doesed parchin deal -- does the parchin deal, does the parchin side deal, secret side deal, does this hurt the iaea? i don't think the administration necessarily is looking to hurt the organization. but do you think it does? david: the short answer is i'm worried it does. but i think there needs to be some background. the united states has tremendous influence with the iaea. but it doesn't pull its strength. and kind of as a background, i don't know if you remember in the press there was discussion that the negotiators were going to put in -- create a list of sites and people that the iaea would get access to. and that that was going to be kind of -- the reporting was it was going to be hard-wired into the deal. they went to the iaea and they said, look, we have our own list. in essence, kind of pushing back. i don't think the negotiators really knew what to do. so, i would think that this iran-iaea deal was not done with the approval of the united states. again, this is just my own experience. i don't think they would have said, go do this. they have been pretty clear in meetings i'v

to parchin. they don't -- some of them don't think anything will be found. lee: i want to be clear, the u.s. does or the iaea does? david: the u.s. wants access the iaea to have access to parchin. they want the iaea to have access to other sites that are associated with p.m.d. and the reason is simple. iran can't create precedents that sites in iran are off limits. the safeguards agreements do not distinguish between military and civilian sites. under the traditional safeguards agreement, the iaea can go where it needs to go and there's no such distinction. it can ask to go to a military site. the board wouldn't have said, you can't do that because it's a military site. it never would have done that. so the united states has strongly wanted to have the precedent set that iran can't deny access. but they want a deal. and so this gets into a very complicated debate. how's the u.s. going to react? i think part of the problem i've seen from, again from europe is that i think both sides are so distort

you're not going to change this iaea parchin deal or iaea-iran parchin deal. it's in place. they can try to make the best of it. they can then try to get access to other sites. they can do a rigorous job on the verification of the possible military dimensions issue. and try to come out of this with the strongest report possible in december and that can withstand criticism. lee: omri, i think you wanted to follow up. omri: this issue of what the white house was telling -- you know, most of the think tanks in this city have attempted to work with the administration in order to point out flaws over the previous two years and so on. that's happened both on the nuclear side, the stuff that david works on, but also in the context of the sanctions regime and so on. and there really was, the dynamic really did develop where the white house would be telling its validaters, these n.g.o.'s, one thing, and would be telling these experts that were trying to contribute a different thing. experts would show up with concerns like p.m.d.'s, with concerns like, you know, the iranians will pus

o again, if you cannot get international inspectors into parchin, where they did that work, what makes us believe that in the future we'll have international inspectors, once that's the established premise, go anywhere else? go anywhere else. as haden said, requiring consultations between the world powers and iran takes inspections from the technical level and puts it at the political level which we he lls a formula for chaos, obfuscation, ambiguity, and doubt. and we do not even know how bad

under the agreement if iran complies the iaea will again gain being a stows parchin. however, iran gets nothing in the way of sanctions relief if it does not address these unanswered questions to the satisfaction. iaea. -- of the iaea. some critics have also suggested that the iaea has outsourced iran its inspection of parchin the most.i have been briefed extensively on this matter in a class fight setting and those briefings are consistent with the conclusion of iaea director general ukia amano. he has stated that the agreement is technically sound and does not compromise the iaea's safeguard standards in any way. secretary moniz has further assured me of this fact. we know the iranians have repeatedly attempted to eradicate any sign of their activities at the parchin site. thus, it is likely that any significant p.m.d. activities have occurred there in the last four years. we do not know what signs of past activities will remain at the site. importantly, the iaea will be able to confirm whether there is any ongoing nuclear activity at that location. critics of the a

