Iran rejects European Union's invitation to discuss nuclear deal with U.S.

Catherine Garcia
·1 min read

Iran's foreign ministry on Sunday said the country will not participate in an informal meeting with the United States and European powers to discuss reviving the nuclear deal.

The European Union offered to hold the talks, but this is "not the time" for such a gathering, spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said. Under former President Donald Trump, the U.S. abandoned the 2015 nuclear deal, and reimposed economic sanctions. Iran refused to renegotiate and instead began ignoring its commitments under the deal.

Tehran has said in order for there to be talks, the U.S. must lift sanctions, which the U.S. has ruled out. A White House spokesperson said on Sunday the U.S. will consult with the other countries that signed the nuclear deal — the United Kingdom, France, China, Russia, and Germany — to determine "the best way forward."

More stories from theweek.com
5 celestially funny cartoons about Perseverance's Mars adventure
The forgotten nuclear threat
6 homes with make believe features

Recommended Stories

  • Iran says it will not meet US for informal talks on saving nuclear deal

    Iran said Sunday it does not consider the time to be "suitable" for an informal meeting - proposed by Europe and involving the US - on the embattled 2015 nuclear deal. The European Union's political director earlier this month proposed the informal meeting involving Iran and the United States. US President Joe Biden's administration has accepted in principle. Following Biden's election, Washington, the European parties to the deal - France, Germany and Britain - and Tehran have been trying to salvage the 2015 nuclear accord, which granted Iran international sanctions relief in return for restrictions on its nuclear programme. The accord has been nearing collapse since former president Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions as part of a "maximum pressure" campaign against Tehran. "Considering the recent positions and actions of the United States and the three European countries, (Iran) does not consider the time suitable to hold the informal meeting proposed by the European coordinator", foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said in a statement. "There has still been no change in the US positions and behaviour yet," he added, saying the Biden administration has continued "Trump's failed policy of maximum pressure". Biden has signalled readiness to revive the deal, but insists Iran first return to all its nuclear commitments, most of which it suspended in response to the sanctions, while Tehran demands Washington take the first step by scrapping the sanctions. The US "has not even announced its commitment to fulfilling its responsibilities" under the deal and the United Nations Security Council resolution that enshrined it, Khatibzadeh said. He added: "America must end its illegal and unilateral sanctions and return to its (deal) commitments. This needs neither negotiations nor resolutions." Iran "will answer action with action, and just as it will return to (deal) commitments in accordance with the lifting of sanctions, it will respond to hostile actions and behaviours in the same way". Iran last Tuesday started to restrict some site inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog, in continuation of suspended nuclear commitments in response to the US failure to lift its sanctions. Khatibzadeh said Tehran would continue to consult with other parties to the nuclear agreement, and European Union Foreign Minister Josep Borrell "in his capacity as the (deal) coordinator, both bilaterally and multilaterally".

  • Iran dismisses idea of talks with EU and U.S. to revive 2015 nuclear deal

    Iran on Sunday ruled out holding an informal meeting with the United States and other major powers to discuss ways to salvage the unravelling 2015 nuclear deal, insisting Washington must first lift all its unilateral sanctions. "Considering the recent actions and statements by the United States and three European powers, Iran does not consider this the time to hold an informal meeting with these countries, which was proposed by the EU foreign policy chief," Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said, according to Iranian media.

