deal ahead of an
Oct. 15 deadline to certify whether Tehran is complying with the
pact, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Wednesday.
Like an all-too-proud father rejecting a teacher's
legitimate criticism of his child, former Secretary of State John
Kerry is defending the U.S.-led global nuclear agreement with Iran
that he engineered from the legitimate concerns of Iran-watchers in
the Trump administration, Congress and the private sector... Kerry's
defense isn't convincing, however. He splits hairs, disregards facts
and lowers the bar for judging the controversial agreement, to which
the P5+1 (the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and
Germany) and Iran agreed in July of 2015 and which took effect the
following January.
The question is not whether President Trump should
decertify President Obama's farcical Iran nuclear deal. Of course he
should. Indeed, he must: Even if we set common sense to the side,
federal law requires it. Instead, there are two questions. 1. Why has
President Trump recertified the deal, not once but twice?...And what
about that second representation: vital to the national-security
interests of the United States?
It may be too soon
to say with certainty what President Trump is going to do in respect
of the nuclear deal with Iran. It's not too soon, though, to express
the hope that the report late this morning is accurate - that the
president has decided to decertify Iranian compliance with the deal.
That would be the most encouraging foreign policy development of Mr.
Trump's presidency so far.
European governments fear a concerted effort to persuade
Donald Trump to continue to certify the Iran nuclear deal may have
failed and are now looking for other ways to try to salvage the two
year-old agreement. European lobbying efforts are now focused on
Congress which will have two months to decide - in the absence of
Trump's endorsement of the 2015 deal - whether to reimpose
nuclear-related sanctions.
European countries will do their utmost to preserve a
deal limiting Iran's nuclear program despite misgivings by U.S.
President Donald Trump, a senior European Union diplomat said on
Wednesday. "This is not a bilateral agreement, it's a
multilateral agreement. As Europeans, we will do everything to make
sure it stays," Helga Schmid, secretary general of the EU's
foreign policy service, told an Iranian investment conference in
Switzerland's financial capital.
U.S.-IRAN RELATIONS
After more than nine months in office, President Donald
Trump finally has an Iran policy. Last month before the opening of
the U.N. General Assembly, Trump approved the long-awaited strategy
to deal with Iran, according to administration officials. These
officials tell me it will outline a new aggressive approach to
countering Iranian threats all over the globe and endeavor to use the
leverage of Trump's threats over the Iran nuclear deal, or Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action, to spur U.S. allies to begin to address
its flaws.
CONGRESS & IRAN
A key U.S. senator long opposed to the 2015 nuclear
agreement with Iran offered a path for President Donald Trump to
distance himself from the accord without immediately quitting it,
imposing new sanctions or carrying out military action. Arkansas
Republican Tom Cotton, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said
Trump should "decertify" Iran's compliance with the
agreement in a report required by Congress every 90 days and next due
on Oct. 15. That, Cotton said, would let Congress develop a list of
demands that the president could press European allies who are part
of the accord -- and oppose abandoning it -- to accept.
As Congress faces a possible fight over the future of
the Iran nuclear agreement, European ambassadors and officials from
President Barack Obama's administration are making their case for
preserving the pact directly to U.S. lawmakers. The British, French,
German and European Union ambassadors to the United States will
participate later on Wednesday in a meeting on Capitol Hill with
Democratic senators organized by the Senate's number two Democrat,
Richard Durbin, congressional aides and embassy officials told
Reuters.
The top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee urged US President Donald Trump on Wednesday to remain in
the Iran nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan
of Action (JCPOA), and not decertify Tehran's compliance without any proof
the regime is not holding its end of the bargain. Taking such action,
Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland said, would constitute a US violation of
the 2015 landmark pact in which the US removed sanctions against Iran
in exchange for it rolling back its nuclear program.
A group of over 180 Democrats led by Reps. Ted Deutch
(Fla.) and David Price (N.C.) sent a letter to President Trump on
Wednesday urging him to re-certify the Iran nuclear accord to Congress
ahead of the Oct. 15 deadline. The letter, signed by all of the House
Democratic leadership, says that decertification of the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) could "embolden" Iran
and compromise the international effort to contain the country's
nuclear development.
BUSINESS RISK
After the international nuclear accord in 2015, European
and Iranian businesses have worked to expand previously prohibited
trade and investment, but tens of billions of euros in deals are
being slowed down because of political uncertainty and financial
issues. US President Donald Trump is threatening to decertify the
pact ahead of a congressionally mandated October 15 deadline to
report on Iran's compliance. That would give Congress 60 days to snap
back sanctions that were lifted as part of the Joint Comprehensive
Plan of Action (JCPOA), the accord signed in 2015 by Iran and six
world powers.
President Donald Trump is threatening
to "decertify" the 2015 agreement that froze Iran's nuclear
program - and if he follows through, it could hurt Boeing. The U.S.
aircraft maker has an agreement to sell 80 new planes to Iran Air and
another 30 to Iranian carrier Aseman. The total value of those deals
is about $20 billion dollars.
