03/31/14 – Tyler Cullis – The Scott Horton Show

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All right.
Our next guest on the show today is Tyler Cullis.
He's with the council.
What is it?
The National Iranian American Council.
Of course, NIAC.
That's niacouncil.org.
And he's co-authored this thing with Trita Parsi here.
It ran at Common Dreams under the name Will U.S. Sanctions Scuttle a Nuclear Deal with Iran?
But it was published all over the place, too.
Just search for Parsi Cullis and sanctions, and you'll find it there.
Welcome back.
Or no, welcome to the show.
Tyler, how are you doing?
Sounding good.
How are you doing?
I'm doing great.
Appreciate you joining us on the show today.
And sorry for making you put that on hold there.
So, hey, very interesting piece that you got here.
Great analysis of the situation as it stands here between nuclear deals with Iran as we're implementing the interim deal and preparing to negotiate the final deal.
And it's the question of these crippling sanctions, the layers and layers of sanctions that have been put on the Iranians by the U.S. and the U.N. Security Council and our allies, et cetera, et cetera.
And as Barbara Slavin was just saying, how might those be wound down and undone?
And it seems like what you're saying is they've passed so many sanctions and they've been implemented in such a way that it may be really difficult, even if Obama can make a deal with the Iranians that satisfies our executive branch's position, et cetera, that he may not be able to promise them the sanctions relief that he would have to be able to promise them in order to get them to make the concessions that he wants or that they're even willing to give if he could lift the sanctions.
Yeah, I mean, that is correct.
I mean, under the Joint Plan of Action, the U.S. is committed to lift all nuclear-related sanctions under a final deal.
We at NIAC asked the question, what constraints have been imposed on the president in being able to lift the sanctions unilaterally without needing Congress's approval?
These are layers and layers of sanctions.
The idea that Congress will revisit the issue every six months to lift sanctions in the phased approach that both Iran and the United States have agreed to do is just not going to happen.
The president needs to be delegated the authority to lift sanctions on a permanent basis alone.
And the way the sanctions, I mean, it almost looks like a design flaw.
It looks like a situation in which Congress simply failed to provide the president the requisite authorities to lift sanctions if and when a deal is reached.
But, you know, if you paid attention to the legislation, you know, from 96 all the way up to 2012, 2013, you know, this was intended.
In 1996, the Iran Sanctions Act was first passed.
Under that legislation, the president was granted waiver powers for 12-month periods.
That was revisited in later legislation, where it was diminished to six-month waiver periods.
And, you know, this is a critical discrepancy that I don't think people are entirely conscious of, which is that the president has broad authorities to waive sanctions on a time-limited basis for six, four-month, six-month, eight-month, 12-month periods.
But he has very limited authorities to terminate the sanctions completely.
He would need to certify things to Congress that go far beyond the province of a nuclear deal, things related to ballistic missiles, things related to state sponsorship of terrorism, things related to security interests of U.S. allies.
And this was designed intentionally to make it very difficult for the president to unilaterally lift sanctions without needing to go to Congress first.
All right.
Well, a couple of things there.
Is there any chance that, first of all, I guess, is there any chance that the Iranians might be willing to say, like, listen, we understand the position that you're in.
At least, you know, make sure that you can lift the ones that are directly related to the nuclear program.
And once we got that out of the way, we ought to be able to work on the rest of this stuff anyway.
So how about that?
You know, you think, I mean, do they have the room politically to make that kind of compromise?
Because as you're saying, there's a lot of other sanctions besides just the ones that are in the name of the nuclear program.
Yeah, I mean, presumably the U.S. negotiators have communicated to the Iranians just what limits are placed upon them, just what they can do themselves and what will need congressional authorization.
And presumably the Iranians understand that it will be politically difficult, especially in the next few years, for Congress to take the kind of action that a deal may require.
Nonetheless, I mean, there's two problems with this.
One is during negotiations.
You know, what the U.S., what the executive has to offer is limited, you know, limited reversible sanctions.
And it does not allow the White House to fully leverage sanctions relief for concessions on Iran's nuclear program.
So you may end up with a situation in which Iran's negotiators look across the table at the Americans and say, you know, if you're presenting us limited reversible sanctions relief, well, we're going to match that limited reversible sanctions relief with limited reversible nuclear concessions of our own.
So it, you know, it raises problems on coming to the terms for a final deal as well.
Now, you know, now if a deal is reached, it presents problems after a deal is reached.
