Iran Live: Decoding the Signals from the Nuclear Talks
Saturday, April 6, 2013 at 6:50Iran Snap Analysis: No Advance in the Nuclear Talks on Friday
Friday's Iran Live: Nuclear Talks Resume in Kazakhstan
1942 GMT: Nuclear Watch. The American attempt to put the spin on the outcome of the nuclear talks has now emerged.
A "senior U.S. official" told reporters that, despite the failure to make any advance, there was no breakdown in nuclear negotiations and that diplomacy would continue.
The official said Iran could be subjected to more economic sanctions in the future, as Western governments seek to step up pressure, but he also claimed that there were some positive signs in the two sets of Almaty discussions in February and April: "Our exchanges were more natural and free-flowing than they had been in the past talks."
1931 GMT: Nuclear Watch. Part of the significance of the outcome of the nuclear talks in Kakakhstan --- an apparent suspension, if not breakdown of the discussions --- is that little is being said in the Iranian press tonight.
Reports merely echo the line of lead negotiator Saeed Jalili that Iran "provided a comprehensive operational plan" to 5+1 Powers, who must now decide how to respond.
Alongside that lack of comment is a second instance of intervention to "kill" a story.
There is a telling difference in the two cases, however. This morning, authorities stepped in to quash a neutral line in favour of optimism over developments (see 0550 GMT).
Tonight the process went the other way. An MP's declaration in ILNA that Iran proposed a six-month shutdown of its Fordoo plant and a suspension of 20% enrichment --- if true, a major shift gesture to the "West" --- has been removed.
A screenshot of the story:
1646 GMT: Nuclear Watch. Back from a break to find no further development --- in particular, no news in Iranian press --- beyond the announcement of the lead negotiator of the 5+1 Powers, Catherine Ashton, of the effective suspension of nuclear talks with the two sides "far apart" (see 1344 GMT).
Russia’s lead negotiator at the talks, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, also made a statement: "Unfortunately, we failed to achieve a breakthrough. We’re still on the threshold.”
1634 GMT: All the President's Men. Joanna Paraszczuk writes....
President Ahmadinejad's right-hand man and likely Presidential candidate, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, has sparked fevered comment with a reference to the Supreme Leader's call for Iranians to make the new Persian year "The Year of Political Epic", saying that it was the Persian poet Ferdowsi who had written Iran's great literary epic.
The remark is seen by some as a not-so-veiled jibe at the Supreme Leader and also a nod towards the "deviant current, which has angered hard-liners, of religious nationalism espoused by Ahmadinejad and his followers.
Mashaei referred to Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, considered Iran's national epic, which tells of pre-Islamic mythology and history before Persia's conquest by foreign rulers: "The Iranian nation understands the epic very well, and the history of the Iranian nation is intertwined with that epic."
Mashai is not the first member of the "deviant current" to refer to Ferdowsi. In March 2012, Ahmadinejad argued that Ferdowsi not only saved the Persian language when he wrote the Shahnameh, but also saved Islam by putting the "burden of the faith onto the shoulders of the Iranian people". Those comments caused outrage among senior clerics, who accused the President of both ultra-nationalism and belittling the role of the clergy.
1344 GMT: Nuclear Watch. After five sessions of discussions, the lead negotiator for the 5+1 Powers, Catherine Ashton, has announced that the two sides are "far apart" and that she is going home with no agreed follow-on meeting.
Ashton said she will be soon in touch with her Iranian counterpart, Saeed Jalili, on how to proceed.
1316 GMT: Nuclear Watch. Negotiations --- unexpectedly --- will continue between Iran and the 5+1 Powers this evening after a break, the fifth session of the weekend.
1233 GMT: All the President's Men. The Iran News Network website, affiliated with the Government, reported on Friday that text messages containing the last name of President Ahmadinejad’s right-hand man, Esfandiar Rahim Mashai, were blocked.
The filtering was reportedly removed several hours after the story was published.
It is not clear who ordered the block.
1154 GMT: Nuclear Watch. A breakthrough in the talks? BBC Persian's Bahman Kalbasi reports via Twitter:
MP in Tehran: "#Iran has offered to suspend 20% enrichment & temporarily shut down Fordo as a goodwill gesture"
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) April 6, 2013
@bbckasranaji deputy head of the Iranian parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Committee Mansur Haqiqatpur told ILNA.
— Bahman Kalbasi (@BahmanKalbasi) April 6, 2013
0938 GMT: Election Watch. Tabnak, close to Presidential candidate and former Revolutionary Guards commander Mohsen Rezaei, has reacted to comments by Mohammad Reza Bahonar, fellow candidate and Deputy Speaker of Parliament, condemning the November 2011 attack on the British Embassy in Tehran as "illegal".
Bahonar had told a press conference about the attack by "Basij students": "We do not approve of illegal behaviour in the country, regardless of where it stems from."
Tabnak noted that Bahonar's remarks had received attention in the English-speaking press, including the "enemy" BBC --- so much attention that, "at first glance, one would think a member of Iran's [nuclear] negotiating team had slammed the attack on the British Embassy!"
The site said Bahonar's answers in the press conference raised the question of whether he will be the final choice for the traditional right in the elections --- the article claimed that Bahonar's faction had announced they would introduce an alternative.
0931 GMT: Nuclear Watch. The morning session of the nuclear talks has adjourned for prayers and lunch.
No details have agreed, but the two sides have agreed to another session this afternoon.
0649 GMT: The Battle Within. Tabnak, close to Presidential candidate Mohsen Rezaei, accuses "politicians" of undermining the Iranian currency to raise Government income.
Tabnak quotes Kazem Jalali, the head of Parliament's Research Centre, that the stop-gap, three-month Government budget was approved in March out of "desperation and coercion". Jalali said there was disagreement over the amount of money allocated to public development projects, and that another issue was the funds allocated to targeted subsidies.
0643 GMT: Nuclear Watch. Laura Rozen of Al Monitor reports that the Iranian delegation has not met with Catherine Ashton, the lead negotiator for the 5+1 Powers, but also separately with French and Chinese representatives before this morning's plenary session:
Official:#Ashton, the Chinese & French met bilaterally with the #Iranians this AM. just now the plenary started. #Almaty
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) April 6, 2013
0550 GMT: Nuclear Watch. We begin this morning with an analysis of the apparent lack of progress --- and, indeed, claims by some Western officials of retreat --- in the first-day discussions between Iran and the 5+1 Powers (US, Britain, Germany, France, China, and Russia) in Kazakhstan.
And we are already hard at work trying to pick up signals from today's encounters and manoeuvres.
For example, Iranian media --- including Press TV and Fars -- are putting out the optimistic line that talks have started early, with 5+1 negotiator Catherine Ashton and Iranian counterpart Saeed Jalili meeting before the plenary session.
A curious development, around a report by the Iranian Students News Agency, reinforces that line.
In its initial post this morning, ISNA had featured the Iranian line --- maintained on the eve of the talks and throughout yesterday --- that the West must work with the Iranian proposals, rather than insisting on their own. It quoted a member of Iran's negotiating team as saying the 5+1 should take a constructive approach to the Iranian proposals, with its "countermeasures and weighted steps".
ISNA reported that Jalili and Ashton discussed the two sides' positions in the last negotiating session on Friday, reviewing the progress of the discussions.
ISNA also noted that today's talks will resume 90 minutes later than planned --- at 0545 GMT --- because of the Ashton-Jalili session.
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