A Diplomatic Solution: The Iran Nuclear Agreement
June 14th, 2017
Join the World Affairs Council in welcoming Dr. Trita Parsi, founder and president of the National Iranian American Council, for a discussion on how the Iran deal was negotiated and concluded, and on his latest book, Losing an Enemy: Obama, Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy.
About the Book:
Drawing from more than seventy-five in-depth interviews with key decision-makers, including Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, Losing an Enemy is the authoritative account of President Obama’s signature foreign policy achievement.
Praised by Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering (former US Under Secretary of State and Ambassador to Russia, the UN, India and Israel) as “insightful, readable and spellbinding,” Losing an Enemy is “a must-read for anyone interested in this seminal subject.” Professor Francis Fukuyama (best-selling author of The End of History) describes the book as a “riveting account of the diplomacy behind Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran".
About the Author:
Trita Parsi is the 2010 recipient of the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order.
He is the founder and president of the National Iranian American Council and an expert on US-Iranian relations, Iranian foreign politics, and the geopolitics of the Middle East. He is the author of Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Iran, Israel and the United States (Yale University Press 2007) and A Single Roll of the Dice – Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran (Yale University Press 2012), a Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2012.
Parsi has followed Middle East politics through work in the field and extensive experience on Capitol Hill and at the United Nations. He is frequently consulted by Western and Asian governments on foreign policy matters. Parsi has worked for the Swedish Permanent Mission to the UN, where he served in the Security Council handling the affairs of Afghanistan, Iraq, Tajikistan and Western Sahara, and in the General Assembly’s Third Committee, addressing human rights in Iran, Afghanistan, Myanmar, and Iraq.
About the moderator:
Nelson Dong is a senior partner at Dorsey & Whitney LLP, an international law firm, and is head of its National Security Group and co-head of its Asia Group. He is a leading practitioner, author and lecturer on international technology law and business issues, particularly U.S.-China cross-border mergers and acquisitions and investment, national security clearances of foreign investments in the United States, and U.S. export controls and economic sanctions. He is an international legal adviser to many companies, professional groups, research universities and independent research institutes, both in the United States and elsewhere. He is a former adjunct professor of international law at Seattle University Law School.
Nelson was a White House Fellow and special assistant to the U.S. Attorney General and served as Deputy Associate Attorney General, and, during the Carter Administration, he helped to support U.S. normalization of relations with China. He serves on the Executive Committee and is the former board chair of the Washington State China Relations Council and is also a director of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. Nelson is a member of the Committee of 100 and the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a graduate of Stanford University and Yale Law School and is a former trustee of Stanford University.