Anonymous officials said Friday that the nuclear negotiations being held in Lausanne, Switzerland, between US Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif may close to reaching some semblance of a deal. The negotiations also include the UK, France, Germany, Russia, and China.
"The sides are very, very close to the final step and it could be signed or agreed and announced verbally," a senior Iranian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters.
While other officials made similar remarks, they also stressed that deal was not yet guaranteed.
"The plan is for the 2-3 page [document] to be made public," one official said, though some aspects would remain confidential.
The West wants to allow Iran to harness nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, while still allowing itself room to prevent Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon. Presumably, such an accord would address many of the key details which would maintain that balance.
One such detail is the number of uranium enrichment centrifuges Iran would be allowed to operate. Iran currently maintains 10,000 centrifuges, and that number has been a point of contention throughout the negotiations. The talks have centered around Iran initially operating a low number of centrifuges, while gradually allowing more if the Islamic Republic proves to be sticking to the agreement.
Exactly how gradual that increase would be is another key point of the talks.
Iran’s underground facility at Fordo has also been hotly debated. Tehran wants to keep the site operational, while Western powers have insisted that the facilities location, deep beneath the surface, makes it too covert.
The lifting of UN sanctions against Iran would also presumably be addressed in the accord.
Under way for 18 months, the negotiations are fast approaching the March 31 deadline for a framework deal. If such an agreement were formed, negotiators would then have until June to hash out a fully-realized, official deal. Even if a framework is reached, there is no guarantee that the technical details would be agreed upon by the June 30 deadline.
