Baku, Azerbaijan Mar. 31
By Umid Niayesh, Khalid Kazimov - Trend:
No real prediction can be made of the ongoing talks' outcome between Iran and the P5+1 group over the Islamic Republic's disputed nuclear program, Iranian expert Reza Taghizadeh said.
Even those who involved in the negotiations can not make forecasts, Taghizadeh told Trend March 30 while responding a question about possibility of reaching a comprehensive nuclear deal in the remaining hours to the March 31 deadline.
Foreign ministry officials from Iran are in intense talks with counterparts from the UN Permanent Security Council, P 5+1 (the US, UK, France, Russia, China, and Germany) to hammer out a deal on Tehran 's nuclear program.
The sides have set an end-March deadline to reach a political understanding of the case before they make a comprehensive deal by July 1. The ongoing talks are currently being held in Lausanne, Switzerland.
"I believe that the talks are very volatile, so much so that even the negotiating officials themselves do not have any idea if they will be able to sign a deal by the deadline," Taghizadeh asserted.
Taghizadeh noted what is obvious is that it will cost much less for each and every side of the negotiations in the short run if they do not reach an agreement.
"It is highly detrimental to the US President Barack Obama's administration if the talks go on like this," Taghizadeh, said, adding that on the other hand, regional states such as Israel and Saudi Arabia disagree with the negotiations per se.
"Nonetheless, the excessive demands made by Iran have restricted the US side," he said.
By the end of their deadline, the sides want to have a two-three page document in which they would clarify how many centrifuges Iran can operate, how the country will cooperate with IAEA inspectors, and how far the Islamic Republic is from developing a nuclear bomb, the expert observed.
"While the Obama administration cannot pledge to Iran to remove all the sanctions overnight, conservatives in Iran worry about their own side affairs," he said.
The expert also touched upon the regional problems which effect the Islamic Republic saying the battle in Iraq's Tikrit city against the Islamic State (IS) group has come to a halt, in Yemen, Saudi Arabia has practically entered the war against the Iran backed Shiite rebels.
On the other hand Israel threatens to carry out cyber-attacks even if an agreement is made here," he added.
Thaqizadeh further stated that it is not legally possible for the sanctions to be lifted overnight, because some of them were instated in 1996 for reasons other than the nuclear case and, moreover, the sanctions have been put to vote and passed in the EU and the UN Security Council.
In the meantime, the Iranian negotiation team cannot take any feasible step because as negotiators, they lack the authority to give or take advantages, the expert said, adding that the Iranian diplomats are only bearers of prescriptions that they are required to implement.
Of the 35 sanctions imposed on Iran, the U.S. put in place 25 and the UN and EU five each. The motivation for the U.S. sanctions imposed on Iran during a period from 1979 to 2012, includes a vast range of topics; including abusing human rights inside the country and Syria, supporting and sponsoring the terrorism, money laundry and its nuclear program.
Edited by CN
Umid Niayesh is Trend Agency's staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @UmidNiayesh
