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00:00Well, President Donald Trump wants a peace agreement with Iran signed today, which happens
00:04to be his 80th birthday, posting that, quote, immediately after it's signed, the Hormuz
00:08Strait will be open to all. But Tehran is giving a different timeline, saying a deal will not be
00:14signed today, but leaving open the possibility that it could come over the next several days.
00:19Of course, all this comes as G7 leaders head to the French Alps for the annual summit, where Iran
00:24is set to be a dominant topic, along with terrorists and Ukraine and European security, as the European
00:32sector deals with inflationary pressures and shaken oil markets from the war in the Middle
00:37East. We're going to go to Abir first. Abir, look, we're hearing different things from different
00:41folks on this timeline, and I'm wondering what you are hearing from the Iranians, from the
00:47Middle East. I've heard that folks from other regional allies are heading to Europe to try
00:51to help facilitate this. But you've got the president very vehemently tweeting, this is
00:55happening today, and messaging from Tehran saying, not so fast. Where is the truth, and
01:00do we know?
01:01Yeah, Christina, look, I mean, we headed into the weekend with some positive sort of sentiment,
01:07thinking this is actually a different time around, that this is going to be signed. What
01:12we're hearing right now is going back to this conflicting statement. So the latest comes from
01:17a Reuters report that suggests that Iran, the MOU that Iran is looking at right now, suggests
01:24diluting the highly enriched uranium within Iran in exchange for $25 billion of frozen assets.
01:32Now, we haven't heard from the American side of things. Reuters does cite a source familiar with
01:39the Iranian negotiating team, but we still have to hear. But look, I mean, even this report,
01:44those two elements, the highly enriched uranium to be destroyed or diluted within Iran, and then $25
01:51billion of assets, those are things that President Trump has not agreed to. When it comes to the
01:56highly enriched uranium, he said he wanted it to be destroyed, whether in Iran or somewhere abroad in
02:02the United States. And Iran hawks in Washington and President Trump have not agreed to let go of those
02:08frozen assets after the 1979 revolution that have been kept in the United States and other places
02:16around the world. So we're still getting conflicting messaging. I know our colleagues are in Geneva and
02:22other places as well to sort of be able to report on the American side. But from the Gulf, for
02:27example,
02:27what we're getting is we know that a Qatari team went to Tehran today to be able to sort of
02:34mend
02:34those differences. Qatar has emerged as a key player in the mediation over the past couple of
02:40weeks or so. We also reported on that alongside Pakistan. And so we're still in wait and see.
02:46I thought or we thought that by now, by Sunday, we're going to be getting a little bit more clarity
02:51on Iran coming to the table and actually this MOU getting signed. The Pakistani Prime Minister
02:57yesterday said that it would be signed electronically within 24 hours. But we're edging more and more
03:03towards it might actually be delayed. And the Strait of Hormuz still effectively shut. President Trump
03:09says that it will be opened as soon as as soon as the deal is signed. But then we're also
03:15not
03:15forgetting about the fact that Iran has mined the Strait of Hormuz and maintains that it wants
03:20management over it once the Strait is is open. So still, the concessions are not being met by both
03:27by both sides. Let's go to the shores of Lake Geneva now to Josh Wingrove, who is missing out on
03:31the
03:32president's birthday celebrations in the UFC fight in the claw. Forgive me, we may have we may have
03:37lost Josh Hugo still on the shores of Lake Geneva. Hugo, great to speak with you. And maybe you can
03:41set the scene for us there in Geneva in the Alps broadly as we look to the start of this
03:46this G7.
03:47Yes, there are a host of economic issues and trade issues likely to be discussed by all the
03:51participants in in that gathering this year. How large does this the conflict in Iran loom over
03:56course of what they're going to be speaking about there? And what meetings does President Trump have
04:00planned on the sidelines here with other non G7 leaders? Well, right up until yesterday,
04:05there was there was speculation that a deal was at hand and there would even be a signing ceremony
04:10here in Geneva hastily convened. And in fact, I flew in from some reporting yesterday morning
04:17to Geneva Airport, and there were four sort of twin rotor helicopters, US US Army helicopters,
04:25plus a massive transport plane that was really kind of setting the scene for a very large presence.
