VIENNA: Iran and world powers will meet in Vienna on Monday to try to salvage their 2015 nuclear deal, but with Tehran sticking to its tough stance and Western powers increasingly frustrated, hopes of a breakthrough appear slim.
Diplomats say time is running low to resurrect the pact, which then-US President Donald Trump abandoned in 2018, angering Iran and dismaying the other powers involved — Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia.
Six rounds of indirect talks were held between April and June. The new round begins after a hiatus triggered by the election of hard-line cleric Ebrahim Raisi in June as Iran’s president.
Tehran’s new negotiating team has set out demands that US and European diplomats consider unrealistic, Western diplomats say.
“Our demands are clear. Other parties and especially Americans should decide whether they want this deal to be revived or not. They abandoned the pact, so they should return to it and lift all sanctions,” an Iranian official close to the talks told Reuters.
Iran’s demands include the dropping of all US and European Union sanctions imposed since 2017, including those unrelated to Iran’s nuclear program, in a verifiable process.
Iran’s foreign ministry ruled out the possibility of direct meeting between Iranian and US officials in Vienna. Talks between Iran and world powers will resume at 1300 GMT on Monday.
In parallel, Tehran’s conflicts with the UN atomic watchdog, which monitors the nuclear program, have festered.
Iran has pressed ahead with its uranium enrichment program and the IAEA says its inspectors have been treated roughly and refused access to reinstall monitoring cameras at a site it deems essential to reviving the deal.
“If Iran thinks it can use this time to build more leverage and then come back and say they want something better, it simply won’t work. We and our partners won’t go for it,” US envoy Robert Malley told BBC Sounds on Saturday.
He warned that Washington would be ready to ramp up pressure on Tehran if talks collapse.
Iranian officials have insisted in the run-up to Monday that their focus is purely the lifting of sanctions rather than nuclear issues. Highlighting that, its 40-strong delegation mostly includes economic officials.
“To ensure any forthcoming agreement is ironclad, the West needs to pay a price for having failed to uphold its part of the bargain. As in any business, a deal is a deal, and breaking it has consequences,” Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani said in defiant column in the Financial Times on Sunday.
“The principle of ‘mutual compliance’ cannot form a proper base for negotiations since it was the US government which unilaterally left the deal.”
Diplomats have said Washington has suggested negotiating an open-ended interim accord with Tehran as long as a permanent deal is not achieved.
Failure to strike a deal could also prompt reaction from Israel which has said military options would be on the table.
“The talks can’t last forever. There is the obvious need to speed up the process,’ Moscow’s envoy, Mikhail Ulyanov, said on Twitter.
West asks whether Iran is serious or stalling as talks set to resume
https://arab.news/6u3ts
West asks whether Iran is serious or stalling as talks set to resume
Trump selects longtime adviser Keith Kellogg as special envoy for Ukraine and Russia
- As special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Kellogg will have to navigate an increasingly untenable war between the two nations
- Trump has criticized the billions that the Biden administration has poured into Ukraine
WEST PALM BEACH, Florida: President-elect Donald Trump said Wednesday that he has chosen Keith Kellogg, a highly decorated retired three-star general, to serve as his special envoy for Ukraine and Russia.
Kellogg, who is one of the architects of a staunchly conservative policy book that lays out an “America First” national security agenda for the incoming administration, will come into the role as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine enters its third year in February.
Trump made the announcement on his Truth Social account, and said “He was with me right from the beginning! Together, we will secure PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH, and Make America, and the World, SAFE AGAIN!”
Kellogg, a retired Army lieutenant general who has long been Trump’s top adviser on defense issues, served as national security adviser to Vice President Mike Pence, was chief of staff of the National Security Council and then stepped in as an acting security adviser for Trump after Michael Flynn resigned.
As special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Kellogg will have to navigate an increasingly untenable war between the two nations.
