The New York Times reported that Khamenei posted a statement on his personal website attacking America but approving of the decision to continue negotiations with world leaders on his country’s nuclear program.
“I do not disagree with the extension of the negotiations, as I have not disagreed with negotiations in the first place,” the ayatollah said in speech published on Khamenei.ir.
Western negotiators – the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and Germany (P5+1) – and Iran failed to meet the second deadline for a comprehensive nuclear agreement on Monday, announcing an extension of talks that started last year.
During that time, the parties have operated under an interim agreement that has limited Iran’s production of enriched uranium, imposed stricter international inspections of the current nuclear program and stopped the country from firing up unused centrifuges. In exchange, the United States and European Union have scaled back sanctions on Iran and released portions of frozen assets.
“America is a chameleon, and every day makes new statements,” he said in comments that were to be delivered to an audience of paramilitary Basij forces, according to his website, Khamenei.ir. “It also says different things in public and in private.”
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in his first response to the extension of talks over the country’s nuclear program, said world powers have failed to humiliate the Islamic Republic.
“The U.S. and all the European colonialist countries gathered together and tried everything to bring the Islamic Republic of Iran to its knees, but they couldn’t and they never will,” Khamenei said today, according to state-run media.
Diplomats from Iran and the so-called P5+1 group — the U.S., Germany, France, the U.K., Russia and China — gave themselves until March to come up with a political framework and July to spell out technical steps needed for a final accord.
Where does this leave John Kerry and his reputation in Washington for failing to get a deal?
Although he has never said a deal with Iran would be easy, Kerry has sometimes raised expectations—as he did in September of last year, when he told “60 Minutes” that a nuclear deal might be reached in less than three to six months.
That was fourteen months ago.
In comments from Vienna Monday, Kerry dangled new hope that a long-term nuclear agreement is close at hand. “[I]n these last days in Vienna, we have made real and substantial progress, and we have seen new ideas surface,” Kerry said, expressing hope that a broad framework could be completed in just four more months.
But administration allies are beginning to worry that Kerry is chasing an ever-moving rainbow’s end.
Shortly after the announcement of the deadline extension, GOP Senate foreign policy figures John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte in a joint statement said, “We believe this latest extension of talks should be coupled with increased sanctions and a requirement that any final deal between Iran and the United States be sent to Congress for approval.”
Interestingly, the presidential waiver authorities that are included in the relevant acts have been ratified by the Congress, yet now that Obama is likely to use them, fierce Congressional opposition has emerged.
Under the Joint Plan of Action agreed between Iran and the P5+1, the US should refrain from imposing new nuclear-related sanctions. In January, Obama explicitly threatened a veto on any new Iran sanction bill. Any new sanction bill would be considered as a violation of the JPOA on the part of the United States.