  • Team Biden About to Start Its First Talks With the Taliban

    GettyPresident Biden’s Afghanistan negotiator has begun a diplomatic trip that will include the first meeting of the new administration with the Taliban, sources familiar confirmed to The Daily Beast.The State Department did not immediately provide comment on the agenda Zalmay Khalilzad is bringing to the Taliban, which belatedly resumed peace talks with the U.S. client Afghan government last week. Khalilzad will first travel to Kabul for meetings with an Afghanistan government whose viability in a post-American Afghanistan is an open question. He’ll also visit other crucial regional capitals.Khalilzad “will resume discussions on the way ahead with the Islamic Republic and Afghan leaders, Taliban representatives, and regional countries whose interests are best served by the achievement of a just and durable political settlement and permanent and comprehensive ceasefire,” a State Department official said.Khalilzad, who has been an Afghanistan envoy for three different presidents, arrives in the region at a pivotal time. Two months remain before the Doha Accord, the deal Khalilzad negotiated with the Taliban last year, requires a full U.S. troop withdrawal. There is enormous international speculation over whether Biden will abide by a deal that extricates the U.S. from a 20-year war it will not admit it has lost.She Helped Escalate an Endless War. Will She End It?“I find that leaving right now is more compelling than it’s ever been in the past,” said Carter Malkasian, who has advised the U.S. military in Afghanistan for more than a decade.Almost immediately upon entering office, Biden placed the Afghanistan deal, struck by the Trump administration, under review. It represents the first critical foreign-policy decision of his presidency. While the review is reportedly nearing its terminal phase, sources familiar with it or close to the administration have said nothing – only that it is not completed, a course of action has not been decided, and they consider the process rigorous.Biden, an opponent of escalation in Afghanistan when he was Barack Obama’s vice president, is under significant elite pressure to forestall a pullout stipulated for May 1. Both Democratic foreign-policy eminances and prestige think-tank panels have urged a delay. “Keeping U.S. troops beyond May while sustaining Doha is possible,” argued Lisa Curtis.Curtis was the senior Afghanistan official on Trump’s National Security Council. She’s a critic of what she calls the “flawed peace deal” Khalilzad negotiated at Trump’s behest, as the obligations it places on the United States—the withdrawal—are more specific than for the Taliban, which is supposed to stop Afghanistan from being a staging ground for international terrorism and enter a dialogue with the Afghanistan government to resolve the country’s political future. Negotiators like Khalilzad should “emphasize [Doha’s] sections on a comprehensive ceasefire and political roadmap,” Curtis said.But delaying the pullout risks blowing up the only diplomatic way out of Afghanistan. “If Biden tears up the agreement, he will own the consequences, and the consequences will not be good,” said Christopher Kolenda, a retired Army colonel who in 2017 and 2018 conducted preparatory diplomacy with the Taliban in Doha.Curtis, Kolenda and all other Afghanistan observers agree on a basic fact, if not its implications. The Taliban, which kept up attacks on Afghan forces after signing the U.S. accord, have put themselves in place for a massive offensive that the U.S., its allies and the Afghanistan government may not be able to repel. Earlier this month, The New York Times reported that the Taliban have closed in on several of Afghanistan’s major cities and control the vital roads to many of them. Whatever Doha envisioned for a Taliban-Afghanistan government path to reconciliation, this is not that. The Taliban, having functionally defeated the U.S. at war, now appear on the horizon of outright victory.