October 16, 2013 | Quote

Iranian Official Wants Year to Resolve Nuclear Issue

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif offered Tuesday to take a year to resolve Iran's nuclear standoff with world powers. That is probably too long a time period for the West and Israel, which says Iran is stalling for time to complete its bomb.

Zarif's written offer was labeled “Closing an Unnecessary Crisis, and Opening a New Horizon.” It proposes a three-step plan to settle the conflict “within a year.”

The proposal, details of which were not revealed, is being mulled by a group of nations called the P5+1 (the United States, Britain, France, China, Russia and Germany), which met Tuesday in Geneva for talks with the Iranians.

Mark Dubowitz, executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said Iran's year-long timeline shows Iran realizes it must get relief from sanctions soon. He doubts Iran is negotiating in good faith.

“A year is a good amount of time to rope-a-dope the P5+1, string things along and get to critical nuclear capability and be at or near a breakout capability” by the time a deal is done, he said.

Read the full article here.

Issues:

Iran Iran Sanctions