it is suspected that triggers for nuclear weapons had been tested at that parchin site., the iaea -- through statements and through our own conversations with at least one staffer there -- now confirms something quite controversial, that the samples to be tested from the facility were taken by iranians themselves with no iaea staffers present. also that visit by amano to parchin might not prove too much either. first of all, it was brief. secondly, they admitted -- the iaea -- that the building was basically empty. there had been reports prior to this stop that, in fact, the entire site had been, quote, extensively cleaned. now remember, in an agreement signed by secretary of state kerry and others in july, the iaea has until just the middle of next month to finish its investigation into iran's alleged nuclear weapons program which might have been going on for years. at the same time, the u.s. will identify which sanctions will be lifted and when. and then it'll be just another two months before the iaea potentially could give iran a clean bill of health. iran has to dem

iaea weapons inspectors will be denied physical access to parchin. now you note, mr. president, that i say, according to press reports. that's because the actual agreement between the iaea and iran is secret and has been withheld from congress. as a member of the intelligencee committee i have been briefed on the agreement but like every other member of congress, i have been denied access to the actual document despite how significant thisnt issue is. the actual text matters becausel of iran's repeated efforts to exploit loopholes and particularly in light of press reports on what is in that document. forth, mr. president, iran iss not required to ratify the additional protocol before sanctions relief is granted. if ever. the additional protocol allows thes iaea permanent inspection access to declare and suspected nuclear sites in a country in a order to detect covert nuclear activity. ratification of the protocol would make the ap permanently, and legally binding in iran. 126 countries including our country have already ratified the additional protocol. yet the agree

physical access by the iaea to parchin is critical to understanding iran's past bomb work. this is where iran constructed a large explosives containment vessel, to quote the iaea. and why did they do it? to conduct experiments related to the development say the international inspectors, of nuclear weapons. iran has blocked their access, the international inspectors' access, to parchin for years, and in the meantime we are told by those inspectors that they watch on spy satellite as iran bulldozes and paves over the site. and then paves over the site again. if the international inspectors cannot attain a clear understanding of the experimentation that took place, then the united states will have great difficulty figuring out how long it would take iran to rush towards a nuclear weapon. in recent congressional testimony, administration officials expressed confidence in their access to suspicious sites that the agreement provides the iaea. yet these separate angments -- arrangements have the potential to seriously weaken our ability to verify the agreement as a whole if it is

under the agreement, if iran complies, the iaea will again gain being a stows parchin. however, iran gets nothing in the way of sanctions relief if it does not address these unanswered questions to the satisfaction. iaea. -- of the iaea. some critics have also suggested that the iaea has outsourced iran its inspection of parchin, the mos.i have been briefed exty on this matter in a class fight setting and those briefings are consistent with the conclusion of iaea director general ukia amano. he has stated that the agreement is technically sound and does not compromise the iaea's safeguard standards in any way. secretary moniz has further assured me of this fact. we know the iranians have repeatedly attempted to eradicate any sign of their activities at the parchin site. thus, it is likely that any significant p.m.d. activities have occurred there in the last four years. we do not know what signs of past activities will remain at the site. importantly, the iaea will be able to confirm whether there is any ongoing nuclear activity at that location. critics of the arrangem

o again, if you cannot get international inspectors into parchin, where they did that work, what makes us believe that in the future we'll have international inspectors, once that's the established premise, go anywhere else? go anywhere else. as haden said, requiring consultations between the world powers and iran takes inspections from the technical level and puts it at the political level which we he lls a formula for chaos, obfuscation, ambiguity, and doubt. and we do not even know how bad the capitulation was in the side agreement a kitchlation that will undermine the ability to catch iranians cheating. that's why we're concerned about the way this was negotiated. but i'll reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california eserves. the gentleman from california. mr. royce: let me go now and yield three minutes if i could, mr. speaker to the gentleman from kansas, mr. pompeo, the author of house resolution 411. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. pompeo: thank you, mr. speaker, and thank you, chairman royce.