“They’re in position for a major offensive. That offensive will include mass-casualty attacks on Americans if we miss the deadline,” said Barnett Rubin, another longtime Afghanistan adviser to the U.S. and the United Nations. “They might be prepared to extend, but if we unilaterally say we’re not satisfied with you so we’re not leaving, that’s what they’ll do. And the muscle memory of the U.S. government is to do that.”Kolenda and other longtime Afghanistan observers argue that attempting to defer the pullout will have precisely the violent effect that Curtis and her side argues will follow the pullout. The Taliban, they argue, would likely see that the U.S. cannot be trusted to keep its word—friction between Washington and Kabul in 2012 doomed an earlier peace process in its infancy—ending any hope of a negotiated end to the war, to say nothing of a secure departure for the remaining U.S. troop presence.“If you’re the Biden administration, would you rather depart as agreed in a safe, orderly manner while leaning into a peace process, or would you prefer the optics of C-17s screaming out of Bagram on the heels of a Taliban offensive like Saigon 1975?” Kolenda said. “I don’t hear the stay-forever crowd talking about the possibility of a humiliating exit.”Curtis acknowledged that the Taliban abandoning diplomacy and attacking U.S. troops again “is a risk.” But, she said, “What is our goal and our objective? We don’t want a terrorist safe haven to reemerge. It’s not just covering us for a safe exit.”Malkasian, more than most, has spent many years attempting to prevent the reemergence of such a safe haven. He sees the risk of a subsequent terrorist attack launched from Afghanistan soil as a “bearable” one— something now grimly proven by COVID-19. “For a good number of days in the winter, we were losing more people per day than we lost on 9/11,” he said. “That means leaving is a viable strategy.”While the review is closely held, the early indications out of the Biden administration and its allies have not suggested an intention to stick with the scheduled pullout.On February 12, State Department Spokesperson Ned Price said among the issues the review will examine are “whether the Taliban are fulfilling their commitments relating to counterterrorism, reducing violence, engaging in meaningful negotiations with the Afghan Government and other stakeholders.” On February 19, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, after meeting with NATO allies, said he sought a “responsible and sustainable end to this war” rather than emphasizing the deal currently in place. This past week, Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), the Democratic chairman of the armed-services committee and a crucial White House ally, advocated for delaying withdrawal. A source described as familiar with the review told Vox that a full withdrawal is “off the table.”“I think the steps the president has taken, in terms of hinting that we might not pull the rest of our troops out on the 1st of May, is exactly right,” Bob Gates, the former Obama and George W. Bush defense secretary, told The Washington Post on Friday. “We may be in a position where we have to tell ourselves we will have an ongoing presence in Afghanistan for some period of time.”Rubin believes there is a way to sell the Taliban on a one-time troop extension of six months—something he acknowledges could backfire, but something he considers possible owing to the six-month delay between the February accord and the September commencement of pivotal Taliban-Afghan government negotiations, which have proceeded haltingly.The Taliban still want things from the U.S.-led coalition, Rubin pointed out, such as additional prisoner releases and the removal of sanctions placed on it not only by Washington but by the United Nations. Additionally, the administration can take advantage of recently energetic regional diplomacy, particularly by Russia, to accelerate the peace process. Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, pledged a “robust and regional diplomatic effort” in a call last month to his Afghan counterpart, but it has yet to publicly manifest.“If one tries to extend the timeline, it should be cast as ‘we’re fully intending to leave Afghanistan, we have this agreement, we want to see it’s fully met, and then we’re returning to a timeline for us to fully leave,’” urged Malkasian. “There is no peace in Afghanistan as long as we stay. We are a driver of violence. The Taliban is able to cast us as an occupying power and it drives them to fight us. That doesn’t mean all Afghans, it’s just enough to get a critical mass to fight. If we want a peace agreement, we have to be willing to leave Afghanistan.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

