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Updated at 8pm
THERE’S A LOT of talk about Iran today – its nuclear powers, its oil and its military bases.
So, what’s going on?
Today, historically, Iran agreed to a deal that essentially prohibits it from developing a nuclear bomb.
Iran agreed to the continuation of a UN arms embargo for up to five more years, as well as strict limits on its nuclear activities.
The agreement also sees stringent UN oversight, with world powers hoping this will make any dash to develop an atomic bomb virtually impossible.
The deal will allow United Nations inspectors to press for visits to Iranian military sites.
The landmark agreement also aims to clarify some past and present issues regarding Iran’s nuclear programme, which has been shrouded in mystery for decades.
What does the deal mean?
The deal was reached after 18 days of intense and often fractious negotiations between world powers and Iran.
It essentially curbs Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for billions of dollars in relief from international sanctions.
It will keep Iran from producing enough material for an atomic weapon for at least 10 years and impose new provisions for inspections of Iranian facilities, including military sites.
“Every pathway to a nuclear weapon is cut off,” said US President Barack Obama.
Iran will have to:
Hold on, US and Iran are hardly best mates, why are they talking?
The relationship is far from friendly, but this agreement is designed to avert the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran and another US military intervention.
The deal “is not built on trust, it is built on verification,” President Barack Obama declared from the White House today.
However, President Obama said the nuclear deal with Iran offered a chance to move in a “new direction” in relations with Tehran.
“Our differences are real. The difficult history between the nations cannot be ignored. It is possible to change,” Obama said.
This deal offers an opportunity to move in a new direction. We should seize it.
The US said things aren’t getting too friendly though and they’ll be continuing their unprecedented efforts to strengthen Israel’s security, efforts “that go beyond what any administration has done before.”
So can UN inspectors just go to inspect suspected nuclear weapon sites when they want?
No, not exactly. Nobody walked away with a perfect deal and it came with a lot of compromises.
Iran agreed to the continuation of a UN arms embargo on the country for up to five more years.
Access at will to any site would not necessarily be granted and even if so, could be delayed, a condition that critics of the deal are sure to seize on as possibly giving Tehran time to cover any sign of non-compliance with its commitments.
Under the deal, Tehran would have the right to challenge the UN request and an arbitration board composed of Iran and the six world powers that negotiated with it would have to decide on the issue.
Iran’s acceptance in principle of access to military sites will give the agency extra authority in its attempts to go to the site and its demands — previously rejected by Tehran — to interview scientists it suspects were involved in the alleged nuclear weapons work.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said:
“We are reaching an agreement that is not perfect for anybody, but it is what we could accomplish, and it is an important achievement for all of us. Today could have been the end of hope on this issue. But now we are starting a new chapter of hope.”
What about Iran exporting weapons, was that a sticking point?
Yes. The US sought to maintain the ban on Iran importing and exporting weapons, as it is concerned that cash freed up in the nuclear deal would be used to expand Iran’s military assistance to Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government, Yemen’s Houthi rebels and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Assad has congratulated Iran on the deal today.
But Iranian leaders insisted the embargo had to end as their forces are combating the likes of Islamic State.
Iran got support from China and particularly Russia on this, which wants to expand military cooperation and arms sales to Tehran.
The international arms embargo against Iran will remain for five years but deliveries would be possible with special permission of the UN Security Council.
What’s in the deal for Iran?
The economic benefits for Iran are potentially massive.
It stands to receive more than $100 billion in assets frozen overseas, and an end to a European oil embargo and various financial restrictions on Iranian banks.
Why should you care?
It means, for now, Iran’s nuclear program will be a lot more transparent than ever before and rules out any production of a nuclear bomb.
Federica Mogherini, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said it’s a deal ” the world was hoping for — a shared commitment to peace and to join our hands to make our world safer”.
Painful international sanctions will be lifted and this could mean lower oil prices for all.
Analysts from Cebr said the extent of the impact on oil prices will depend primarily on the domestic capability to get oil on the market, but the lowering of oil prices is good news for most Western economies.
