Bad reaction in nuke ‘deal’
WASHINGTON — Iran won’t get a final nuclear deal unless it agrees to gradual phaseout of economic sanctions, the White House said Friday — dismissing Iranian calls for immediate sanctions relief.
“It’s very clear and understood that sanctions relief will be phased,” White House foreign policy adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters with President Obama in Panama for the Summit of the Americas. “The fact of the matter is, we have framework. The President has said if the details don’t bear out, we won’t have a deal.”
Rhodes’ pushback came after Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Hassan Rouhani both insisted Thursday that any final nuclear deal cut by a June 30 deadline had to include an immediate end of sanctions.
The framework reached last week says sanctions will be suspended once international monitors verify that Tehran is abiding by the limitations spelled out in the agreement.
In his comments Thursday, Khamenei said that punitive “sanctions should be lifted completely, on the very day of the deal.”
White House officials dismissed the leaders’ stance as a rhetoric driven by internal political pressure.
“They have their own hardliners who are skeptical of this deal,” Rhodes said. “The test of whether or not that framework can be memorialized is not a comment on any given day by an Iranian leader. The test will be if by the end of June we have a document."
Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) called Khamenei’s remarks “a major setback.”
“These differences need to be thoroughly explained by the administration if we are to give serious consideration to this agreement,” McCain said Thursday.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest responded in a tweet Friday.
“Naive and reckless for @SenJohnMcCain to believe every word of the Supreme Leader’s political speech,” Earnest wrote.
The back-and-forth comes as the Senate Foreign Relations Committee prepares Tuesday to vote on legislation that would allow Congress to block a nuclear deal with Iran. Pressed by the White House, Democrats are eyeing ways to weaken the bill through amendments.
It’s very clear and understood that sanctions relief will be phased. White House foreign policy adviser BEN RHODES