04:33Obviously, President Trump has not yet arrived. And I think the very fact is we were just hearing
04:39that that there is a very much on or off deal means that it's very, very hard to predict what's
04:45going on. But obviously, as you say, the peace talks and finding a solution has dominated
04:53what would otherwise be, you know, a G7 meeting about global cooperation. Because in addition to
04:59whatever the US and Iran managed to negotiate, we have President Macron convening leaders from the
05:07Gulf region here as well. So it's very much not a kind of G7 business as usual type of event
05:14this year.
05:14Hugo, I've seen some comparisons. The last time this G7 met in Evian in France,
05:20it was June 2003. The US had just invaded Iraq over the strident objections of France and Germany.
05:26And President Bush was the one rolling into some chilly handshakes. I mean, this is not a friendly
05:32environment. Obviously, these leaders need the United States are going to put on their friendliest
05:36face to try to convince the president to maintain America's stake in European security. But we've got a
05:43lot of messaging from the White House. We've got announcements and then unannouncements and
05:47reannouncements of NATO troops being pulled back. We've got this messaging that they're going to,
05:50possibly take some of the jets out of the region, which would impact readiness and ability to
05:54respond to conflicts when they do occur. How are leaders approaching this? Is there a united front
06:00among these leaders on how to approach this? And then what do you think the odds are of convincing
06:04the original NATO idea, the original Secretary General said it was to keep Germany down, Russia out,
06:09and the US in? How is that going?
06:12Well, we know that NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte's kind of approach of buttering up the US
06:21president was thought initially to be a successful strategy. And then clearly, one by one, US leaders
06:27have been willing to say, no, we are simply not going to do that. Started with Keir Starmer. And then
06:34you've seen President Merz in, sorry, Premier Merz in Germany do the same thing. So it feels like that
06:40approach where we're going to just go along with whatever Donald Trump says, in order to keep him
06:46on side, that kind of unified front has been sort of undone, picked apart, because they just realized
06:54that even sometimes doing that doesn't guarantee you the results. You just mentioned, you know,
06:58the major plans this week to pull US fighter jets out of Europe. So Mark Rutte's sycophantic approach,
07:09dare I say it?
07:10Maybe appeasement. Yeah, one of those, one of those, yeah.
07:13One of those words, the A word, it has not worked. And so I think you're going to see a
07:20rather,
07:21obviously, we're not going to be in that room, but you're going to see a less than united front.
07:25And so it'll be, it'll be the mood music, and it will be whether they can manage to achieve any
07:29kind
07:30of agreement on a communique coming out of the meeting that will clearly be parsed very closely
07:36by those looking for signs that, that, that friendly coalition or, or sort of mutual willingness
07:46to work together has really fallen apart definitively.
07:49Here in the US, the president's distaste for the JCPOA is, is pretty evident, pretty palpable.
07:54And he tweeted about that yesterday, that this deal is not that, that was a smooth,
07:57beautiful road to a nuclear weapon, to paraphrase him, his deal, whatever that may be, is not.
08:03I'm curious how large the historical resonance is at this moment, how much leaders throughout
08:08the Middle East are talking about getting back to something like the JCPOA. Is it,
08:12is it something that they're trying to avoid as assiduously as, as President Trump is?