The Biden administration has begun urging Ukraine to quickly increase the size of its military by drafting more troops and revamping its mobilization laws to allow for the conscription of troops as young as 18.
The White House has pushed more than $56 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the start of Russia’s February 2022 invasion and expects to send billions more to Kyiv before Biden leaves office in less than months.
Trump has criticized the billions that the Biden administration has poured into Ukraine. Washington has recently stepped up weapons shipments and has forgiven billions in loans provided to Kyiv. The incoming Republican president has said he could end the war in 24 hours, comments that appear to suggest he would press Ukraine to surrender territory that Russia now occupies.
As a co-chairman of the American First Policy Institute’s Center for American Security, Kellogg wrote several of the chapters in the group’s policy book. The book, like the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025,” is a move to lay out a Trump national security agenda and avoid the mistakes of 2016 when he entered the White House largely unprepared.
Kellogg in April wrote that “bringing the Russia-Ukraine war to a close will require strong, America First leadership to deliver a peace deal and immediately end the hostilities between the two warring parties.”
Kellogg was a character in multiple Trump investigations dating to his first term. He was among the administration officials who listened in on the July 2019 call between Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky in which Trump prodded his Ukrainian counterpart to pursue investigations into the Bidens.
The call, which Kellogg would later say did not raise any concerns on his end, was at the center of the first of two House impeachment cases against Trump, who was acquitted by the Senate both times.
On Jan. 6, 2021, hours before pro-Trump rioters stormed the US Capitol, Kellogg, who was then Pence’s national security adviser, listened in on a heated call in which Trump told his vice president to object or delay the certification in Congress of President Joe Biden ‘s victory.
He later told House investigators that he recalled Trump saying to Pence words to the effect of: “You’re not tough enough to make the call.”
FBI says bomb threats made against Trump nominees
- “The FBI is aware of numerous bomb threats and swatting incidents targeting incoming administration nominees and appointees,” the agency said
- Elize Stefanik, a Trump loyalist congresswoman tapped to be UN ambassador, said her residence in New York was targeted in a bomb threat
WASHINGTON: Several members of Donald Trump’s incoming administration have received threats including bomb alerts, the FBI said Wednesday, with one nominee reporting a pipe-bomb scare sent with a pro-Palestinian message.
“The FBI is aware of numerous bomb threats and swatting incidents targeting incoming administration nominees and appointees, and we are working with our law enforcement partners,” the agency said in a statement.
Swatting refers to the practice in which police are summoned urgently to someone’s house under false pretenses. Such hoax calls are common in the United States and have seen numerous senior political figures targeted in recent years.
Karoline Leavitt, a spokeswoman for Trump’s transition team, earlier said that several appointees and nominees “were targeted in violent, unAmerican threats to their lives and those who live with them.”
Elize Stefanik, a Trump loyalist congresswoman tapped to be UN ambassador, said her residence in New York was targeted in a bomb threat.
She said in a statement that she, her husband, and small son were driving home from Washington for the Thanksgiving holiday when they learned of the threat.
Lee Zeldin, Trump’s pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, said his home was targeted with a pipe bomb threat sent with a “pro-Palestinian themed message.”
The former congressman from New York said he and his family were not home at the time.
Fox News Digital quoted unidentified sources saying that John Ratcliffe, Trump’s nominee to head the CIA, and Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary pick, were also targeted.
Ahead of his return to the House in January, Trump has already swiftly assembled a cabinet of loyalists, including several criticized for a severe lack of experience.
The Republican, who appears set to avoid trial on criminal prosecutions related to attempts to overturn his 2020 election loss, was wounded in the ear in July in an assassination attempt during a campaign rally. The shooter was killed in counter-fire.
In September, authorities arrested another man accused of planning to shoot at Trump while he played golf at his course in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Saudi development fund chief meets Congo’s finance minister
CEO of the Saudi Fund for Development Sultan Al-Marshad met Congo’s Minister of Finance Doudou Fumba Likunde, the Saudi Fund said on X on Wednesday.
