“It is an illusion for members of Congress to think that they can vote this plan down and then turn around and still persuade countries like China, Japan, South Korea, Turkey, India - Iran’s major oil customers,” Kerry said in yet another passionate plea on Iranian nuclear deal in Philadelphia.
“They ought to continue supporting the sanctions that are costing them billions of dollars every year That is not going to happen,” Kerry said.
“And don’t forget that the money that has been locked up as a result of sanctions is not sitting in some American bank under US control. The money is frozen and being held in escrow by countries with which Iran has commercial dealings,” he said in his speech. “We don’t have that money. We can’t control it. It is going to begin to be released, anyway, if we walk away from this agreement. Remember as well that the bulk of the funds Iran will receive are those that sanctions relief are already spoken for, and they are dwarfed by the country’s unmet economic needs,” he said.
Kerry’s public speech on Wednesday came after he wrote a letter to members of the Congress on the need to pass the Iran nuclear deal. Kerry warned that if this plan is voted down, the US cannot predict with certainty what Iran will do. “But we do know what Iran says it will do, and that is begin again to expand its nuclear activities. And we know that the strict limitations Iran has accepted will no longer <g data-gr-id="33">apply,</g> because they will no longer be any agreement,” he said. “Iran will then feel free to begin operating thousands of other advanced and other centrifuges that would otherwise have been mothballed. They will be free to expand their stockpile of <g data-gr-id="27">low enriched</g> uranium, rebuild their stockpile, 20 per cent enriched uranium, free to move ahead with the production of weapons-grade plutonium,” he said.