With reporting from Associated Press and AFP
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Rabbit Ebola. Sounds like an awful death for an animal.
No danger to humans. What about dogs, cats and other wild animals that prey on rabbits?
@John O’Connor: they are all safe for m it but can carry it on their fur or cloths to other rabbits.
Coursing clubs are shamefully and unbelievably, lobbying for the re-issuing of the license taht would enable them to resume capturing hares with nets for use in coursing.
The so-called Coursing Support Group Kerry is demanding that the license be restored, claiming that coursing clubs won’t do any harm if they are permitted to capture hares, as “they’d never course a sick or diseased hare”. Kerry Radio carried the following report today on this:
And backwoods politicians are also pressing for a resumption of nationwide hare capture and live coursing, with an emergency motion on the subject tabled at a meeting of Kerry County Council!
I hope the Minister and the NPWS will reject the pseudo-scientific nonsense emanating from the pro hare coursing lobby and its political apologists.
Coursing practices would greatly increase the risk of the disease spreading: Coursing clubs use nets to catch the animals. They handle them casually and roughly, place them in little boxes (confinement that is totally unnatural and terrifying to them), transport them in vans or car boots to various locations and then pack them into compounds or paddocks where these normally solitary creatures find themselves in a cramped and unnatural environment: conditions ideal for the spreading of the disease.
Coursing clubs have been asserting in recent weeks that if they are permitted to resume capturing hares with nets for their fixtures they will vaccinate the hares they capture against the disease. Some politicians have backed them in this desperate ploy.
What they fail to mention, however, is that 1) the vaccine, called ‘Eravac’, which is licensed in Europe, is not available in Ireland and 2) more importantly, it cannot be applied to hares…just rabbits.
Coursing clubs are NOT conservationists, as they’d like us to believe. They are by definition people who capture hares for the express purpose of setting dogs on them for “sport.”
The ban on hare netting must remain. An entire species should be put at risk just to accommodate people who get their kicks from watching an animal running its life.
@John Fitzgerald: hi john I don’t hear of or see you standing against the travellers whom hunt with lurchers sometimes four and five at a time. The hare has no chance. I’m constantly ringing the Gardaí running them out of land beside me. The Gardaí can do nothing. Just like you.
They kill whatever moves in the land then throw it in a ditch. It’s a very common practice of theirs and what worse it’s all year round.
@John Fitzgerald: Well John, its a pity that the npws and the journal are full of antis like yourself.
Coursing will be back this year, if left to the coursing clubs the hare will multiply and strengthen, also strong talk about the antis planting an infected rabbit, nothing would surprise me with this crowd.
@francis walsh: hilarious that you use “antis” as if it’s a bad thing to be against wild hares being trapped and hoarded together before having to run for their lives just for your bloodthirsty entertainment.
@Stephen:
I’m opposed to all forms of so-called recreational hunting/coursing of hares, whether the ones that are banned or those permitted by law. The netting ban should remain, but of course the Gardai should pursue illegal coursers/hunters and prosecute them. Landowners are getting hell from those gangs. It is important, however, not to blame any one section of society for such activities. The vast majority of travelers are law-abiding people who abhor any form of animal cruelty.
@francis walsh:
“Antis” are people opposed to animal cruelty such as hare coursing…meaning the overwhelming majority of the Irish people. Your allegation re the planting of an infected rabbit is beyond ridiculous and shows how desperate your side has become in recent weeks.
@francis walsh: and pigs will fly ! , how is it that inspite of all the overwhelming evidence to the contrary you can still put these selfish, ignorant views out on social media.
Coursing clubs and those who support them need to wake upto the horrific abuse they inflict on a gentle creature like the Irish hare.
One of the benefits of “breeding like rabbits” is that those rabbits who are fortunate enough to have the right genetic makeup to withstand this virus can rapidly repopulate and make for lost numbers.
Its only a matter of time before some such disease starts to affect humans as well after all there are a lot of similarities between today’s human behaviour and rabbits.
Will the cruel hare coursing stop? Illegal hare coursing will still continue as part of their backward “culture”
@Niall O’Neill: not backward Néill, just great.
