Iran's Zarif criticizes hard-liners for leaks on nuclear talks
In an exclusive interview, Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator criticized those attacking the nuclear deal.
With a new US administration that has not made its opposition to the nuclear deal a secret, Iran’s foreign minister and chief nuclear negotiator Mohammad Javad Zarif took aim at those inside Iran who continue to try to sabotage the implementation of the nuclear deal and reveal contents of his confidential testimonies about those talks.
During the hourlong Feb. 11 video interview with Entekhab website, Zarif said the domestic criticism gave the opposing sides in the nuclear talks the wrong impression that Iran’s negotiators did not have the backing of Iran’s so-called hard-line “resistance” groups and that the negotiators were operating against Iran’s national interests. Zarif continued that the disclosures from his closed-door testimonies to parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission were detrimental to the talks and later the implementation, which he described as even more time-consuming than the deal.