back sanctions over something that's proven or was acceptable in a highly controversial case like parchin? i would worry that the europeans may not stick with the united states. i think the u.s. will vote to snap back. but i think there's worry the united states -- the others may not. certainly you can't count on russia and china. you just need one of the three to say, maybe we're not going to go with this. so i think it's also in the long-term, it's a problem -- the long term, it's a problem. finally, we want the iaea to be as strong as it can be. it can be incredibly strong. in north korea they nailed the north koreans to the wall with environmental sampling and other evidence to say they had an undeclared production of plutonium and separation of plutonium. they didn't know how much, but they had them cold. there have been other cases where they've done. that they caught them despite modification. but, iran's gotten better at modification. it's certainly learned. and i think we can't -- i think the electric example actually proves the case that you have to worry more about parchin. it

no one can get in parchin. why would the iranians insist on this arrangement in an agreement that no one can get in parchin. they intend to cheat and they intend to do it at parchin. they have gotten away with a lot of things at parchin in the past and so they want to protect it. all of these things argue for no agreement being better than a bad agreement, which this is. let me talk about just a couple of the things, and there has been a lot of time spent on them. this situation regarding the money is just -- i don't understand how people can talk about signing onto this agreement when you're talking about what's going to happen with the money that's going to be freed up to iran. there's $150 billion going to be freed up. now, you will get people to say well, this isn't that much because they owe this, it's dedicated here, what have you, so let's just take the $50 billion that everybody -- i think they say $54 billion, but let's take $50 billion, $50 billion. in iran, this is not small change. here in the unite

physical access by the iaea to parchin is critical to understanding iran's past bomb work. this is where iran constructed a large explosives containment vessel, to quote the iaea. and why did they do it? to conduct experiments related to the development say the international inspectors, of nuclear weapons. iran has blocked their access, the international inspectors' access, to parchin for years, and in the meantime we are told by those inspectors that they watch on spy satellite as iran bulldozes and paves over the site. and then paves over the site again. if the international inspectors cannot attain a clear understanding of the experimentation that took place, then the united states will have great difficulty figuring out how long it would take iran to rush towards a nuclear weapon. in recent congressional testimony, administration officials expressed confidence in their access to suspicious sites that the agreement provides the iaea. yet these separate angments -- arrangements have the potential to seriously weaken our ability to verify the agreement as a whole if it is

iaea weapons inspectors will be denied physical access to parchin. now, you know, mr.president, that i say according to press reports. that's because the actual agreement between the iaea and iran is secret and has been withheld from congress. as a member of the intelligence committee, i have been briefed on the agreement, but like every other member of congress, i have been denied access to the actual document despite how significant this issue is. the actual text matters because of iran's repeated efforts to exploit loopholes and particularly in light of press reports on what is in that document. fourth, mr. president, iran is not required to ratify the additional protocol before sanctions relief is granted, if ever. the additional protocol allows the iaea permanent inspection access to declare and suspected nuclear sites in a country in order to detect covert nuclear activities. ratification of the protocol would make the a.p. permanently and legally binding in iran. 126 countries, including our country, have already ratified the additional protocol. yet, the agreem

at a broader level if verification standards have been diluted for parchin or elsewhere and limits imposed, the ramifications is significant as it will affect the iaea's ability to draw definitive conclusions with the requisite level of assurances and without undue hampering of the verification process." unquote. that's troubling. regarding these troubling reports, i have a number of outstanding questions and concerns that have only been amplified by the obama administration's steadfast refusal to share the text of the agreement with congress. this intransigence amounts to an evasion of the spirit and possibly the text of the bipartisan of the iran nuclear agreement review act, a development that rightfully sows doubt and concern about what else the obama administration might be hiding. in light of these incredible concessions to the iranian regime, i am very, very concerned about a number of other factors. and i have to say i'm also deeply troubled by the great benefits the iranian regime stands to enjoy from this deal. to use the succinct words of one scholar -- quote -- "president obama