SANCTIONS RELIEF
A top Irish senator said an economic delegation from the
European country will take a trip to Iran shortly, in what he
described as the first concrete step toward developing bilateral
trade ties. "We are already engaged in cooperation with Iran on
the export of agricultural equipment and medicine and technology
sharing, which we intend to increase," Denis O'Donovan, chairman
of the upper house of Irish Parliament, was quoted as saying by
IRNA.
MILITARY MATTERS
We're here today because Iran is in the process of
spreading its military and political influence across the Middle East
to a greater extent than ever before. How is it achieving this?
Tehran has found an economical and sustainable means of resourcing
its expansion -- the so-called Iranian Foreign Legion. This formula
works for one simple reason: At little cost, Iran can take poor,
enthusiastic young men from Arab countries and Afghanistan and throw
them into the meat-grinder of the region's wars. Instead of risking
its own people, Iran has hit on an alternative way of putting boots
on the ground. This will increasingly allow Tehran to "fight to
the last Arab" or "the last Afghan" in its regional
wars, because these casualties bear no political repercussions in
Iran. This is a capability that cannot be allowed to develop any
further because it is a potential war-winner -- against America, our
allies in Iraq and Yemen and Syria, and even against Israel
IRAQ CRISIS
The presidents of Iran and Turkey say their countries
will take steps to ensure that borders in the region remain unchanged
following last week's independence referendum in Iraq's autonomous
Kurdish region. "We will not accept changing borders in the
region," Iranian President Hassan Rohani said in Tehran on
October 4 at a joint news conference with his Turkish counterpart,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "Turkey, Iran, and Iraq have no choice but
to take serious and necessary measures to protect their strategic
goals in the region," he also said.
Iran and Turkey should prevent Iraq's Kurdistan region
from declaring independence, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei said on Wednesday after meeting Turkish President Tayyip
Erdogan in Tehran, state TV reported. Relations have generally been
cool between Shi'ite Iran and mainly Sunni Turkey, a NATO member. But
both have been alarmed by the Iraqi Kurds' vote for independence last
month, fearing it will stoke separatism among their own Kurdish
populations.
Iran and Turkey will work together to confront the
disintegration of Iraq and Syria to ease tension in the crisis-hit
region, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday after
meeting with his Turkish counterpart in Tehran. "We want
security and stability in the Middle East ... the independence
referendum in Iraq's Kurdistan is a sectarian plot by foreign
countries and is rejected by Tehran and Ankara," Rouhani told a
joint news conference with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.
Less than two months after Iran's Chief of General Staff
Maj. Gen. Mohammad Hossein Bagheri paid a rare official visit to
Ankara, his Turkish counterpart, Gen. Hulusi Akar, visited Tehran on
Oct. 2 to meet high-ranking Iranian officials and discuss bilateral
and regional issues. However, although the two generals' meeting in
Ankara was more focused on finding a common ground in Syria, their
encounter in Tehran was shadowed by a more urgent and crucial issue,
namely the Sept. 25 independence referendum in Iraq's Kurdistan Region.
Akar's Iran visit, which began two days before Turkish President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Oct. 4 visit to Tehran, came as the two
countries are trying to arrive at a coordinated policy on how to deal
with the Kurdish issue.
Iran devoted enormous energy to try to prevent Iraqi
Kurds from holding their Sept. 25 independence referendum, accusing
the Kurdish leadership of recklessness and endangering the stability
of the region. Having failed in that endeavor, officials in Tehran
are now at a loss as to what punitive measures they can realistically
take to punish the Kurds without causing further instability on their
doorstep. As the pressure mounts on Iraqi Kurds following the
plebiscite in which nearly 93% of voters cast ballots in favor of
seceding from Iraq, Iran as a historical ally of the Iraqi Kurds
appears to be hesitant to take extreme measures against its western
neighbor, fearing further instability that could easily spill over
into Iran's own Kurdish areas. Nonetheless, Tehran has taken some
half measures against the Iraqi Kurds, seemingly mainly for domestic
consumption.
DOMESTIC POLITICS
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had nothing but contempt for
the ordinary citizens of Iran. In his own words, he saw them as
"ignorant, incomplete and imperfect". Such was his contempt
for those he was destined to enslave that he described them as
nothing more than brutes, who would eventually destroy each other if
left to their own devices... With Iran facing significant economic
issues such as inflation, unemployment, renewed sanctions, and a
severe lack of housing, the regime continues to plunder the people's
wealth, making billionaires out of many of the country's leaders, and
the military budget under so-called moderate Rouhani rising to $285
billion. Billions of dollars that should be earmarked for building up
Iran's economy is being frittered away in a mad rush to acquire new
weaponry and not for providing food and shelter for those in need.
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