Tortuous negotiations aimed at laying to rest fears Iran will get nuclear weapons moved into top gear on Saturday as both sides demanded the other give ground as a deadline loomed. “We’re at that point in the negotiations where we really need to see decisions being made,” a senior US State Department official said late on Friday at the talks in lausanne, Switzerland.
“The work is very complicated and difficult. The other side needs to choose between pressure and a political accord,” countered Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. France’s top diplomat laurent Fabius, the most hawkish in the P5+1 group of countries negotiating with Iran since late 2013, will be the first European minister to fly in for the crunch talks.
He will join US Secretary of State John Kerry, Zarif and negotiators from the six powers, chasing an agreement on the broad outlines of a what they hope will be a historic deal by Tuesday.
Since a major diplomatic push to resolve the long-running crisis began in 2013, Kerry and the US-educated Zarif have met multiple times but have twice missed a deadline to nail down an accord.
The powers want Iran to shrink its nuclear programme in order to make any dash to make a bomb under the guise of its civilian atomic programme all but impossible and easily detectable.