08:16Yeah, well, look, I mean, the current deal or the NYU, the 14 provisions that were leaked by
08:23semi-official media in Iran yesterday, suggests that a lot of the concessions that are on the
08:30table may actually be worse off. So a lot of it plays into Iran's favor. So the two things that
08:36President Trump wants to get through the line is for Iran to never, never be able to get a hold
08:41of a
08:41nuclear weapon. But the thing is, Iran has always maintained that it wasn't going to get a nuclear
08:47weapon. I know a lot of people talk about the fatwa that was issued during the late Supreme
08:54Leader's time. But that is, you know, we don't know if that fatwa dies with him. And that is sort
08:59of an Islamic way of getting things done in Iran. But we don't know if that fatwa dies with him,
09:07or if it is still pretty much the case. Now, there's a body of 88 clerks that kind of come
09:12comes up with those, with those fatwas. And we haven't heard since his death, if that changes. So
09:18for the time being, what we know is that Iran is still not going to get a nuclear weapon or
09:24is not
09:24seeking to get a nuclear weapon. And then the other thing that the US would win out of this is
09:29the
09:29opening of the Strait of Hormuz. And arguably, the Strait of Hormuz was pretty open for business before
09:34this whole thing started late in February. The other concessions, our own teams and then wider
09:40analysts say that they all play into Iran's favor. So the unblocking of the 25 or 24 billion dollars of
09:48frozen assets, removing the oil sanctions, the rebuilding of Iran. Again, that leaked statement
09:54suggested that Iran was asking for about 300 billion dollars in damages to rebuild the country
10:01economically. So a lot of the consensus here is, well, how does this deal leave us better than what
10:08happened under President Obama, the GCPOA? And then the main thing that President Trump wanted to
10:15change was a regime change. Now, he said that we're dealing with a different regime in Iran,
10:21but ultimately, it is still, you know, the son of the late Supreme Leader that is making the ultimate
10:27decisions here. And so, you know, the consensus is still about whether this is actually better off
10:35than what we had a few years ago under President Obama or not. We just don't know yet what concessions
10:42are going to be met. So we'll have to wait and see again. And Hugo, that's a question that some
10:45European leaders have voiced pretty openly, including Marz of Germany, who, you know, said that essentially
10:52Trump was being played by Iranian negotiators earlier in this process. Those comments are still
10:57kind of hanging over this summit. I want to I want you to run us through who the president is
11:02meeting with and who he's not meeting with, because he's having bilats with some of these
11:06leaders, but he's not having bilats or even meetings on the sides of the G7 with some pretty
11:10significant figures, including Benjamin Netanyahu and Zelensky. They're having like a working group,
11:14but they're not having a one on one. You know, I think it's it's the final agenda. But I mean,
11:22I think it's still very fluid because everything will be overshadowed by a deal or the failure to
11:28get a deal. And that, I think, is something he really wants to be able to bring. So if he's
11:33got
11:34a deal, he's going to want to trumpet that. And I can imagine that some of those bilaterals are going
11:38to be set aside. But yeah, clearly, he does not take well to being criticized by the likes of
11:46by Merz. And I don't know the latest if he's if he was supposed to have a bilateral with him.
11:52But
11:52but I think those kind of comments about President Trump getting played are likely to see him snub.
11:58And obviously, as the leader of the most powerful economy and military in the world,
12:03he has that that prerogative. And we've seen we've seen him do it in the past. So
12:08it's it's going to be very interesting. Compressed time timing that he has focused so much on getting
12:15a deal across the line means that really is I think his focus and then those of his advisors
12:19is almost only going to shift onto the conventional G7 schedule and those bilateral meetings compared
12:27to, you know, the Iran focus. We were talking about the sycophancy with Mark Rutte. The president
12:32is going to go to Versailles, I gather, at the end of this for a one on one with Macron
12:36as well. So
12:36there is I guess that's not a formal byline at the summit, but something happening on the heels of
12:40this as well. Also, this is this plays into what these leaders have found to be effective with
12:44President Trump. A lot of pop and circumstance, a lot of gilded moldings, a nice, a nice ceremony,
12:49and then maybe convincing him of what they want. Abir, I also want to ask you, there is news that
12:56the
12:57former Supreme Leader of Iran is likely to be buried. I think in the next week, they're going to have
13:02a
13:02funeral service for him. Where has that body been this whole time? Do we know? And is it significant
13:08that it's a bit back to business as usual, that the Iranian regime, whatever that may be at this
13:13point, feels comfortable holding that kind of a ceremony? Yeah, I was reading that over yesterday
13:20and that the burial is going to take place later or over next week. So we don't know where the
13:26body
13:27has been held. The Iranian regime keeps those details pretty, pretty secretive, just like the
13:32location of the current Supreme Leader, Mustafa Khamenei, has been a secret since the outbreak of
13:39this war late in February. And so, look, again, we don't know the details. We know that previously
13:46burials or funerals held for such leaders have brought in millions of people. We don't know how
13:53that's going to take shape under the current circumstances in Iran. But yeah, that is
13:59essentially what the Iranian regime had said, what it has suggested, that it will just happen next
14:04week at some point. Not further details, I'm afraid, Christina.
14:09Thank you very much. Thanks to Hugo as well. We'll find Josh Wingrove.
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