You know, the U.S. is obligated to meet its own commitments, as I spelled out earlier, under the Joint Plan of Action, the U.S. is committed to lift all nuclear-related sanctions, you know, all nuclear-related sanctions.
That's an amorphous term, but, you know, presumably both parties have a sense of what that means.
You know, the best means of ensuring Iran's compliance with a deal is to ensure our own compliance with the deal.
If the president were granted the power to match Iranian actions with U.S. sanctions relief, that deal becomes a strong and sustained one, which is in the interest of both parties and in the interest of, you know, both parties creating a much different relationship than has dominated over the past 35 years.
So, you know, I mean, part of this is, yes, I mean, it will start out with the president offering waivers.
I mean, the president has broad authorities to offer waivers.
From Iran's perspective, though, you know, there has to come a time soon after a deal is reached in which the president is granted much broader powers to terminate the sanctions.
Because from Iran's perspective, we want, you know, Iran's perspective is sanctions relief means that our economy opens up to the rest of the world.
We want international business to come into Iran to help develop the economy.
In order for that to happen, international business, international banks, etc., need to be reassured that the sanctions aren't going to be reimposed six months down the road because parties disagree over how the deal is being implemented.
I mean, that's a big part of this is the willingness of international financial institutions to participate in any kind of commerce in Iran at all because of the uncertainty.
They don't know what's within the rules and what's not.
They might have, you know, like on the Simpsons, you know, shipment of boxes of hot pants or something, but they don't know if that's going to get their bank sanctioned right off the face of the earth by the U.S.
Treasury Department because of a failure to dot an I or even if they do dot all the correct dies.
They don't know exactly what the Treasury Department's thinking about any of this at any given time.
And so they just don't want to participate at all.
Sorry, we can't bring you medicine because we don't want, you know, our bank won't deal with your bank.
So sorry.
Yeah, I mean, this is absolutely the case.
I mean, the most I mean, both parties talk about having a phased out approach.
Presumably the Iranians, the first thing on their menu will be Section 1245 of the 2012 NDAA.
That is the provision that sanctions foreign financial institutions that conduct transactions with basically all of Iranian financial institutions.
So it makes international trade with Iran exceptionally difficult to do because foreign financial institutions have to skirt using the Iranian financial system.
The entire financial sector in Iran is designated and is prohibited from other financial institutions engaging in business with them.
That's why they call them crippling sanctions.
I mean, they really have almost on the levels of the blockade against Iraq in the 1990s, not quite as severe, but pretty close.
They've tried.
Yeah, I mean, and there's a four month waiver provision for that.
I mean, that is the that is the shortest waiver provision in all of the sanctions.
It's four months.
Every 120 days, the president would need to certify to Congress that doing so was vital to the national security interests of the United States.
Now, that 120 days does not provide the confidence for, you know, U.S. and foreign financial institutions to engage in the kind of transactions that Iran will expect.
And, you know, that presents a lot of problems to Iran because Iran expects a benefit from this deal.
And the benefit from the deal is that it is reintegrated into a global economy.
If Iran doesn't see that as part of the deal, it will be very hard to ensure that they're compliant with the terms of any final deal.
And so, you know, part of the thing that needs to happen, you know, there needs to be some outreach to congressional allies.
The White House needs to take this up as well.
Actually, right before the two weeks ago, right before the Vienna talks.
I'm sorry, we got to take this break here.
I'll stop.
The good thing is there's really no law in America.
The president can do whatever he wants so he can reassure the Iranians and show him a thousand examples, too.
Anyway, we'll be right back with Tyler Cullis from the National Iranian American Council right after this.
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All right, guys.
Welcome back.
It's the show.
It's the Scott Horton Show.
I'm talking with Tyler Cullis from the National Iranian American Council at niacouncil.org.
Trita Parsi's outfit over there.
Reza Marashi and them.
And we're talking about these sanctions and how there's so many sanctions on Iran, it's really limited Obama's ability to be able to promise the Iranians that he can lift them.
And I was just going to, you know, I was kind of making a joke out of it, but it really does seem like an important point.
Know that he doesn't even have to really do a waiver.
All he has to do is just not enforce these sanctions and instruct the Treasury that we're not going to enforce these sanctions until I say enforce them again.
And then what's Congress going to do about it?
Impeach him?
I mean, he changes the law with executive orders all the time.
He does whatever he wants all the time.
He killed a lucky 16 year old boy and said, yes.
So what?
I mean, this guy can do whatever he wants in the world.
Certainly, he can make a peace deal over the objections of the Republicans in the Congress.
