Iran committed to halt the expansion of its uranium enrichment program and not to press ahead with its Arak reactor or related plutonium program, the United States said on Sunday describing a nuclear agreement between Tehran and six major world powers.
The breakthrough deal to curb Tehran's nuclear program in exchange for limited sanctions relief was reached Sunday in what could be the first sign of an emerging rapprochement between the Islamic state and the West.
Aimed at ending a dangerous standoff, the agreement between Iran and the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia was nailed down after more than four days of negotiations in the Swiss city of Geneva.
The accord was designed as a package of confidence-building steps to ease decades of tensions and confrontation and banish the spectre of a Middle East war over Tehran's nuclear aspirations.
European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who has been coordinating talks with Iran on behalf of the major powers, said it created time and space for talks aimed at reaching a comprehensive solution to the dispute.
"This is only a first step," Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told a news conference. "We need to start moving in the direction of restoring confidence, a direction in which we have managed to move against in the past."
In Washington, President Barack Obama said the deal was an important first step towards a comprehensive solution to Iran's nuclear program.
"There are substantial limitations which will help prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon," Obama argued in a late-night appearance at the White House after the deal was sealed in Geneva. "Simply put, they cut off Iran's most likely paths to a bomb."
Obama said that if Iran did not meet its commitments during a six-month period, the United States would turn off sanctions relief and "ratchet up the pressure."
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said the agreement would make it harder for Iran to make a dash to build a nuclear weapon and would make Israel and other U.S. allies safer, adding that while Obama would not take off the table the possible use of force against Iran, he believed it was necessary first to exhaust diplomacy.
$4.2B in foreign exchange
The West fears Iran has been seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability. The Islamic Republic denies that, saying its nuclear program is a peaceful energy project.
President Barack Obama speaks in Washington about the nuclear deal between six world powers and Iran that calls on Tehran to limit its nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief. (Susan Walsh/Associated Press)
A senior U.S. official said the agreement would neutralize Iran's stockpile of uranium refined to a fissile concentration of 20 per cent, which is a close step away from the level needed for weapons, and calls for intrusive U.N. nuclear inspections, the official said.
Iran has also committed to stop uranium enrichment above a fissile purity of five percent, a U.S. fact sheet said.
Refined uranium can be used to fuel nuclear power plants — Iran's stated goal — but also provide the fissile core of an atomic bomb if refined much further.
The deal has no recognition of an Iranian right to enrich uranium and sanctions would still be enforced, the U.S. official added.
Iran will get access to $4.2 billion in foreign exchange as part of the accord, and is also expected to receive limited sanctions relief on gold, petrochemicals and autos, a Western diplomat said.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a Twitter message that it was an "important and encouraging" first-stage agreement with Iran, whose nuclear program "won't move forward for 6 months and parts rolled back."
Israel critical
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said the deal only confirmed Iran's right to civil nuclear power.
Iran has agreed not to press ahead with building a large reactor at Arak, southwest of Tehran, that would yield enough plutonium to build several bombs a year. (Hamid Foroutan/ISNA/Associated Press)
"After years of blockages, the agreement in Geneva on Iran's nuclear program is an important step to preserving security and peace," Fabius said in a statement.
Kerry and foreign ministers of the five other world powers joined the negotiations with Iran early on Saturday as the two sides appeared to be edging closer to a long-sought preliminary agreement.
The Western powers' goal was cap Iran's nuclear energy program, which has a history of evading U.N. inspections and investigations, to remove any risk of Tehran covertly refining uranium to a level suitable for bombs.
Tehran, whose oil-dependent economy has been severely damaged by tightening Western sanctions over the past few years, denies it would ever "weaponize" enrichment.
Diplomacy was stepped up after the landslide election of Hassan Rouhani, a relative moderate, as Iranian president in June, replacing bellicose nationalist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Rouhani aims to mend fences with big powers and get sanctions lifted. He obtained crucial public backing from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, keeping powerful hardline critics at bay.
On a Twitter account widely recognized as representing Rouhani, a message said after the agreement was announced, "Iranian people's vote for moderation & constructive engagement + tireless efforts by negotiating teams are to open new horizons."
The OPEC producer rejects suspicions it is trying covertly to develop the means to produce nuclear weapons, saying it is stockpiling nuclear material for future atomic power plants.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has loudly criticized the deal, saying the international community is giving up too much to Iran.
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