the trip included a visit to the contentious parchin site. first time the agency last been able to visit the site. >>> a car bomb has exploded at the gates of somalia's presidential palace, at least five people were killed in the capital mogadishu. as yet no claim of responsibility. the palace is the official home of the president prime minister and parliament speaker. >>> stocks have suffered their biggesbiggest fall ever of volk. facing more questions over whether i.t. happened in europe as well. jonah hull reports. >> this was the frankfurt international motor show on monday, the volkswagen stand under the bonnet a dark secret, revealed last week by the environmental protection agency in the united states. volkswagen it says has been falsifying data for years to embellish the clean air credentials of its much prized turbodiesel tdi engine. in early trading on monday the company's stock lost to up to a quarter of its value. >> translator: at the time cost vast amounts of money and there is a threat not just of fines but also class action la

we have got self-inspections by the iranian regime with respect to parchin, which is the one military site where we know, we know that the iranians, because of 1,000 pages of documents, did most of their bomb work. and they say now, no, no, no. we'll do the inspections. we'll turn that stuff over, but nobody's going into our military sites. that's the argument they are making. and the sunset clause in this means the key parts of this deal expire at the end of the deal. so, we've got prominent sanctions relief for the iranian regime, relief that's going to go into their military in exchange for temporary constraints on iran's nuclear program. and the restrictions on iran's missile program designed to deliver those weapons -- now, this came up in the 11th hour of this negotiation, no one anticipated it being in the agreement. at the 11th hour the russians came forward and on behalf of the iranians said we want the lifting of the sanctions, international sanctions that the community has on the icbm program and on the arms transfers. with respect to iran. and unbelievably we ended up gett

that's not going to happen at purge parchin. a long-term intrusive and verification regime. 83 senators said this to the president. that's not going to happen at parchin, either. these kipped of absurd ip specks go much further than the parchin inspection side deal and they are the side deal why so much merps reject this overwhelmingly. when we agreed to lift captions on general soleimani, the head of the quds force, that wasn't a concession. that of the a humiliation. as senator ernst said last night, tws a slap in the face of our veterans, many of whom were killed by i.e.d. z's supplied by general soleimani. when the leader of russia, one of our so-called international partners, met with general soleimani recently to discuss arms transfers, that wasn't a concession. that was an outrage. when the united states in the president's agreement states that it wants a -- quote -- "new relationship with iran" and they don't respond in kind in the agreement but real estate spond b-- but respond by saying "death to america" in their week

what we are informed of is iran is going to do its own inspection at parchin, without full ability to inspect these sites. we will be verifying in the dark just as we were with north korea. the eye tolla is demanding sanctions be lifted before iran dismantles its nuclear infrastructure. in short, the supreme leader says he isn't going to let the inspectors and yet he wants sanctions relief that he could funnel into terrorist groups that he funds including hezbollah and hamas. just like north korea, iran wants its rewards up front. and again like north korea, what is iran glanding? the best prize of all, the stamp of international legitimacy for its nuclear program. the truly stunning thing about this nuclear deal even if iran fulfills all of its commitments in a few short years they will be free from restraints and have international blessing for iran's nuclear program and will have billions of dollars that -- in my opinion what will they use it, destabilizing the region. their military controls the contracts. not too late to stop iran from getting nuclear weapons. but to do so we nee

thousand pages of bombwork that the iaea had in its possession that iran supposedly conducted at parchin was to get iran to answer these questions and to this day, to my knowledge, scientists in iran are not available to answer these questions. now perhaps if we obtain these documents, these two side agreement, we will have the details that assure us that finally these 12 questions have been answered but i can tell you during the interim agreement, we only got half of the first question answered and after that, iran shut it down. there was to be no more discussion about their past bomb work. i yield two minutes to the gentleman from mississippi, mr. trent kelly. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from mississippi is recognized for two minutes. mr. kelly: mr. speaker, i rise today to voice my opposition to the iran nuclear agreement. i ask for unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. i thank the gentleman from california for yielding to me and on the eve of september 11, i remember the american lives lost to terrorism and the unfortunate reality that people want to do americ