Right.
I mean, to I mean, he does have the powers to investigate and he could choose not to investigate.
I mean, you recall that when the Iran Sanctions Act was first passed back in 1996, President Clinton did not enforce them.
There is the EU actually threatened the United States with a lawsuit at the WTO.
And under that deal, Clinton promised not to enforce the sanctions.
And their first the first instance of their enforcement doesn't take place until about 2006.
So it's a decade later that the Iran that a provision of the Iran Sanctions Act is actually enforced.
But, you know, there's actually there's actually consequences, even not enforcement.
The consequences were such that you can actually see foreign investment in Iran's energy sector start dwindling from 1996 on because of the expectation that at some point the sanctions could be enforced.
Yeah, I mean, uncertainty is still there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, so the uncertainty creates a lot of problems from Iran's perspective.
And that is a that is a problem that will need resolution at some point, maybe not before a deal, but perhaps after a deal.
The White House actually after right before the last Vienna talks, a senior administration official said that the White House is doing a lot of consultations with Congress on how to unwind the sanctions should a final deal be reached.
Hopefully those consultations continue.
What we would imagine is that Congress would provide the authority for the president to lift sanctions on a more permanent basis than he is presently available.
That would be do the best to both secure Iran's compliance with the deal, but also to offer Iran the incentive to both make a deal with the United States on the nuclear issue and to fulfill its promise.
You know, it is very important that the United States understands that in order to inspire confidence, the confidence required for Iran to make concessions on its nuclear program, Iran has to believe that the United States can live up to its obligations under any deal reached.
And right now that is unclear whether that's the case.
I actually, Tyler, just got off the phone with Barbara Slavin here, and she has this new report today for Al Jazeera, america.aljazeera.com about a trial balloon of a possible final deal here.
And part of it, of course, is, and they've been talking about this for, since before the interim deal was ever signed, I think, which is that one thing that they're going to really insist on is, of course, an end to any enrichment up to 20%, and they want to see the Fordow facility, if not closed, they want to see it converted from any kind of backup enrichment facility to nothing more than, you know, kind of a highfalutin research lab or something like that, that, you know, would be taken out of the equation, in other words, for a possible breakout, that it couldn't be used for such a thing, that kind of a thing.
And the way they describe it in there, you know, turning it into a research facility, that sounds like the kind of thing that that's asking the Iranians to go so far on that issue that that's really not reversible.
You know, that was the way he phrased it before.
That's how you talk about in the article.
If all the sanctions relief on this side is reversible, then they'll probably only be willing to go so far in suspending or downscaling any part of their program to reversible levels themselves.
And yet, anyway, the point I'm trying to make is the contrast here between what they're leaking about what it is that they want to see from the Iranians here, and then what they're up against from their their self-sabotage on this issue with the sanctions relief.
Yeah, I mean, in fact, the Iranian negotiators came into the deal with two principles in mind, and they communicated those two principles to U.S. negotiators, and those two principles that whatever obligations were incurred from both parties, those obligations would be proportional and reciprocal.
So if the United States made certain concessions on its nuclear program, they would be balanced out by Iranian concessions on its nuclear program, you know, same sanctions relief for the same concessions on nuclear program.
So limited and reversible sanctions relief from Iran's perspective and from the attitude Iranian negotiators have brought to the talks will mean limited and reversible nuclear concessions as well.
And that is just not that is just not going to fulfill the appetites of either hardliners in Iran or, you know, certain members of the U.S. Congress, both sides that would rather not see a deal between the United States and Iran.
You know, in order for a deal to actually take effect and take root, it needs to be strong, sustained and secure.
And the best way to do that is to put out meaningful sanctions relief so that Iran, in turn, can produce the kind of concessions on its nuclear program that are amenable to, you know, nonproliferation specialists and the like.
You know, that's the way it has to be done.
Well, as you guys put in the article here, yeah, I mean, as far as proportional and all that, the whole idea of having the sanctions is so that you can lift them.
I mean, that's the whole deal is it's a bargaining position.
Unless the plan is to just reduce all Iranians to desperation for fun or whatever.
Right.
If we're getting our cart before the horse, that kind of thing.
Otherwise, the whole deal is, you know, at least the claim and I don't really buy this, but at least their claim is this is what it takes to drive the Iranians to the table and make them deal.
Well, then, OK, we got to be able to lift them on our side.
Well, so I guess the question then is how steep of a hill is this to climb in Congress?
