Iran: Some people consider peace ‘an existential threat …
Story highlights Netanyahu says a deal would open the way for Iran's nuclear weapons Iranian foreign minister says speech had "no effect on the negotiating table"
Christiane Amanpour's full interview with the Iranian foreign minister airs at 7pm London.
"The only explanation that you can have here is that some people consider peace and stability as an existential threat," Javad Zarif told CNN's Christiane Amanpour.
"Because a deal cannot be threatening to anybody unless you want conflict and tension and mistrust and crises."
In a highly controversial speech to the U.S. Congress on Tuesday, Netanyahu said that far from stopping Iran, the deal currently being negotiated in Switzerland would pave Iran's way to nuclear weapons.
Zarif told Amanpour that Netanyahu's speech had "no effect on the negotiating table."
He spoke from Montreux, Switzerland, where Iran, the U.S. and five other countries are trying to hammer out an agreement that would trade sanctions relief for guarantees on Iran's nuclear program.
Zarif told Amanpour that he believed negotiators were "very close" to such a deal, but only if everybody avoided "the path of confrontation."
"Everybody has to make tough choices. We have made the choice to engage in negotiations, although we believe that this entire exercise was unnecessary -- this was a manufactured crisis."
"People have been predicting for the past 20 years that Iran was a year away from making a bomb, and that prediction has been proven wrong time and again," Zarif said.
See the original post:
Iran: Some people consider peace 'an existential threat ...