Nuclear Issues

Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian recounts his 544 days in an Iranian prison during a talk with R. Nicholas Burns of the Harvard Kennedy School.

A interview conducted by The Fletcher School Forum with Ambassador Nicholas Burns, Former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs.

The importance of the United States to Israel's national security cannot be overstated. Washington is usually the first, and often the sole, port of call for strategic consultation – almost always the foremost one, and inevitably the primary means of addressing the challenges Israel faces. America is the be-all and end-all of most policy deliberations in Israeli national-security decision-making forums. Some four decades into this 'special relationship', the price of a truly remarkable partnership has been a significant loss of Israeli independence. Indeed, Israel's dependence on the US has become so deep that it is questionable whether the country could even survive today without it.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi traveled to Washington last week, making his fourth trip to the United States since taking office just two years ago. India and South Asia Program Fellow, Ronak Desai examines the strategic approach to India's relations with the United States.

In this journal article for Survival, Aaron Arnold argues that the success of financial sanctions rests largely on the dominance of the US dollar and the correspondent banking system. Yet emerging trends could undermine Washington’s capacity to employ this tool.

The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog has certified Tehran’s compliance with the terms of a nuclear accord the United States, Iran and other world powers reached in April 2015. The historic agreement is aimed at curtailing Iran’s controversial nuclear program, and paves the way for longstanding sanctions against Tehran to be lifted. Sanctions targeting Iran, and particularly its lucrative energy sector, have crippled the country economically and isolated it diplomatically.

Ronak Desai examines what the lifting of Iran sanctions mean for India.

Professor Nicholas Burns, a former point man on Iranian nuclear matters, talks with The Wall Street Journal's Washington Bureau Chief, Gerald Seib, about why he advocates effort to contain Tehran’s regional ambitions.

"The P5+1 should set aside the effort to craft an all-at-once comprehensive bargain and instead adopt a strategy of negotiating incremental agreements. An incremental approach has a number of advantages. The negotiators could focus on one sticking point at a time, without having to coordinate agreement on all of them at once. Negotiators could defer currently intractable issues, like enrichment capacity, until greater trust is built or new opportunities arise. Most importantly, the compromises already achieved under the JPA could be maintained and consolidated, independently of the ups and downs of ongoing negotiations."