Republicans slap Obama over Iran talks extension
Republicans
on Wednesday rebuked President Barack Obama for refusing to walk away
from nuclear talks with Iran after negotiators in Switzerland missed a
key deadline.
The Obama
administration said earlier in the day that talks would be extended for a
second time, to Thursday, after world powers haggling with Iran failed
to conclude a political framework agreement by Tuesday's target date.
Republicans
are seizing on the delay as a new line of attack in their argument that
Obama is willing to sign onto a bad deal and displaying weak
leadership. But the delay could prove a fleeting political moment that
soon ends in an agreement, as negotiators continue to point to signs of
progress.
The GOP critics also suggested that the extension was a worrying sign that Tehran may have the upper hand in the talks.
"Deadlines
have to mean something. When you are negotiating and you have
deadlines, you have to show that you are serious and then walk away from
the table and then come back in a position of strength, not a position
of weakness," Republican Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton told CNN's Wolf
Blitzer.
Cotton
accused the administration of making "very dangerous" concessions on
Tehran's stocks of enriched uranium and future enrichment activity, and
charged that the White House was "kicking the can down the road" and
allowing Iran to get a nuclear weapon in "slow motion."
Cotton
orchestrated a letter from Republican senators last month that warned
Iran's leaders that any nuclear deal could be rejected by Congress or a
future U.S. president.
Republican Sens.
John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who like
Cotton are deeply skeptical of the talks, said Wednesday that the omens
were good.
Iran: Key players in the nuclear talks 9 photos
"It
is clear the negotiations are not going well. At every step, the
Iranians appear intent on retaining the capacity to achieve a nuclear
weapon. "Without significant change, we have little confidence the
negotiations will end well," the two Republicans said in a statement.
The
White House, however, said that as long as progress was being made in
the talks in Switzerland, it would be wrong to "arbitrarily or abruptly
end them."
But White House spokesman
Josh Earnest indicated that "if we are in a situation where we sense
that the talks have stalled, then, yes, the United States and the
international community is prepared to walk away."
But for now at least the waiting game will go on, with no deal for at least another day.
"We
continue to make progress but have not reached a political
understanding," said State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf.
"Therefore, Secretary Kerry will remain in Lausanne until at least
Thursday morning to continue the negotiations."
While
it remained unclear exactly what was going on behind closed doors in
the talks, comments by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif
hinted at the high stakes and possible acrimony.
"There
are obviously problems that have prevented us from reaching the first
stage and finding a solution, and I certainly hope that our colleagues
will recognize the fact that this is a unique opportunity that will not
be repeated," Zarif said. "They need to take advantage of this
opportunity,".
A State Department
official said that "some serious issues remain unresolved. It is still
totally unclear when this might happen, if it happens at all."
While
the focus has been on Tuesday's lapsed deadline, the hard end date for a
final agreement with all technical details resolved is June 30.
Tuesday's
deadline was seen in many quarters as an artificial date put forward by
the U.S. so that Obama could show some tangible progress to skeptical
Democrats, who are threatening to join Republicans in Congress in a bid
to scupper the diplomacy.
The main
points at issue are believed to be the pace at which U.N. sanctions on
Iran will be lifted, how much nuclear research and development Iran will
be able to maintain and whether Iran will ship its stockpile of
enriched uranium out of the country for reprocessing into a safer form.
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