Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct. 27
By Dalga Khatinoglu, Trend:
Iran and P5+1 has reached "significant progress" in nuclear talks, but there is still "hard work" ahead, says a member of the U.S. nuclear negotiating team.
Referring to a recent speech by the head of the U.S. negotiating team Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Sherman, U.S. State Department's Persian Language Spokesperson Alan Eyre told Trend on Oct. 27 that as Under Secretary Sherman noted, while considerable progress has been made in the negotiations, there is much hard work ahead before the November 24th deadline.
Speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Sherman said last week that major powers negotiating with Iran have offered it ideas that are "equitable, enforceable and consistent with Tehran's expressed desire for a viable civilian nuclear program."
Referring to Sherman's comments, Eyre said there is "no better chance than between now and November 24th' to reach an agreement. All components of a plan that should be acceptable to both sides are on the table, and the parties have cleared up misunderstandings and have held exhaustive discussions on every element of a possible text."
Responding to some Iranian statements about reaching some general agreements in nuclear talks, Eyre noted there had indeed been significant progress, but that making a distinction between generalities and details in many ways isn't a useful distinction, since agreeing on generalities isn't sufficient, and each detail of comprehensive accord is important." In this regard Eyre quoted from the Joint Plan of Action (aka the Geneva Agreement): "With respect to the final step and any steps in between, the standard principle that 'nothing is agreed until everything is agreed' applies."
Iran and P5+1 (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council comprising of China, France, Russia, Britain, the US Plus Germany) sealed an interim deal in Geneva on November 24,2013 to pave the way for the full resolution of the West's decade-old dispute with Iran over the country's nuclear energy program.
The Geneva deal took effect on January 20 and expired on July 20. However the two sides agreed to extend their talks for four months till Nov. 24 to reach a permanent deal on Iran's disputed nuclear program.
Eyre said that nuclear talks between P5+1 and Iran is in a hard stage despite intense negotiations, and referred to Sherman's recent speech at CSIS when she said "The U.S. hope the leaders in Tehran will agree to the steps necessary to assure the world that this program will be exclusively peaceful and thereby end Iran's economic and diplomatic isolation and improve further the lives of their people."