On Monday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani posted a tweet that praised the successful nuclear deal his country just bartered with six world powers. One tiny problem—no such deal has actually been made yet. Talks about an agreement over the terms of Iran’s nuclear program, which started several weeks ago, have dragged on through multiple deadline extensions and unexpected roadblocks. The original deadline for an agreement, June 30, has long passed, and delegations from multiple countries, including the U.S., are still hashing out terms in Vienna right now. It’s unclear when a final deal will be announced. Politico captured Rouhani’s overly hasty tweet, which was removed almost immediately after it was made:
Shortly after noon Eastern time, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani tweeted: “#IranDeal is the victory of diplomacy & mutual respect over the outdated paradigm of exclusion & coercion. And this is a good beginning.”
But less than 15 minutes later, the tweet had been deleted. Rouhani retweeted an earlier message from Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, Secretary of State John Kerry’s negotiating counterpart.
“If #IranDeal reached, triumph of diplomacy means we all will have won when we all could have lost. Plain and simple; no spin needed,” Zarif tweeted.
Rouhani later tweeted a similar statement, prefaced with an “if.”
Oops.
Though the nuclear talks are taking place behind closed doors, Politico reported that some of the obstacles still possibly holding up a final accord include disagreements over the lifting of an arms embargo on Iran and discussion over how to handle Iran’s previous nuclear activity.
