If You Liked Baghdad Bob, You’ll Love Iran’s Chief Nuclear Negotiator, Javad Zarif

At the Iran nuclear talks, one of the chief fixtures has been Iran’s foreign minister and chief negotiator, Javad Zarif. He’s the bearded fellow you’ve seen in the endless photo-ops of the murk-shrouded talks. He usually shows up flanked by dignitaries, in various permutations, of the six world powers, including the U.S., who in the current incarnation of the nuclear talks have been haggling with Iran over its nuclear program since cutting an interim deal in Nov. 2013. That was more than 19 months ago, which in terms of the amnesiac modern 24-hour news cycle means they have been talking since pretty much the beginning of recorded time. Zarif does a lot of the talking.

Zarif has kept up with his other chores by jetting back and forth between the nuclear talks, in venues such as Vienna and Geneva, and his appointments elsewhere — such as his pilgrimage early last year to the grave in Lebanon of the late Hezbollah terrorist mastermind Imad Mugniyah, or his chipper meeting in Tehran with an envoy of North Korea (you can read more about some of his travels, to Syria, Moscow, etc., here). Educated in the U.S., Zarif was based for many years in New York as one of Iran’s former ambassadors to the United Nations (where along with his activities at the UN, he secretly abused his diplomatic privileges by overseeing a sanctions-violating multi-million-dollar money-laundering operation in Manhattan for the Iranian government, per orders of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei).

Zarif speaks fluent English — as buttery smooth as Viennese chocolate, but wrapped around an astounding collection of demands and lies. Zarif peddles statements as warped, in their way, as the buffoonish fictions of Saddam Hussein’s old spokesman, Baghdad Bob. Except where Baghdad Bob was patently ridiculous, Zarif is far more dangerous. His statements come with slick packaging, the polished veneer of a regime that has been repeatedly discovered building illicit nuclear facilities and indisputably sponsors terrorism and harbors terrorists. His statements also come framed these days by the eager attentions of  U.S. top diplomats, who appear desperate to cajole Iran into a deal, whatever it takes.

Zarif is now in Vienna, where Secretary of State John Kerry has been parked since June 26, trying to entice Iran to close a nuclear  bargain. Having over-run three self-imposed deadlines since last July, the Iran nuclear talks are nearing a fourth deadline this Tuesday, July 7.  From the negotiators at Vienna’s Palais Coburg, there are hints that this time they might just clinch the deal.

And what kind of a deal might that turn out to be?