  • Iran rejects informal talks with US on restoring nuclear deal

    ‘The time isn’t ripe,’ says foreign ministry as it calls for end to US sanctions

  • Israel says initial assessment is Iran behind explosion on Israeli-owned ship

    Israeli defence minister Benny Gantz said on Saturday his "initial assessment" was that Iran was responsible for an explosion on an Israeli-owned ship in the Gulf of Oman. The ship, a vehicle-carrier named MV Helios Ray, suffered an explosion between Thursday and Friday morning. A U.S. defence official in Washington said the blast left holes above the waterline in both sides of the hull.

  • Iran rejects nuclear talks with U.S., for now

    A spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry said on Sunday that conditions are not ripe for informal nuclear talks between Iran, the U.S. and other world powers.Why it matters: The Biden administration had proposed the talks as part of its efforts to negotiate a path back to the 2015 nuclear deal. The White House expressed disappointment with Iran's response, but said it remained willing to engage with Tehran.Stay on top of the latest market trends and economic insights with Axios Markets. Subscribe for freeWhat they're saying:“There has been no change in the U.S. position and behavior yet, and the Biden administration has not only not abandoned Trump's failed policy of maximum pressure, but has not even announced its commitment to fulfilling its overall commitments as part of the nuclear deal," said Iranian spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh.He added Iran won't re-negotiate the nuclear deal and reiterated Iran's longstanding insistence that the U.S. start the process by removing sanctions."While we are disappointed at Iran’s response, we remain ready to reengage in meaningful diplomacy to achieve a mutual return to compliance with the nuclear deal commitments," a White House spokesman said."We will be consulting with our P5+1 partners on the best way forward," the spokesman added, referring to the other parties to the nuclear deal: China, Russia, the U.K., France and Germany.Between the lines: The Iranian response to the U.S. proposal seems to be connected to a diplomatic effort by the U.S. and European signatories to pass a resolution against Iran at an upcoming meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).The resolution is expected to criticize Iran for curtailing the access of nuclear inspectors.The state of play: The Biden administration says it'll return the U.S. to the 2015 deal by lifting sanctions if Iran returns to compliance by reversing its recent nuclear steps. The main sticking point is the sequencing of those moves. More from Axios: Sign up to get the latest market trends with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free

  • Mike Pompeo attacks Biden's policies heightening speculation of 2024 presidential run

    Mike Pompeo, the former US Secretary of State, touted the Trump administration's America-first foreign policy and attacked Joe Biden's agenda in a pitch to conservative voters on Saturday. Mr Pompeo said that while working under Donald Trump, "I sent messages repeatedly to bad guys around the world that if you touch an American, you'll pay dearly", in a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Orlando, Florida. Mr Pompeo's speech at CPAC, the annual conservative jamboree, has heightened speculation that the former top US diplomat is considering a 2024 presidential run. “What’s good news today for me is when you’re a diplomat...you have to stay in your lane. I don't have that. I’m not a diplomat. I’m going to let it rip,” he said. During the fiery address, Mr Pompeo praised the assassination of top Iranian general Qassim Soleimani, who was killed by a US drone strike last year.

  • Cape Town: Pictures of how Muslim worship helps quell South African ganglands

    A team of Islamic scholars in South Africa is on a mission to some dangerous and drug-infested areas.

  • The Latest: First US J&J vaccine doses shipping Sunday night

    The White House said the entire stockpile of the newly approved single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine will go out immediately. J&J will deliver about 16 million more doses by the end of March and 100 million total by the end of June, but the distribution would be backloaded. The White House is encouraging Americans to take the first dose available to them, regardless of manufacturer.

  • Psaki defends Biden's response to Khashoggi report amid calls for harsher action against Saudi crown prince

    White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki on Sunday defended President Biden's response to a United States intelligence report that directly linked Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, but questions over whether the administration went far enough seem likely to remain. The Biden administration announced sanctions on dozens of Saudis involved in Khashoggi's killing, but did not include any direct penalties on the crown prince. Psaki said "historically" presidential administrations have not imposed sanctions on leaders of foreign governments with whom the U.S. has diplomatic relations. "We believe there are more effective ways to make sure this doesn't happen again," she told CNN's Dana Bash, adding that the White House wants to leave room to work with Riyadh on areas where the two governments agree. "Do you feel like justice has... been done when it comes specifically to the crown prince and his role in the brutal murder of a journalist?" @DanaBashCNN presses WH Press Sec. Jen Psaki on Biden's failure to directly sanction the Saudi crown prince over Jamal Khashoggi. #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/s5UVeAeNsl — State of the Union (@CNNSotu) February 28, 2021 Bash seemed unconvinced by Psaki's explanation, questioning if Biden's response really holds the crown prince accountable, and she wasn't alone. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) told ABC's George Stephanopoulos that Biden deserves "credit" for the sanctions that were announced and acknowledged it's a challenging situation for the new administration, but said "there ought to be something additional" focused on Salman. Portman's fellow Ohioan Sen. Sherrod Brown (D) agreed further steps are needed to hold the Saudi royal family accountable, though he told a skeptical Chuck Todd on NBC's Meet the Press that he doesn't think Friday's sanctions represent the final say on the matter. More stories from theweek.com5 celestially funny cartoons about Perseverance's Mars adventureThe forgotten nuclear threat6 homes with make believe features

  • Sister act as Korda romps to Gainbridge LPGA win

    Nelly Korda produced a flawless final round to claim a three-shot victory at the Gainbridge LPGA tournament in Florida on Sunday.