I mean, are they just there's no way they're going to go along with this because AIPAC says so or the president's going to be able to lead them on it and say, you know, I don't know, how much support does he have for his position, do you think?
I mean, I think there needs to be some outreach to Congress.
I mean, the White House needs to do a little bit more outreach itself to Congress over, you know, where the negotiations are, you know, what the White House thinks will be needed, what does what, you know, authorities will need to be designated to the president should a deal be reached.
You know, there needs to be that kind of consultation with Congress.
So especially allies of the White House in on Capitol Hill understand, you know, something is expected out of us from a final deal.
You know, what is expected out of us?
What is expected out of us is that the president is granted authorities to lift sanctions on a more permanent basis.
You know, it's actually interesting because the report Barbara wrote about this morning actually said that, you know, as part of a final deal, Congress should pass a preemptive AUMF if Iran failed to comply with the terms of a final deal.
You know, and our perspective is, you know, there's something a little almost absurd about this whole, you know, thing.
You know, why is it so much easier for the president to make war rather than to make peace?
You know, if members of Congress are willing to preemptively grant the president the authority to use military force, then, you know, perhaps, you know, the Congress can also grant the president the authority to make peace, you know, to make a deal with Iran that is meaningful and sustained.
And, you know, it secures a new kind of basis for a relationship that has not been a good one for the past 35 years.
You know what?
Even a lame duck like Obama and for all his troubles and all his poll number problems and whatever, when he gets up in the State of the Union and says, hey, your sabotage Iran sanctions, your new round of sanctions that I don't want, I'll veto them, so don't even bother.
All of you back down now.
They all back down, and quick.
And you saw people taking their names off the co-sponsor list, and that was the end of that.
He's the president of the United States.
He's working on a peace deal here.
Congress, get in line, he says once, and they get in line.
Blam.
If he's willing to go that far.
Yeah, I mean, and that's the question from this White House, whether the White House is willing to reach out to members of Congress the way it needs to.
It had not reached out to members of Congress during the entire run-up for the 1881, the new sanctions legislation.
And it wasn't until the State of the Union, I mean, you're totally correct, it wasn't until the State of the Union that the president and the White House decided to do some outreach on the Hill to let them know that, you know, this is hurting our negotiating position.
This hurts the possibilities for us to reach a deal with Iran.
And as we saw, you know, members of the president's own party quickly back down.
And so there needs to be that kind of communication between the president and Congress in order to facilitate, you know, resolution to the issue of sanctions relief.
All right.
Now, well, we sort of got to the Israel lobby there and the AIPAC sanctions.
I saw Josh Block, who is still, I think, unofficial spokesman for AIPAC.
And he was kind of staking out some territory over on Twitter a couple of weeks back, saying that, hey, you know, they could have some form of nuclear program.
Accepting a nuclear program is not the same thing as accepting enrichment.
And now, of course, all the outlines of the deal that have been floated from all sides includes a recognition of their, if not their right to enrich, a recognition of the impossibility of making them stop enriching up to at least 3.6 percent.
That's the compromise.
No 20 percent for your medical isotopes, just 3.6 percent for your electricity.
And the AIPAC, the Israel lobby, their position is no enrichment whatsoever.
Now, I guess my question for you is, presuming that you're up there in D.C. dealing with all these politicos and stuff, is how much of a fight do you think they're willing to put up for this?
Is this a real line in the sand for them?
Are they kind of already resigned to the fact that this is going to happen one way or the other?
I mean, well, I mean, I think what's important to remember is that, you know, to some extent, they're going to have to live with whatever deal is made.
You know, if it is the case that the P5 plus one makes the deal with Iran, you know, the United States is put in an awful position if it chooses to renege on that deal.
You know, part of the strength of the sanctions has been the political solidarity between the United States, the Europeans, Russia, and China.
If the P5 plus one is willing to enter into a deal with the Iranians and the U.S. Congress breaks down that deal, violates the agreement, it is going to be very difficult for them to reimpose the kind of crippling sanctions that they had because the political solidarity will no longer be there.
Russia and China will certainly no longer go along with the U.S. sanctions program.
And what the Europeans do then is up in the air as well.
Right.
All right.
Well, I'm sorry we're out of time.
But thank you very much for your time on the show today.
I really appreciate it.
Thank you so much.
That's Tyler Cullens.
He's at the National Iranian American Council.
That's NIA Council dot org.
Trita Parsi, Reza Marashi and them over there.
Tyler Cullis is his name.
And the article is all over the Internet.
Iran sanctions.
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