UN Nuclear Watchdog Chief Arrives in Tehran as UK Says Deal 'Close'

Tehran — 

The U.N. nuclear watchdog’s chief arrived Friday in Tehran amid hopes of reviving a 2015 accord between Iran and world powers, with Britain saying a deal was “close.”

The visit by International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi, who was set to meet Iranian officials Saturday, is seen as critical to clinching agreement over a return to the nuclear deal and comes in parallel to negotiations in the Austrian capital to salvage the accord.

Grossi “was received on arrival in Tehran by Behrouz Kamalvandi, spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran,” the Iranian body said in a statement on its website. He is to meet with its chief Saturday.

“This is a critical time but a positive outcome for everyone is possible,” Grossi wrote on Twitter earlier Friday.

The next few days are widely seen as a crunch point for the negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program — the latest round of which started in late November in Vienna.

“We are close. E3 negotiators [are] leaving Vienna briefly to update ministers on [the] state of play,” the head of the British delegation, Stephanie Al-Qaq, said Friday, referring to negotiators from Britain, France and Germany.

She added that they were “ready to return soon.”

Along with counterparts from China, Iran and Russia, they have been taking part in the latest round of talks in the Austrian capital since late November, with the U.S. participating indirectly.

Grossi had vowed earlier this week that the IAEA would “never abandon” its attempts to get Iran to clarify the past presence of nuclear material at several undeclared sites.

Iran has said the closure of the probe is necessary to clinch a deal on the nuclear accord.

Grossi is expected to hold a news conference on his return to Vienna.

Ready to go to Vienna

The EU has been chairing the nuclear deal talks, and the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said Friday that he hoped “to have results this weekend,” while stressing that there was “still work ongoing.”

The 2015 deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was aimed at guaranteeing that Iran’s nuclear program could not be used to develop a nuclear weapon — something Tehran has always denied wanting to do.

It began unravelling when then-U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from it in 2018 and reimposed sanctions, prompting Iran to start disregarding the limits on its nuclear activity laid down in the agreement.

Earlier Friday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said he was prepared to travel to the Austrian capital if a deal was reached.

“I am ready to go to Vienna when the Western sides accept our remaining red lines,” he said in a phone call with Borrell, quoted in a foreign ministry statement.

While Amir-Abdollahian did not define the “red lines,” Iran has repeatedly demanded the right to verify the removal of sanctions and for guarantees the U.S. will not repeat its withdrawal from the agreement.

On Thursday, U.S. State Department deputy press spokeswoman Jalina Porter said negotiators were “close to a possible deal,” but that “a number of difficult issues” remained unresolved.

However, “if Iran shows seriousness, we can and should reach an understanding of mutual return to full implementation of the JCPOA within days,” she added.

Pacific Alliance: Singapore arrives at the Summit in Buenaventura - Cali - Colombia

Nine years have passed since Cali hosted, in May 2013, the delegates attending the seventh summit of the countries that make up the Pacific Alliance to promote protocols and developments in trade, culture, tourism, technology and the environment.

The Pacific Alliance is made up of Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru, and is a mechanism for economic and commercial integration, based on four pillars: free movement of goods, services, capital and people and a transversal axis of cooperation. The group was founded in 2011.

For nine years there have been changes for the deep integration bloc, which held its Summit yesterday at the Bahía Málaga Naval Base, in Buenaventura.

The heads of state of Colombia attended, Iván Duque; from Chile, Sebastián Piñera, and Peru, Pedro Castillo, and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs of Mexico, Marcelo Ebrard.

(Also read: What is behind the crime of indigenous leader Albeiro Camayo?)

The president of Ecuador, Guillermo Lasso, also arrived. His country has been an observer state since 2013, it is not associated, but it hopes to be, after a request since 2018.

Also present were the Foreign Minister and Vice President of Colombia, Marta Lucía Ramírez; the Foreign Minister of Chile, Andrés Allamand; and the Colombian Trade Ministers, María Ximena Lombana; from Mexico, Tatiana Clouthier Carrillo; from Peru, Roberto Helbert Sánchez, and from Singapore, Gan Kim Yong.