  • Hezbollah and Israel’s Richest Were Both Welcome at a Congo Bank

    (Bloomberg) -- 2018 was a good year for Afriland First Group SA, a Switzerland-based company that oversees a network of banks across Africa.In his opening comments to the annual report for the year, Paul Fokam, the group’s chairman and one of Cameroon’s wealthiest men, highlighted the “challenge of being ethical and compliant while creating value.” He asked readers to bear in mind that “we are in a battlefield where only alertness, flexibility, and perseverance can ensure sustainable victory.”Little mention was made in the report’s 83 pages of one of the group’s star performers though, its unit in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a vast central African nation rich in natural resources including diamonds, cobalt and copper. While deposits across Afriland’s subsidiaries increased 17%, a PwC audit seen by Bloomberg shows that in Congo, accounts swelled nearly fivefold that year to $279 million, accounting for more than one-tenth of the group’s total at the time.The influx transformed the bank, and would go on to wreck the lives of two employees who provided information to anti-graft organizations in Europe about where the cash was coming from. Gradi Koko Lobanga, the former head of the unit’s internal audit division, and Navy Malela Mawani, its comptroller, have since decided to go public with the allegations to combat claims they fabricated the data. Both have fled Congo and sought asylum in Europe.New files the two men shared with the Paris-based Platform for the Protection of African Whistleblowers, known as Pplaaf, and several media outlets including Bloomberg, suggest Afriland Congo had carved out a niche for itself in doing business with risky clientele, including Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler. The documents cover banking operations at Afriland between late 2017 and early 2019, and show at least seven sanctioned individuals and companies had accounts at the bank, although some with small amounts of money in them.Afriland Congo, its sister bank in Cameroon and its parent company in Switzerland didn’t respond to repeated requests for comment.There were accounts held by a firm the U.S. government said it believed to be a subsidiary of a sanctioned company linked to a financier of Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which the U.S. considers a terrorist organization, and another that it blacklisted for the same reason in December 2019.Hezbollah’s media office didn’t answer two calls seeking comment on the group’s activities in Congo.North KoreaOther accounts were linked to a North Korean-owned statue-builder. Concerns that North Korea was using statue-building companies to help fund its weapons programs led the United Nations, U.S. and European Union to target the practice.The UN panel of experts on North Korea recommended this month that the Security Council sanction the Congolese company’s two owners, Pak Hwa Song and Hwang Kil Su, according to excerpts of the report shared with Bloomberg. An email and phone call to their company, Congo Aconde SARL, went unanswered.Still other records show large amounts of money transiting through the personal accounts of Congolese politicians.But the largest by far were the accounts seemingly linked to Gertler, one of Israel’s richest men, a burly billionaire in his mid-40s with a history of controversy in Congo. In December of 2017, the U.S. had sanctioned Gertler for alleged corruption in mining and oil deals. The Treasury Department accused him of acting as a middleman between multinational corporations and the state and of setting up companies on behalf of former Congolese President Joseph Kabila, all of which Gertler denies.A year after he was sanctioned, deposits by companies and individuals connected to Gertler grew to more than a third of total deposits at Afriland Congo, according to a PwC audit.“It was quite curious that a person who was just sanctioned by the United States started coming to the bank,” said Koko, one of the whistleblowers, in an interview at a lawyer’s office in Paris last week.Three emails since Feb. 22 to Afriland units in Cameroon and Congo, its Swiss headquarters as well as to the chief executive officer and deputy chief executive of Afriland Congo, have gone unanswered. The spokesman for Afriland Cameroon didn’t answer when called by Bloomberg.A person who picked up the phone at the Swiss parent company on Friday said the email address wasn’t working and asked Bloomberg to send a letter. He declined to provide any other contact information for Fokam, the group’s chairman.The Congo unit previously told Global Witness and Pplaaf that it hasn’t violated any regulations or assisted any of its customers in circumventing U.S. sanctions.First BonusesTransaction fees at Afriland soared with the new business in 2018, said Malela, the former comptroller, who began working at the bank 12 years ago. “We were never given bonuses at the end of the year” until then, he said.By that time, Koko had already sought refuge in Europe. As internal auditor, he had oversight of all the bank’s accounts and says he recognized the risks Afriland was taking. Two months after Gertler was sanctioned, Koko wrote a letter warning the Congolese subsidiary’s directors that servicing accounts for companies connected to Gertler as well others linked to Zoe Kabila, the then-president’s brother, could result in penalties or sanctions for the bank.