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The Iran Agreement's "Exit Ramp"
(The Hill) Owen Alterman - Paragraph 36 of the Iran agreement tells us when and how the agreement might end. Any party - be it Iran or a future U.S. president - can essentially ditch the Iran nuclear deal with 35 days' notice. Under Paragraph 36, Iran can claim that any of the P5+1 is "not meeting its commitments" under the agreement. That triggers a 35-day set of meetings. Once that clock runs, Iran can claim the issue "has not been resolved to [its] satisfaction" and that it "deems" that the issue "constitutes significant non-performance." Iran can then "cease performing its commitments under this JCPOA in whole or in part." Once Iran has received its $150 billion and locked in long-term business contracts with the West, this quick exit could be an attractive option. The writer is a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.