Was the Iran Deal Threatened by US Sanctions Provisions?

by Peter Jenkins What went wrong? Why were the United States and Iran unable to come to a comprehensive agreement in Vienna on Monday? According to an Iranian source close to the negotiations, the main obstacle was the inability of… Continue Reading →

Security Council Resolutions: Barrier to Iran Nuclear Deal?

by François Nicoullaud Paris, France—This is not the first time that we may have trapped ourselves when drafting UN Security Council (UNSC) resolutions that were intended to trap another country—in this case, Iran. The present situation recalls in some respects… Continue Reading →

Iran Nuclear Talks: Reading the Tea Leaves

by François Nicoullaud Secretary of State John Kerry has a hectic traveling schedule, and this month’s itinerary has been particularly focused on doing everything to ensure a good deal with Iran over its nuclear program is achieved by the deadline of… Continue Reading →

Fall of the Berlin Wall: Looking Back and Forward

by Robert E. Hunter Twenty-five years ago, on “9/11”—November 9th in European date-notation—the Berlin Wall opened and, it seemed, everything changed. Freedom was no longer just an aspiration across much of Europe but a rising reality. The transformation was so… Continue Reading →

Netanyahu and Obama: Name-Calling and its Discontents

by Mitchell Plitnick The obsession in politics and diplomacy with decorum–largely a relic from the past–can easily distract people from the realities of the present. Case in point, the uproar over Jeffrey Goldberg’s latest article in the Atlantic, the headline of… Continue Reading →