Only 2 hares found and the npws which is full of animal anti groups have suspended greyhound coursing, another kick in the teeth to rural Ireland, the government have passed the can and the antis win again.
@francis walsh: “The disease has been found in 12 animals but the actual number of infected rabbits and hares could be far higher as samples in a number of these cases were taken from one animal drawn from a larger group of dead animals…The disease can be transmitted directly through fluids such as saliva and urine or indirectly through clothes, animals or insects..”. You think satisfying your bloodlust is more important than trying to stop the spread of this deadly virus in the hare population?
@francis walsh: “The disease has been found in 12 animals but the actual number of infected rabbits and hares could be far higher as samples in a number of these cases were taken from one animal drawn from a larger group of dead animals…The disease can be transmitted directly through fluids such as saliva and urine or indirectly through clothes, animals or insects..”. You think satisfying your bloodlust is more important than trying to stop the spread of this deadly virus in the hare population?
@francis walsh:
Can’t take chances. Hare coursing already stands condemned and utterly discredited on animal welfare grounds (the hares are mauled and have their bones broken, and if they survive they are passed on to other clubs for re-coursing) but now this horrible “sport” poses a clear existential threat to the the Irish Hare as a species.
@francis walsh:
No, it’s a pro-rural Ireland move to suspend hare netting by gangs of coursers…the disappearance of our iconic Irish Hare from the countryside would be severe blow to rural Ireland and to our wonderful wildlife heritage that is under pressure on many fronts.
@John Fitzgerald: you’re ignorance is consistent John, you really don’t have an idea of what you are talking about.
@francis walsh: what has John said that’s incorrect?
@francis walsh:
Oh but I do know “Francis”…this time the science is against you. It’s not an animal protection group that suspended the hare netting license. A Government department acted in response to a crisis, on the best advice from a team of experts. Any resumption of hare netting by gangs across the country would place the entire species at risk. Imagine, at this time…gangs of whiskey-slugging gougers handling hares, passing them around, shoving into little boxes for transportation around the country…and then dozens of hares at a time bunched into paddocks where they await contrived chases. Add to that the widespread trafficking of hares between clubs (a hare can fetch up to a hundred euro) and you have a recipe for ecological disaster. Coursing clubs do NOT capture hares to vaccinate them or somehow “care” for them. They capture them for the sole and express purpose of setting dogs on them. Fact. So should the Irish Hare have to face possible wipe-out just to appease these gangs of predators?
@John Fitzgerald: you’re a langer.
Wasn’t there cases of a similar infection in Deer in the US over the last couple of years.
Nature’s way is survival of the fittest
@Dave Walsh: Or man’s way of controlling the amount of rabbets
@Alan Scott: that’s what guns are for…
Josephine they were probably doing too much Swinging
Thankfully there is a vaccine out for it. I had my bunny vacinated 2 weeks ago. Kept him out of the garden till then. On a side note. Anyone from Cork know how they rabbits on the Dunnkettle roundabout are doing?
@Edmund Murphy: the vaccine works for rabbits but not hares.
@EillieEs: yep I read your comment on that earlier. Glad it at least works on Rabbits.
@Edmund Murphy: absolutely, just a shame it doesn’t work for hares too
Who framed Roger Rabbit?
There’s a an aids like virus wiping out cats as well…they go off food and waste away in a week..very distressing… Vaccinate…
Elmer Fudd is on the case . We’re hunting wabbits
Is that the mix a my toties ?
Methinks China needs to sharpen up their disease controls, given the widespread pig, poultry, & now the furry wildlife virus outbreaks .
For a country with unlimited state controls, gigantic food production needs, surely they should get their livestock health under strict control.
We don’t need these almost seasonal plagues to spread everywhere.
Methinks China needs to sharpen up their disease controls, given the widespread pig, poultry, & now the furry wildlife. For a country with unlimited state controls, gigantic food production needs, surely they should get their livestock health under strict control.
We don’t need these almost seasonal plagues to spread everywhere.
have your say