Tell the Senate to support patient, persistent diplomacy with Iran
The U.S. and its international allies are within reach of a peaceful resolution to the issue of Iran’s nuclear program. Negotiations about Iran’s nuclear program look very promising, with a framework agreement likely by March and a final deal possible by a June deadline. You may have seen promising media reports in the last day or two about negotiations in Geneva between Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif, which is very good news.
However, conservative senators and even some supposed liberals are dead set on imposing new economic sanctions on Iran, which will risk scuttling the talks and putting us on a reckless path toward yet another Middle East war.
We stopped sanctions last year, and intend to do it again, but your senators need to hear from you today. The new sanctions bill is scheduled to move through the Senate Banking Committee starting next week, with a full Senate vote expected in February or March. That may sound like we have a bit of time, but, unfortunately, pro-sanctions forces are lobbying hard, and senators may well decide their positions on this issue very soon, so this alert is extremely urgent.
While some senators claim their push for new sanctions is intended to support diplomacy, Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) let the cat out of the proverbial bag, stating “The end of negotiations isn’t an unintended consequence of congressional action; it’s an intended consequence.”
Please take a few minutes to contact your senators today.
This may be one of the most important actions for peace you could take this or any year. After you’ve sent your email to your senators, if you want to do more, please visit our Peace Blog for a target list of Democratic senators and sample letters to the editor for you to write a letter to your local newspaper, still one of the best ways for us to get our views out to a wide audience (and to senators as well, their staffs monitor the letters to the editor pages religiously).
Humbly for Peace,
Kevin Martin
Executive Director
Peace Action
P.S. – When you go to our action page please take a few minutes to edit the letter to your senators in order to personalize your message.
-
[…] Tell the Senate to support patient, persistent diplomacy with Iran. […]
Leave a Comment
Middle East problems will continue while the main cause – oil/natural gas competition – is excluded from discussions and/or analysis. Pipeline wars, violence initiated over energy markets in Europe to the east and China to the west, along with somewhat less causative yet still important factors of the various energy exporting/importing nations around the world must become resolved through appropriate legal institutions – not on the field of battle.