The Greene County Democrat

Tag: US

  • Newswire: Iran will receive significant concessions in the deal to end the war, according to officials

    Newswire: Iran will receive significant concessions in the deal to end the war, according to officials

    BY JON GAMBRELL, ZEKE MILLER, MICHELLE L. PRICE AND SAMY MAGDY, AP NEWS

    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran will immediately take steps to reopen the Strait of Hormuz once a tentative deal with the U.S. to end the war is signed and will be allowed to sell its oil without restrictions, according to leaked copies of an interim agreement that officials say broadly matches the document. 

    The accord, due to be signed in Switzerland on Friday, also envisions Iran receiving at least $300 billion to rebuild after the war and says the U.S. would work to end all American and United Nations sanctions imposed on Tehran — if a final agreement addressing Iran’s nuclear program is reached.

    The deal will stop the fighting and start more negotiations

    Much of the agreement would restore the status quo before the war, including ending hostilities, restarting negotiations between the U.S. and Iran over Tehran’s nuclear program, and reopening the strait, which is a crucial passage for the world’s oil and natural gas and whose closure created a historic energy crisis.

    The deal includes an end to the fighting in Lebanon between Israel and the Iranian-backed militia Hezbollah. That is one of the most delicate parts of the agreement because Israel has maintained it will continue to defend itself and to occupy vast swaths of Lebanon. Iran has said Israel must withdraw under the deal, although the leaked versions make no mention of withdrawal.

    A person who was briefed on the memorandum of understanding after it was signed and another who viewed a copy beforehand said it largely matched the text of what was published by the Saudi-owned broadcaster Al Arabiya, which reported details of the deal on Tuesday. The two people spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussions.

    Another two officials in the Mideast, who spoke on condition of anonymity for the same reason, also said the versions published by Al Arabiya and Bloomberg broadly matched the final agreement.

    The White House and other American officials have not published the terms and did not immediately respond to questions. However, White House communications director Steven Cheung wrote online Wednesday after CNN published a leaked version of the deal that it “does not reflect the language of the actual” agreement, without elaborating. 

    Iran also has not published an official version of the deal. Iran’s semiofficial Tasnim news agency, close to its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, claimed Wednesday that Bloomberg’s version had missing portions, without offering a full accounting. 

    Trump has cited various goals for the war, including at times vowing it would end Iran’s nuclear and missile programs and its support for Hezbollah and other proxy groups in the region. He also suggested it could lead to toppling the Iranian government. 

    The interim deal falls short of all of these goals, but Trump hailed it Wednesday. “Nobody knows what it is but it’s very strong,” Trump said in France, where he is attending a Group of Seven summit.

    But he also opened the door to abandoning it: “It’s a memorandum of understanding and if I don’t like it, we’ll go back to shooting at them, dropping bombs.”

    The deal provides major concessions to Iran

    Some concessions to Iran — including the full lifting of sanctions and the release of frozen assets — would happen gradually and be linked to progress in the nuclear talks, according to officials from Pakistan, a key mediator. They outlined some of the deal’s major points on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

    But in the meantime, the U.S. will issue waivers to sanctions that allow Iran to sell oil freely. Iran’s main buyer of oil, China, is believed to have bought at below-market prices because of its willingness to ignore the sanctions.

    Granting oil waivers at the start of the 60-day talks strips the U.S. of a major point of leverage. Only at the conclusion of the overall deal in 2015 were sanctions on Iran’s oil lifted.

    The interim deal also opens the door to ending all sanctions Iran faces from the U.S. and at the U.N. — though it says the schedule for that will be worked out later. Still, that is far beyond the 2015 deal, which only lifted some sanctions in exchange for Iran drastically reducing its enrichment and stockpile of uranium.

    The accord would also provide Iran with at least $300 billion to rebuild after an intense U.S. and Israeli bombing campaign — an extraordinary figure and another major benefit for Iran. That also appears dependent on the progress of further negotiations. 

    U.S. Vice President JD Vance has said Gulf Arab nations would invest that amount. Trump reiterated Wednesday that the U.S. would not contribute and said it was up to other countries if they wanted to invest.

    The deal would provide relief to the global economy

    The deal provides a major win for the global economy — the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded once passed before the war began. Since then, Iranian attacks on shipping and the threat to vessels effectively shut the strait. 

    The strait’s closure drove up energy prices around the world and made many basics, including food, more expensive. Iran let out some vessels that paid tolls, something never done before in the strait, which has long has been considered an international waterway. The U.S. later provided military support to get other tankers out, but traffic was nowhere near levels before the war. 