inspections at military sites bike par chin -- like parchin where the iranians have concealed suspect elements of their nuclear weapons program in the past are not covered by this agreement. the american people have been told not to concern themselves with this. there are secret side agreements between iran and the iaea which are elected representatives -- which our elected representatives in congress cannot see either. it's not clear any obama administration officials have seen the final text of these side deals either. the iranians continue to insist, and i quote, there will be no access to any military sites, and in at least some crucial cases relating to past activities, the regime will be inspecting itself. that is historic. historically misguided. the value of this agreement and the veracity of president's claims about it rest on the inspections regime contained within it. inspectors need to know what iran has done in the it's so -- in the past so they have a baseline against which to assess whether the country is cheating this the country. secretary kerry seemed to understand t

international atomic energy agency, yukiyo amano, said he now has environmental samples from the parchinitary site. but, he also acknowledged that renovations may obscure what actually went on there. the u.s. presidential race will have one less candidate. wisconsin governor scott walker is quitting the republican nomination contest. he initially led the polls in iowa, but has since fallen far back in the pack. 15 republicans are still in the race. volkswagen stock plunged today after the company admitted it rigged u.s. emissions tests of its diesel vehicles. v.w. shares fell nearly 20% in trading across europe. analysts in frankfurt said that should come as no surprise. >> ( translated ): there is a giant scandal and it has arrived as a shock even here. the management of v.w. already confessed to this and now there is a threat of several billion dollars worth of penalties and the shares plunged accordingly. >> ifill: bloomberg reported today the justice department has opened a criminal investigation of volkswagen. and germany said it will investigate whether v.w. falsified emissions res

we have got self-inspections by the iranian regime with respect to parchin, which is the one military site where we know, we know that the iranians, because of 1,000 pages of documents, did most of their bomb work. and they say now, no, no, no. we'll do the inspections. we'll turn that stuff over, but nobody's going into our military sites. that's the argument they are making. and the sunset clause in this means the key parts of this deal expire at the end of the deal. so, we've got prominent sanctions relief for the iranian regime, relief that's going to go into their military in exchange for temporary constraints on iran's nuclear program. and the restrictions on iran's missile program designed to deliver those weapons -- now, this came up in the 11th hour of this negotiation, no one anticipated it being in the agreement. at the 11th hour the russians came forward and on behalf of the iranians said we want the lifting of the sanctions, international sanctions that the community has on the icbm program and on the arms transfers. with respect to iran. and unbelievably we ended up gett

been leaked about them, is that pertain to the actual inspection process at important sites like parchin. i would hope that my colleagues would review every word of the process with something so important to our national security, and that in and of itself i would say is a reason to be highly skeptical of this agreement, along with the other issues that i have raised. finally, we have a long history in this body of debating important international agreements, including agreements that deal with they fundamental -- very fundamental >> >> we have a long history of debating in a bipartisan manner and to work in a bipartisan manner to improve agreements but yet here we are left in a position where a majority of the united states said it come on a bipartisan basis, has said he has serious reservations about this agreement and have declared they will vote against this agreement but yet the administration is continuing to push forward to get this done to make sure this agreement is fully implemented without reaching out in a bipartisan fashion to insurer to be sure it is so important for nation

critics of the arrangement to inspect parchin have also suggested that the iaea has entered into a secretside deal with iran. in fact, the united states and all of the other n.p.t. countries, nonproliferation treaty countries, have confidential agreements with iaea which cannot be shared. these agreements vary by country but are designed to protect the integrity of the iaea inspection process and the sensitive technical and design information about peaceful national nuclear programs. the iaea and the obama administration have taken extraordinary steps to brief congress this agreement and classified setting. these agreements have been informative and helpful to understand more fully what we can expect in the months and years ahead. now i would like to discuss at this point the topic of the arms embargo and missile sanctions, which is part of this arrangement. like of many my colleagues, i remain concerned about the elements of this agreement that relate to these issues. the inclusion of these provisions in the jcpoa is directly related to the fact that the united states secure these measur

