Secret US-Iran talks cleared way for historic nuclear deal
The United States and Iran secretly engaged in a series of high-level, face-to-face talks over the past year, in a high-stakes diplomatic gamble by the Obama administration that paved the way for the historic deal on Tehran’s nuclear programme, according to The Associated Press.
The discussions - which were kept hidden even from America’s closest friends, including its negotiating partners and Israel, until two months ago - were held in the Middle Eastern nation of Oman and elsewhere with only a tight circle of people in the know, the AP reported. Since March, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Jake Sullivan, Vice President Joe Biden’s top foreign policy adviser, have met at least five times with Iranian officials.
The last four clandestine meetings, held since Iran’s reform-minded President Hassan Rouhani was inaugurated in August, produced much of the agreement later formally hammered out in negotiations in Geneva among the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany and Iran, said three senior administration officials speaking on condition of anonymity.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/10471030/Secret-US-Iran-talks-cleared-way-for-historic-nuclear-deal.html