During the period in the Presidency pro temporeAccording to President Duque, business expectations of more than 40 million dollars and investment of more than 84 million dollars were achieved.

He added that the efforts to incorporate Singapore and Ecuador were intensified, the number of observer states increased and improvements were achieved in customs and stock exchange procedures.

(Also: Camayo, a man who gave his life to defend his territory and his people)

Within the Alliance, the Bahía Málaga-Buenaventura Declaration was proposed.

At the Summit of the Alliance it was planned, in turn, to formalize the delivery of the Presidency pro tempore from Colombia to Mexico.

Likewise, the presidents and high dignitaries welcomed Singapore as a new partner, the first in the Alliance.

“Singapore arrives with its experience, with its tradition, as one of the main centers of innovation, science and technology on the planet. It also comes with a valuable contribution to the fourth industrial revolution and to enrich the trade and investment relationship, being one of the world leaders in port logistics and foreign trade logistics”, assured the Colombian head of state.

Singapore’s entry is the first recorded in the Alliance’s decade of life and, according to President Duque, above “to mobilize investment and to open up to the trade of the founding countries of the Pacific Alliance. This arrival of Singapore marks a historic milestone, and it is one more step with the prompt arrival of Ecuador as a full member of the Pacific Alliance”.

(You may be interested in: Know where to apply the third dose against covid in Cali)

Duque stated that Singapore means technical cooperation in areas where they are governed by excellence, such as educational quality, technological value-added projects in the industrial sector and the ability to train a relevant workforce, “to take on the challenges of the fourth revolution industry and position Latin America as a programming center and as a consolidated center for goods and services”.

With the entry of Singapore, additionally, the doors to cooperation are opened in various areas such as energy, food trade, the digital economy, infrastructure and urban solutions, port management and logistics and the interoperability of the Single Trade Windows. Exterior.

empowerment of women

At the Summit of the Pacific Alliance, an action plan was promoted, within a period of six months, to promote greater participation of companies led by women in production chains, in such a way as to favor their insertion in the intra-regional and extra-regional trade, with special emphasis on the entrepreneurship of rural women.

This is one of the two proposals within the Alliance that were discussed at the Summit, which takes place at the Bahía Málaga Naval Base, in Buenaventura.

According to Vice President and Foreign Minister Ramírez, the economic empowerment of women is sought.

The second proposal aims to carry out, in those same six months, a diagnosis of public policies at the economic level with a gender approach to identify strategic elements that increase and improve the participation of women, in the face of sustainable economic growth and with equity.

“With the endorsement of the Foreign Ministers and Trade Ministers, this proposal will become a mandate of the Pacific Alliance, which will be in charge of the Gender Technical Group,” said Ramírez.

The senior official highlighted that on December 11, 2020, within the framework of the XV Summit of the Pacific Alliance, held in Chile, the leaders of Colombia, Mexico, Chile and Peru signed the ‘Declaration of the Pacific Alliance on Equality of Gender’, together with the roadmap for the autonomy and economic empowerment of women of this regional integration mechanism.

With this, it seeks to guide the work of the Pacific Alliance in the design, implementation and evaluation of public policies and initiatives, to promote the economic and social development of women in the member countries.

At this Summit, the signing of the Declaration on Strengthening the Creative Economy was scheduled, which will later allow for a roadmap for economic recovery and social transformation in the countries of the Pacific Alliance in this important sector of the economy.

At the same time, in Buenaventura, authorities are looking for solutions to the critical social situation and public order, since more than 700 people were displaced from their homes in Bajo Calima, a rural area of ​​this district, due to the presence of organized armed groups, such as the ‘ Clan del Golfo’ that does not allow the entry of human rights defenders or any State official.

Social leaders make a call from Buenaventura for the Government to speed up the implementation of all the commitments made when there was a civic strike in 2017, among them, that the 400,000 inhabitants of this city have the drinking water that they have been demanding for a service not every three days, but 24 hours.

CALI