been leaked about them, is that pertain to the actual inspection process at important sites like parchin. i would hope that my colleagues would review every word of the process with something so important to our national security, and that in and of itself i would say is a reason to be highly skeptical of this agreement, along with the other issues that i have raised. finally, we have a long history in this body of debating important international agreements, including agreements that deal with they fundamental -- very fundamental foreign policy, including nuclear nonproliferation, nontreaty issues, and we have a long history of actually debating these in a nonpartisan manner and working in a non partisan manner to approve agreements. yet in this agreement we are left in a position where a majority of the united states senate on a bipartisan basis has said that we have serious reservations about this agreement and have declared that they're going to vote against this agreement. and yet the administration is continuing to push forward to get this done to make sure that this agreement is f

as you know, i mean you certainly heard orally the presentation regarding how we are dealing with parchin. actually a pretty amazing after the ap report came out how this has actually survived late-night comedy. we know that if the iaea gives a report on iran's previous military dimension i think you know iran is supposed to be supplying the iaea information and access to scientists regarding what they were doing, but regardless of what the quality of this is, if it's a d- report or in a+ report from the fact is they still get the sanctions relief that they're seeking over the next nine months. in addition to that, the inspections process, we've all had concerns about the fact that you have to wait 24 days -- by the way, there's a lot of misunderstanding about the 24 days. that is after the iaea raises a concern. that is after iran response to the. some people of written they can take as much as 40-45 days for this to occur, but then there's a 24 day period. our leader referred to the ir-1. iran has done a masterful job because they've gotten to p5+1 to focus on their ir-1 centrifuges. 19

you know, i mean, you have certainly heard orally the presentation regarding how we're dealing with parchin. it's really pretty amazing after the a.p. report came out how this has actually survived late-night comedy. we know that if the iaea gives a report on iran's previous military dimensions, i think you know iran is supposed to be supplying the iaea information and access to scientists regarding what they were doing, but regardless of what the quality of this is, if it's a d-minus report or an a-plus report, the fact is they still get the sanctions relief that they're seeking over the next nine months. in addition to that, the inspections process. we've all had concerns about the fact that you have to wait 24 days. by the way, there is a lot of misunderstanding about the 24 days. that is after the iaea raises a concern. that is after iran responds to that. some people have written it could take as much as 40 to 45 days for this to occur. but then there is a 24-day period. our leader referred to the ir-1's. iran has done a masterful job because they have gotten the p-5 plus 1 to focus on

embarrassingly weak, it gets worse, when one considers the secret side deals that prevent inspection of the parchin military complex and allow iran to inspect itself. this is not the any time, anywhere inspections the administration claimed it was pursuing. the fact is that in spite of claims of the administration, this agreement is not built on verification, it is built on trust. it requires us to trust a regime that is the largest exporter of terrorism in the world, that has already violated the interim nuclear agreement and whose supreme leader just today stated that israel will not exist in 25 years. mr. speaker, as the president himself has said, no deal is better than a bad deal. mr. speaker, this is a bad deal. and i urge my colleagues to reject it and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from virginia is recognized. the gentleman from virginia is recognized. mr. connolly: thank you, mr. speaker. i now recognize my friend, mr. cohen of tennessee, for two minutes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman f

itself by conducting its own inspections and collect samples on the secretive military facilities in parchinhere much of the military dimensions of its nuclear program had been carried out. i also oppose a last minute decision to lift the embargo on conventional arms and ballistic missiles. this is what general martin dempsey, chairman, joint chiefs of staff, testified before the senate armed services committee in july that, quote, we should under no circumstances relief pressure on iran relative to ballistic missile capabilities and arms trafficking, end of quote. so they didn't listen to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. so under this agreement after just five years, the conventional arms embargo would be lifted. after just eight years the ballistic missile embargo will be lifted. iran has long sought the technology to develop intercontinental ballistic missiles which would be a direct threat to the united states and our allies. and iran's past arms trafficking to the hezbollah, hamas, and other terrorist organizations has long threatened the state of israel. other middle eastern