“These irregularities are likely to expose the bank to non-compliance from both a national and international point of view,” Koko wrote. He recommended the bank block all accounts linked to the two men and report them to the relevant authorities. Zoe Kabila did not respond to four emails requesting comment.The reaction of Afriland officials to Koko’s concerns was swift, but not in the way he’d intended. Instead of investigating the accounts, he said one of the bank’s directors intimidated him.Violent Threats“He said to me, ‘These people aren’t just anyone,’ and that they could shoot me while I was leaving the bank,” Koko said. The threats then turned violent, he says, declining to give further details.In a statement provided by a Gertler spokesman on Friday in response to the latest allegations, Gertler said the claims about him were “entirely false.” He said the two bank employees were “victims” of “appalling conduct” by the anti-graft organizations, saying they’d been co-opted into illegal acts including stealing confidential bank data about him, and falsifying documents.“They are unable to return to their homeland, their lives having been destroyed by the reckless decision-making of Global Witness and Pplaaf,” Gertler said of the whistleblowers.The bankers’ earlier revelations were published by Bloomberg in July alongside a report by Global Witness and Pplaaf. That report outlined a network of individuals and companies who appeared to be using Afriland to move money on behalf of Gertler. Gertler denied any wrongdoing and contests the notion he was evading sanctions, some of which were recently eased. Lawyers for Afriland say that Koko and Malela stole and falsified data from the bank.Death PenaltyAfriland identified Koko and Malela after the initial report in July and filed a criminal complaint against them in Congo’s capital, Kinshasa.A lawyer for Afriland, Eric Moutet, said on Thursday that a court last year found the two men guilty of theft, forgery, and violating bank secrecy. It also convicted them of criminal association, a charge that can carry the death penalty. The Paris-based lawyer said the judges gave the harshest sentence possible because the defendants didn’t appear in court.The decision would set “a deplorable precedent” that would deter future whistleblowers, Nick Elebe, a lawyer and Congo director for the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa, said Friday. Congolese courts should investigate the allegations, which if confirmed, “could undermine the entire banking system, while at the same time posing risks to both the country’s economy and public savings,” he said.Although the death penalty is still on Congo’s statute books, no executions have been carried out in the country since 2003.When Koko fled, Malela decided to stay behind, copying more documents and sending them to his former colleague in Europe. Eventually, he too left the country before Pplaaf and Global Witness published their joint report last year. Koko received asylum in Europe in 2019, while Malela’s application is still pending.Representatives of Gertler and one person mentioned in the Global Witness and Pplaaf report say they’ve sued the two organizations for defamation. Global Witness and Pplaaf said they haven’t seen copies of the lawsuits.“We deny these allegations, and we stand with our sources and our investigation,” the two organizations said on Friday.Sanctions ReprieveAfriland also filed a complaint against both organizations at a court in Paris in early July, the day before the report was published. Global Witness and Pplaaf said in their report that they couldn’t prove that the bank’s network of individuals and companies was used to evade U.S. sanctions and it doesn’t allege any criminal behavior.On Jan. 15, in the final days of the Trump administration, the U.S. Treasury Department eased sanctions on Gertler and his companies through January 2022 without explanation. Bloomberg has reported that the Biden administration is likely to reverse that decision. Gertler said in an emailed statement that the reprieve was based on his commitment “to comply with the terms and conditions” set by Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.Both Malela and Koko want to stay in banking and say they know of other potential whistleblowers in Congolese banks.“The things that we’re denouncing are more important than the fear we may have,” Koko said. “So we’ll keep condemning these actions that go against the public interest despite the fear.”For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2021 Bloomberg L.P.

