Iran: Sanctions Bills in Congress Threaten U.S. Diplomacy as Iran Appears to Accept Uranium Deal
I had lunch this week with a labor union organizer from Iran seeking support for the rights of workers in Iran. One of his biggest fears was that the implementation of additional sanctions would serve the interest of Iranian leadership making the case for foreign intervention as the reason for solidarity across all sectors in Iran. While it may appear that factions in Iran are sharp and irreconciliable there is a clear warning that movements in the direction of reform, and the well-being of the Iranian public, would be severely affected by new sanctions. Jim Fine's assessment below extends that analysis and provides background we should have in hand on the state of the sanctions legislation in Congress. Mark C. Johnson
From Jim Fine at FCNL:
The Senate's approval by voice vote January 28 of a new Iran sanctions bill (S. 2799) poses a serious challenge to the Obama administration's policy of diplomatic engagement with Iran in both the immediate and long-term future.
The bill now goes to conference where Senate and House leaders will negotiate to reconcile differences with a bill passed by the House in December. The administration must decide how strongly to press lawmakers to change provisions in the bills that would prevent the U.S. from gradually easing sanctions in the future in response to positive actions by Iran.
The importance of avoiding crippling restrictions on U.S. diplomacy was underscored this week by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's announcement that Iran was prepared to accept a deal to ship most of its enriched uranium out of the country in return for the future delivery of fuel rods for a Tehran reactor that produces medical isotopes. Iran agreed to the U.S.-proposed plan last October but later backed away after the deal was caught up in Iran's domestic turmoil, with reformers opposing the plan and others, including President Ahmadinejad and the chief of the Iranian armed forces, supporting it. If Ahmadinejad's Feb 2 announcement leads to implementing the deal, it could set U.S.-Iran relations on a course to resolve concerns over Iran's nuclear program and achieve increased cooperation between the U.S. and Iran, including on Iraq and Afghanistan.
One of the most restrictive provisions of the Iran sanctions legislation moving through Congress is a measure in the House version that would prevent the president from easing economic sanctions until he can certify that Iran has ceased "nuclear-related activities, including uranium enrichment." Iran has a right under the non-proliferation treaty to enrich uranium and most analysts say that a realistic agreement with Iran would include continued Iranian enrichment in return for intrusive international inspections. Legislation making it impossible to lift sanctions as long as Iran enriches uranium could prevent future agreement with Iran.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has said he would consider changes sought by the administration, and a State Department official has pledged to "work constructively with conferees as they work on the final version of this legislation," but the administration has so far not made clear how hard it will press for changes.
New questions about the direction of the Obama administration's Iran policy were raised, moreover, by its announcement last week that it was deploying anti-missile defenses in the Persian Gulf and neighboring Arab states. Some observers have seen the move as a reversion to the policy of the Bush administration and expressed fear that it could provide Iranian hard liners with a pretext to move decisively to crush the Iranian reform movement.
For more on Congress and Iran sanctions see posts by Jim Fine and Jim Cason on the FCNL 2C blog site.
