Your Spring Break Iran Update

So as the title says, it’s Spring Break this week. Not for me, but for my daughter, which effectively means it’s Spring Break for me, too, but not in the fun way. I’m kidding; we’re actually planning on doing a little family traveling this week, which will be fun. The upshot as far as you’re concerned is that this is probably all you’ll be getting from me this week, regardless of how things wind up going in Switzerland.

I feel a little bad for all the folks in Switzerland, actually. I’m sure Switzerland is lovely this time of year, or any time of year really, but the Iranian and P5+1 negotiators are presumably a little too busy to enjoy it. I’m sure US Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz would rather be doing keg stands on some beach in Cancun, you know?

But he’s stuck in meetings to try to beat Tuesday’s firm deadline for hashing out a framework agree–

Oh goddammit.

The optimism that’s seemed to mark the talks over the past week has been, according to Reuters, replaced by as sense of “gloom” among the negotiators, as key issues were still up in the air with the deadline imminent. This is why I’m kind of happy to be leaving town this week; it’s probably going to be kind of a roller coaster. Anyway, the two major outstanding issues that everybody seems to be talking about are the limits that will be placed on Iran’s nuclear research and development in years 11-15 of the deal (15 years seems to be the overall length they’re discussing, with years 11-15 being a “phase” period where Iran will be allowed to slowly ramp its nuclear activity up so long as it’s keeping up its end of the deal) and the procedures by which UN Security Council sanctions on Iran will be lifted.

The second point of contention may be more problematic, as it’s actually a potential source of discord among the P5+1. Russia would like the UNSC sanctions rescinded altogether, so that if Iran is accused of violating the deal and the other UNSC members decide to reimpose those sanctions, that decision could be subject to a Russian veto. Iran, obviously, would prefer that course as well. The US, France, and UK (and probably Germany, though they likely won’t say so publicly) all want the sanctions to snap back automatically if certain conditions are met, which would get around the possibility of a Russian veto. My guess is that China could accept an agreement either way; they wouldn’t mind Russia holding that trump card because Iran is a key energy supplier, but they also really don’t like the idea of an Iranian nuke, should Tehran ever elect to go that route.

Another monkey-wrench was potentially thrown into the talks yesterday, when, as reported by the New York Times, Iran’s deputy FM Abbas Araghchi appeared to put the official kibosh on any plans for Iran to ship all or most of its remaining enriched uranium stockpile to Russia for conversion to reactor fuel. In the NYT’s unparalleled fair and balanced style, reporters David Sanger and Michael Gordon sought comment on the story from two vocal deal opponents, Ray Takeyh (from the Council on Foreign Relations) and Olli Heinonen (formerly of the IAEA and currently with the shady anti-Iran group United Against Nuclear Iran, an affiliation that Sanger and Gordon apparently didn’t see the need to disclose), and that’s it. The size of Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile affects its “breakout time,” so it’s a key component of the metric that the Obama administration has inexplicably made the most important question in how a deal gets evaluated. The more LEU Iran keeps, the fewer centrifuges it can keep operating and still maintain that all-important (I guess) 12 month breakout period, but since the Iranians don’t want to cut their centrifuges past the ~6000-6500 they’re already at, this could create a bit of an impasse.

Contrary to the NYT’s sensationalism, though, it’s probably best not to hyper-ventilate about piecemeal information like this and wait, instead, to see the final framework, assuming one can be worked out. There are other ways to render that LEU stockpile less risky apart from shipping it to Russia (it could be diluted with natural uranium or converted to fuel plates in Iran, for example), and the technical details are less important than the imposition of an inspections regime that ensures that the IAEA will know if the Iranians decide to further enrich that LEU towards something approaching weapons-grade purity.

The same goes for reports that Iran will be allowed to continue running centrifuges at its underground Fordow site, a prospect that has the “Bomb, Bomb Iran” crowd in a bit of a tizzy. Again, the crucial element of any deal is the stringency of the monitoring requirements, so that, if Fordow is being used to enrich weapons-grade uranium, inspectors will be nearly certain to find out (and so that any currently unknown/undeclared enrichment sites, which are a far more likely vector for Iran to get to a bomb — if it wants to do so — than a known facility like Fordow, will be uncovered before things go too far). From what it sounds like, Iran will be barred from enriching any uranium at Fordow and will instead use the facility to enrich medical isotopes (some of which could actually render the centrifuges unusable for uranium enrichment anyway). This allows Tehran to keep the facility going rather than destroying it and appearing to have caved to Western demands, while still taking it out of the nuclear program altogether.

OK, well, barring some huge news or some sudden inspiration on my part over the next 24 hours, I’m out of here until next week. Thanks for reading!