  • Exclusive: Biden in no rush to lift Venezuela sanctions, seeks 'serious steps' by Maduro

    President Joe Biden’s administration is in “no rush” to lift U.S. sanctions on Venezuela but would consider easing them if President Nicolas Maduro takes confidence-building steps showing he is ready to negotiate seriously with the opposition, a White House official told Reuters. Signaling that the new U.S. president may be unlikely to loosen the screws on Venezuela anytime soon, the official emphasized that existing sanctions have enough special provisions to allow for humanitarian aid shipments to help Venezuelans cope with economic hardships and the COVID-19 pandemic. This suggests that for now Biden is prepared to stick with the specific sanctions, including crippling oil-sector penalties, imposed by former President Donald Trump on the OPEC nation, despite the failure to force Maduro from power.

  • The inside story of the Iranian attack on Al Asad Airbase

    60 Minutes contributor David Martin and producer Mary Walsh report on the January 2020 attack on American forces stationed in Iraq.

  • Clippers look lost late against Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bucks in defeat

    Milwaukee star Giannis Antetokounmpo played like a two-time NBA MVP, spearheading a late charge by the Bucks to send the Clippers to a 105-100 loss.

  • Prince Harry 'feared history repeating itself' with Meghan like Diana, he tells Oprah

    The Duke of Sussex has told Oprah Winfrey his biggest fear was "history repeating itself," a reference to the death of his mother, as he explained his decision to leave royal life. Meanwhile, his wife, the Duchess of Sussex, appeared to suggest that her experiences in Britain had been "almost unsurvivable”. CBS, the US television network, released two 30-second excerpts from Oprah With Meghan And Harry: A CBS Primetime Special, the blockbuster interview which will be broadcast in full on March 7. The first opens with Ms Winfrey talking to the Duchess alone, seated on garden furniture on a patio. Ms Winfrey asks the Duchess: "Were you silent, or were you silenced?” The chat show host then makes clear to viewers that "no subject is off limits" in the interview. Addressing the Duchess, Ms Winfrey then says: "Almost unsurvivable sounds like there was a breaking point?”

  • Prince Harry tells Oprah he worried history would repeat itself

    Prince Harry, who shocked Britain last year when he and his wife Meghan stepped back from royal duties, told U.S. interviewer Oprah Winfrey that he had worried about history repeating itself, according to excerpts released on Sunday. The CBS broadcast network released two brief clips from Winfrey's interview of the couple, which is scheduled to air on March 7. "My biggest concern was history repeating itself," Harry said, apparently referring to his mother Princess Diana, who was hounded by the British press and died at age 36 in a car crash in Paris after her divorce from Prince Charles.

  • No backup catcher? Dave Roberts sees Will Smith and Austin Barnes as '1 and 1A'

    Figuring out how to maximize the strengths of Austin Barnes and Will Smith will be a challenge for manager Dave Roberts and the Dodgers in 2021.

  • Trump rants in CPAC speech that women's sports 'will die' if trans athletes are allowed to compete

    "Joe Biden and the Democrats are even pushing policies that would destroy women sports," Trump said.

  • South Africa signs J&J vaccine deal, eases restrictions

    South Africa has signed an agreement with Johnson & Johnson to secure 11 million COVID-19 vaccine doses and will ease restrictions due to a decline in new cases, President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Sunday. South Africa has been the hardest-hit on the continent by the pandemic, recording almost half of the COVID-19 deaths and more than a third of reported infections. Ramaphosa said in a televised address that 2.8 million of the J&J doses would be delivered in the second quarter, with the rest spread throughout the year.