[caption id="attachment_154687" align="alignright" width="211"] Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (3rd L) poses for a photograph with US Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) (2nd L), Senate Minority Leader Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) (4th L), and Senate Majority Whip Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) (L) prior to a meeting at the US Capitol, March 3, 2015 in Washington, DC.[/caption]

International lawyer Barry Grossman says a letter by US Republican senators to undermine President Barack Obama's efforts to reach a nuclear agreement with Iran probably “amounts to a breach of the oath taken by senators to ‘support and defend the Constitution’”.

In an open letter to Iran on Monday signed by some 47 Republican senators, the lawmakers warned Tehran that any deal signed by the Obama administration must be approved by Congress or it could be abandoned by next president after Barack Obama leaves office in January 2017.

Grossman said the Republican senators are clearly attempting to derail the talks underway between Iran and the P5+1 countries – the US, Britain, France, China, Russia, and Germany, which have entered a sensitive final stage.



Grossman, who is based on the Indonesian island of Bali, told Press TV on Monday that the “reckless and outrageous” letter provides “grounds for them to be impeached, if not actually prosecuted for treason.”

“The terms of the letter make it clear that these congressional dullards do not even know that the consensus of informed opinion is that Iran HAS NO nuclear weapons program,” he said.

“The concern being addressed by the 5 +1 talks is that, by exercising its rights as a sovereign state and as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to advance a non-military nuclear program, Iran will be in a better position to develop a nuclear weapons program should it ever decide to start such a program at some point in the future,” Grossman stated.
“However, the 17 agencies comprising the US security apparatus have consistently said since 2003 that Iran has no nuclear weapons program and has not decided to start such a program,” he added. “Nobody - except these renegade senators - genuinely claims that Iran has a nuclear weapons program. This is not open to debate.”


Iran and the P5+1 are holding negotiations to work out a final deal aimed at ending the longstanding standoff over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.

The scale of Iran’s uranium enrichment and the timetable for the lifting of anti-Iran sanctions are seen as major sticking points in the talks.

The illegal sanctions on Iran have been imposed based on the unfounded accusation that Tehran is pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear program.

The Republican-dominated Congress is pushing a new round of sanctions on Iran. Obama has warned Congress not to impose more sanctions on Iran, saying he will veto any such move.
Grossman said, “These cretins are clearly attempting to derail a process which falls squarely within the president's foreign affairs power and derives any such legitimacy as it may have from [what many would consider] already dubious claims made by the US security and political apparatus that the 5+1 talks deal with a matter of US national security.”
“If that is not enough, even before any agreement is made, these senators are also announcing to the world that the US Congress does not consider itself bound by Treaties or Agreements made by the United States and doing so in the most arrogant, ignorant and insulting terms imaginable,” he noted.

“This can only be seen as an attempt to advance Israel's agenda and derail the delicate process which, through its presidential administration, the US is participating in as one of six nations negotiating with Iran.”



Grossman said, “The issue is not whether Congress has some residual role to play in ratifying treaties. The issue here is that these renegade senators have attempted to derail a delicate process by interfering with the president's executive powers,  and by announcing to Iran, indeed threatening even before the terms o f any agreement which might be reached are known, that Congress will not abide by any agreement made by the executive branch.

“This arrogant and unprecedented letter also ignores the fact that the 5+1 in these 5+1 talks refers not to the USA alone in all its exceptional glory but rather to the group of six world powers which in 2006 joined the diplomatic efforts with Iran with regard to its NON-MILITARY nuclear program.

“The term refers to the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, namely the United Kingdom, the United States, Russia, China, and France, plus Germany.

“Of course, it’s no surprise that these rogue senators are incapable of appreciating America's limited but important role in this process, let alone the limits of their own role as individual senators and those applicable to the Congress as a whole.”

By Press TV