During the meeting, they reviewed development cooperation between the two sides that began 40 years ago, as well as discussing ways to enhance economic cooperation to develop vital sectors in Congo.
Ambassador of Saudi Arabia to Congo Abdulaziz Al-Badi was present during the meeting.
Book Review: ‘Rifqa’ by Mohammed El-Kurd
Mohammed El-Kurd’s “Rifqa” is a searing and lyrical exploration of identity, resistance and the enduring impact of colonization. Named after El-Kurd’s late grandmother, the poetry collection captures the Palestinian experience with an intensity that is both personal and profoundly universal.
Through vivid language and raw emotion, El-Kurd weaves together memories, history and the lived realities of occupation, crafting a work that is as much a tribute to resilience as it is a call to action.
Through poems that shift between tender recollections of family and sharp critiques of displacement and violence, El-Kurd creates a narrative that refuses to separate the personal from the political. This duality gives the work a profound resonance, as it reminds readers of the humanity at the core of resistance.
El-Kurd’s grandmother, Rifqa, emerges as a symbol of steadfastness in the face of oppression, her life embodying the spirit of defiance that runs through the collection.
His language is evocative and unrelenting, often blurring the lines between poetry and protest. His verses are charged with anger, grief and a fierce love for his homeland, making every word feel urgent and necessary.
Yet, amid the rage and sorrow, there are moments of quiet beauty — glimpses of family life, the olive trees of Jerusalem and the enduring cultural traditions that tether the poet to his roots. These moments serve as a poignant reminder of what is at stake, grounding the collection in the everyday lives and stories of Palestinians.
What sets “Rifqa” apart is its refusal to sanitize or soften its message. El-Kurd speaks truth to power with unapologetic clarity, confronting readers with the stark realities of occupation and the complicity of global systems in perpetuating injustice.
Yet, his voice is not only one of condemnation, but also of hope and resilience. The poems are a testament to the enduring spirit of a people who continue to fight for their land, their identity and their right to exist.
“Rifqa” is a powerful and deeply affecting work that demands to be read as a testament to the resilience of a people and the enduring strength of a grandmother’s legacy.
It is a book that stays with you long after the final page, urging you to listen, to feel and to act. Mohammed El-Kurd has crafted a work that is both a lament and a rallying cry, a reminder that poetry has the power to witness, to resist and to endure.
Search for Red Sea sinking survivors enters third day
CAIRO: The search operation for seven people still missing from a dive boat that capsized and sank off Egypt’s east coast entered a third day on Wednesday, the governor of the Red Sea province said.
The country released video footage on Wednesday morning of the latest tourists rescued from the vessel aboard which at least four people, including one Slovak tourist, died.
The governor’s office said the search operation was continuing for seven people still missing after the “Sea Story” was struck by a wave and capsized in the middle of the night on Monday.
The vessel had set off the day before from Port Ghalib, near Marsa Alam in the southeast, on a multi-day diving trip with 31 tourists — mostly Europeans, along with Chinese and US nationals — and a 13-member crew.
A total of 33 people have been rescued, including tourists seen in the video stepping off a speedboat, wrapped in blankets, at a marina near Marsa Alam. “We were shaking with cold,” one unidentified man said in the footage.
The tourists who appeared in the video had spent at least 24 hours inside a cabin of the overturned vessel before rescuers found them on Tuesday morning, according to a government source close to the rescue operations. Two survivors — one identified by authorities on camera as an Egyptian — were rolled out on stretchers, one of them conscious and speaking.
A Belgian tourist sobbed when she was greeted by Marsa Alam Mayor General Hazem Khalil.
Red Sea Governor Amr Hanafi said the boat capsized “suddenly and quickly within five-seven minutes” after being struck by a strong wave in the middle of the night, leaving some passengers unable to escape their cabins.
