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NUKEWARS
IAEA chief fails to reassure US senators on Iran deal
By Michael Mathes
Washington (AFP) Aug 6, 2015


Israeli president warns of isolation over row with US on Iran
Jerusalem (AFP) Aug 6, 2015 - Israeli President Reuven Rivlin warned Thursday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's fight with Washington over the Iran nuclear deal threatens to leave the Jewish state isolated.

US President Barack Obama vigorously defended the agreement with Tehran on Wednesday and singled out the Jewish state as its only public opponent.

"I am very worried by the battlefront (that has opened up) between Obama and Netanyahu and by relations between the United States and Israel," Rivlin told the Maariv daily.

"The prime minister is leading a campaign against the United States as if we were equals, and that is liable to hurt Israel," he said.

"We are to a large extent isolated in the world at the moment... I'm not a pessimist but for the first time I see that we are alone."

Rivlin told Haaretz daily: "I say to him (Netanyahu) and I'm telling him again that disputes, even where they are just, can at the end of the day turn out to be at Israel's expense."

The interviews, marking the completion of Rivlin's first year in office, were conducted before Obama's speech, his spokesman said.

Netanyahu has not responded publicly to Obama's speech at the American University in Washington. His office declined comment when contacted by AFP on Thursday.

He has previously said the deal will not block Iran's path to nuclear weapons and that the lifting of sanctions will allow it to further back proxy militants in the region, including enemies of Israel.

Netanyahu on Tuesday made a direct appeal to US Jewish groups to fight the agreement, while hitting out at "disinformation" over Israel's trenchant stance against it.

Obama pointedly refused to meet Netanyahu when he travelled to Washington in March to argue against the deal before the Republican-dominated US Congress.

US must seize chance to 'win trust' of Iranians: Zarif
Tehran (AFP) Aug 6, 2015 - Iran's foreign minister on Thursday called on the United States to "win the valuable trust" of Iranians after the "historic opportunity" created by Tehran's nuclear agreement with world powers.

"It would be best to seize this historic opportunity to win the valuable trust of the Iranian people, which has been damaged through decades of hostile and wrong policies by the United States," Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a statement.

He was speaking after President Barack Obama told US lawmakers on Wednesday that rejecting the nuclear deal would lead to war and destroy Washington's credibility.

"Congressional rejection of this deal leaves any US administration that is absolutely committed to preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon with one option: another war in the Middle East," Obama said.

"Many of the same people who argued for the war in Iraq are now making the case against the Iran nuclear deal," he added.

Zarif said US intervention in the region had proved harmful.

"The previous US governments have wasted great opportunities by their false beliefs," he said.

The use of "threats of coercion as a foreign policy" would "result in nothing but a waste of American resources and (damage to its) reputation," he added.

"It's high time that this dangerous and harmful behaviour, which belongs to past centuries, be put away."

Iran and the United States, along with Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia, recently struck a deal meant to ensure Iran's nuclear programme could not produce a bomb.

The deal, that rewards Iran with a lifting of crippling sanctions, must be reviewed and approved by lawmakers in the US and Iran before it can be implemented.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Bob Corker said lawmakers left a Wednesday briefing by the head of the UN nuclear watchdog agency "less assured" about the nuclear deal with Iran.

"The majority of members here left with far more questions than they had before the meeting took place," Corker told reporters after an hour-plus briefing by International Atomic Energy Agency director general Yukiya Amano.

"I can say from my perspective that it left me far less assured."

Amano traveled to Capitol Hill in a bid to assuage growing concern in Congress, where lawmakers will be voting in September on whether to approve the nuclear accord between Iran and world powers.

In particular, he was to address two confidential side deals the IAEA signed with Tehran.

Washington has described the side deals as "technical agreements," which are believed to include a deal about Iran's documentation of the alleged "previous military dimension (PMD)" of its nuclear program.

Iran in July granted the IAEA tightly-controlled "managed access" to its military bases as part of the accord.

The IAEA agreement is aimed in part at resolving suspicions about Iran's military facility at Parchin, where US lawmakers, citing intelligence reports, say Tehran conducted past nuclear work.

- Issue of IAEA access key -

Lawmakers have aired concerns about Iran's military capacity, and in particular what kind of access the IAEA would have to Parchin.

"We can not get him to even confirm that we will have physical access inside of Parchin," Corker said of Amano.

The IAEA chief told reporters he recognized the frustrations, but said he "explained that my legal obligation is to protect safeguards confidentiality."

Should Congress approve the joint comprehensive plan of action and it goes into effect, Amano stressed, "the nuclear activities of Iran will be reduced in size, and we'll have the most robust verification regime in Iran."

The top Democrat on the panel, Senator Ben Cardin, said it was important for members of Congress to at least be able to see key portions of the IAEA-Iran agreements.

"I thought today was helpful, but it was not a substitute for seeing the document," Cardin told reporters.

"I think there's previsions in the document that relate to the integrity of the review of the PMD that would be useful."

Senate Republican David Perdue, a member of the committee, emerged frustrated at Amano's lack of detail.

"The number one question we had was, are we going to get access to the two side agreements, and the answer was 'no'," Perdue told AFP, describing the nuclear deal with Iran as "troubling."

Meanwhile Wendy Sherman, undersecretary of state for political affairs, testified to the Senate Banking Committee that she has read the side agreements and would share key details of them later Wednesday in a classified briefing to senators.

- 'Gullible and naive' -

Republican Senator Ted Cruz slammed the Iran accord after attending part of Sherman's briefing.

"This Obama-Iranian nuclear deal is a bad deal, and it keeps getting worse," he told reporters.

Cruz, also a White House hopeful, said the details revealed in the briefing "produce no comfort or security whatsoever."

"This deal is not materially different from simply calling the Iranian supreme leader, asking if they're developing nuclear weapons, and taking his word for it when he says no," he said.

"The idea that we would trust Iran to inspect their own facilities takes a level of gullibility and naivete that exceeds the standards even of the Obama administration."

Obama meanwhile nominated a senior White House adviser as the US envoy to the IAEA.

Laura Holgate -- a special assistant responsible for weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and threat reduction -- was named to go to Vienna.

The IAEA will play a key role in monitoring Iran's nuclear activities under the deal, which relieves Iran of sanctions in return for curbs on the country's enrichment activity.

Iran must report on the possible military dimensions of its past nuclear program to the IAEA by mid-October


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UN nuclear watchdog chief to meet US senators over Iran deal
Vienna (AFP) July 31, 2015
The chief of the UN's nuclear watchdog will travel to Washington next week to meet lawmakers and discuss a historic deal struck with Iran earlier this month, the Vienna-based agency said on Friday. Yukiya Amano was due to meet members of the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on Wednesday," the International Atomic Energy Agency announced in a statement. "Mr Amano welcomed an invit ... read more


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