The Obama administration has been willing to tolerate just about anything from Iran — even cheating — to save talks about limiting the country’s nuclear program, even as the White House rejects growing congressional support for tougher sanctions.
But with the Republicans taking control of the Senate this week, that approach is at risk of breaking down.
Negotiators from the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China are trying to reach a permanent deal with Iran before the second extension of a November 2013 interim deal, which was supposed to last just six months, runs out June 30. Meanwhile, the administration is downplaying reports that Tehran has been cheating on the interim deal as relief from sanctions boosts Iran’s sagging economy.
When Foreign Policy magazine reported a month ago that the United States, citing information from the International Atomic Energy Agency, had quietly accused Iran of illicitly trying to obtain parts for a heavy water research reactor that could produce weapons-grade plutonium, the State Department refused to characterize that action as cheating.
“Iran has kept all of their commitments under the [interim deal],” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said when asked about the report. “We continue to believe that.”
Though the 2013 interim deal does not specifically bar Iran from trying to evade existing international sanctions, the Obama administration publicly said Tehran was committed to “halt progress on its plutonium track.”
In another case, the Institute for Science and International Security examined whether Iran had violated the agreement by feeding uranium hexafluoride gas into a research centrifuge at an enrichment facility at the Natanz nuclear site. The independent, nonpartisan organization concluded in a Dec. 16 final report that the move violated the spirit if not the letter of the interim deal.
The Iranians agreed to stop feeding the centrifuge as part of the agreement reached Nov. 24 to extend the interim deal for another seven months, widely seen as the latest example of Tehran bargaining away something Washington says it shouldn’t be doing in exchange for new concessions from international negotiators.
The tolerant approach to Tehran is fueling a push for new sanctions among lawmakers concerned that the administration has lost the leverage necessary to reach a deal that would prevent Iran from being able to build a nuclear weapon — President Obama’s stated goal and one of the cornerstones of his foreign policy. Though Obama has stiff-armed lawmakers who want to discuss new sanctions, his leverage with them is waning, too, and it appears likely more sanctions will be enacted this year over his veto.
“While the administration appears content to sweep these and other Iranian nuclear violations under the rug as talks continue, I will work with my congressional colleagues to hold Iran accountable and stop its drive to nuclear weapons,” Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., co-author of proposed new sanctions with Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., told the Washington Examiner.
The two senators have been lining up bipartisan support for new sanctions legislation with a goal of building a majority large enough to overcome an expected veto. Their efforts have been boosted by the administration’s seeming willingness to avoid offending Iran or accusing the country of actions that might jeopardize the talks.
“There doesn’t seem to be anything they’re not willing to tolerate,” said Mark Dubowitz, executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and an expert on Iran sanctions.
Administration officials have defended their conduct, even though they admit remaining differences with Iran could prevent a permanent agreement. They say the interim deal has halted Iran’s nuclear progress and even reversed it in some areas, while the sanctions relief, worth $700 million a month, is not enough to heal the country’s ailing economy.
“Our strategy has been underestimated from the beginning,” Vice President Joe Biden said last month.
Administration officials warn that new sanctions would kill the talks, because Iran would see them as a violation of the interim deal. But they may be key to giving the United States needed leverage to get an airtight agreement that prevents Iran from building a bomb.
The interim deal has taken some of the pressure off Iran’s economy, which had spiraled into a deep depression after tough U.S. sanctions were imposed in 2010, Dubowitz said. Nearly two years ago, Iran’s economy was on its back, he said. “Now it’s on its knees getting up to its feet.”
Iran’s theocratic rulers also have done a good job raising their people’s expectations, creating an atmosphere of optimism that the end of international sanctions is inevitable, the New York Times reported.
That is important, Dubowitz noted, because the United States has largely abandoned attempts to coerce Iran into compliance.
“Without any instrument of coercive statecraft, we’re left on the negotiating table with economic sanctions,” he said. And though most of them remain in place, U.S. leverage is slipping because Iran is no longer facing economic collapse.
The administration’s hard line against Congress on new sanctions has eroded U.S. leverage even further, he said.
“While it might have been politically useful on the Hill, I think it eventually undermined their negotiating position.”