    The deal also says the U.S. will lift a blockade imposed on Iranian ports and that the strait will return to its prewar traffic levels in 30 days, while acknowledging Iranian mines may need to be destroyed.

    The deal leaves much more to be resolved in future negotiations

    The interim deal sets a 60-day window, which can be extended, to negotiate over limiting Iran’s nuclear program, which has been discussed at multiple rounds of talks during Trump’s second administration without success. The U.S. promises not to make threats of military action under the current deal after two rounds of talks were interrupted by attacks.

    Featured Image:  A small motorboat passes anchored vessels in the Strait of Hormuz off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Wednesday, June 17, 2026. (Amirhosein Khorgooi/ISNA via AP)

  • Newswire: U.S. is one of three countries to vote against U.N. resolution calling slavery a ‘crime against humanity’

    Newswire: U.S. is one of three countries to vote against U.N. resolution calling slavery a ‘crime against humanity’

    by The Associated Press

    UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday adopted a resolution declaring the trafficking of enslaved Africans “the gravest crime against humanity” and calling for reparations as “a concrete step towards remedying historical wrongs.”

    The resolution also urges “the prompt and unhindered restitution” of cultural items — including artworks, monuments, museum pieces, documents and national archives — to their countries of origin without charge.

    The vote in the 193-member world body was 123-3, with 52 abstentions. Argentina, Israel and the United States were the three members voting against the resolution. The United Kingdom and all 27 members of the European Union were among those that abstained.

    While the United States opposes the past wrongdoing of the transatlantic slave trade and all other forms of slavery, it “does not recognize a legal right to reparations for historical wrongs that were not illegal under international law at the time they occurred,” deputy U.S. ambassador Dan Negrea said before the vote.

    “The United States also strongly objects to the resolution’s attempt to rank crimes against humanity in any type of hierarchy,” he said. “The assertion that some crimes against humanity are less severe than others objectively diminishes the suffering of countless victims and survivors of other atrocities throughout history.”

    In the United States, support for reparations gained momentum in the wake of the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020. However, the issue has been a difficult one and has been caught up in a broader conservative backlash over how race, history and inequality are handled in public institutions.

    Unlike U.N. Security Council resolutions, General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding but are an important reflection of world opinion.

    “Today, we come together in solemn solidarity to affirm truth and pursue a route to healing and reparative justice,” Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama, a key architect of the resolution, said before the vote.

    “The adoption of this resolution serves as a safeguard against forgetting,” he said. “Let it be recorded that when history beckoned, we did what was right for the memory of the millions who suffered the indignity of slavery.”

    Mahama noted that the vote was taking place on the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, honoring the memory of about 13 million African men, women and children enslaved over several centuries.

    Diplomats applauded and some cheered the adoption of the resolution.

    The history of slavery and “its devastating consequences and long-lasting impacts” must never be forgotten, said British acting U.N. Ambassador James Kariuki, speaking on behalf of mainly Western nations, including some that enslaved Africans.

    Western nations are committed to tackling the root causes that persist today, he said, pointing to racial discrimination, racism, xenophobia and intolerance. He said “the scourge of modern slavery” also must be addressed — trafficking, forced labor, sexual exploitation and forced criminality.

    Cyprus’ deputy U.N. ambassador, Gabriella Michaelidou, speaking on behalf of the E.U., echoed the U.S. and U.K. on concerns about “the use of superlatives” that imply “a hierarchy among atrocity crimes.”

    Michaelidou also cited the E.U.’s concern about the resolution’s “unbalanced interpretation of historical events” and legal references that are inaccurate or inconsistent with international law, including “suggestions of a retroactive application of international rules which was non-existent at the time and claims for reparations.”

    The resolution “unequivocally condemns the trafficking of enslaved Africans and racialized chattel enslavement of Africans, slavery and the transatlantic slave trade as the most inhumane and enduring injustice against humanity.”

    In approving the resolution, the General Assembly affirms the importance of addressing the historical wrongs of slavery that promotes “justice, human rights, dignity and healing.”

    The resolution calls on U.N. member nations to engage in talks “on reparatory justice, including a full and formal apology, measures of restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction, guarantees of non-repetition and changes to laws, programs and services to address racism and systemic discrimination.”

    It encourages voluntary contributions to promote education on the transatlantic slave trade and asks the African Union, the Caribbean Community and the Organization of American States to collaborate with U.N. bodies and other nations “on reparatory justice and reconciliation.”