:00:00. > :00:16.The president was very clear. This had to be a good agreement. No
:00:17. > :00:21.agreement was better than a bad agreement.
:00:22. > :00:30.These negotiations were essentially about curbing Iran's nuclear
:00:31. > :00:32.programme. In return for suspension and then later on lifting of
:00:33. > :00:40.international sanctions against Iran. I think it certainly made
:00:41. > :00:46.doing business much more difficult to have social media everywhere.
:00:47. > :00:52.Those times of eating together and breaking bed together are always
:00:53. > :00:55.useful in building the relationships you need when you are in the midst
:00:56. > :01:05.of such a tough, tough negotiation -- breaking red. I ask everyone to
:01:06. > :02:10.put their iPhone in the fridge. I think from the outset, most people
:02:11. > :02:16.were rather sceptical. And thought the chances to get a deal where
:02:17. > :02:24.below 50% because everything came together, enormous technical
:02:25. > :02:28.difficulties, complicated technical questions, and on the other hand,
:02:29. > :02:33.the political framework, which was also extremely difficult. We had to
:02:34. > :02:42.deal with two challenges, a technical challenge and a political
:02:43. > :02:48.challenge. It is about centrifuges, stabilising, and quickly, you need
:02:49. > :02:50.people who are experts. I'm not an expert. I became a little more
:02:51. > :03:08.knowledgeable. In all of the negotiations, it is
:03:09. > :03:13.not only a negotiation with the run, but within your own government --
:03:14. > :03:18.Iran. It is negotiating with each of the partners sitting at the table,
:03:19. > :03:21.and then with the permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany
:03:22. > :03:27.and the EU have to come to an agreement and then an agreement with
:03:28. > :03:29.Iran. When talks were going on like that, it was ever just a good
:03:30. > :03:35.nightmare for everyone. Journalists included. -- logistical. Every time
:03:36. > :03:43.there was an extension or they mist a deadline. Can you say a few words?
:03:44. > :03:48.Hello, Scott. As soon as our live broadcast was over, we would all
:03:49. > :03:52.rush to the hotel reception, extending our rooms or booking new
:03:53. > :04:41.ones for the next round -- missed a deadline. Good luck.
:04:42. > :04:48.I don't think any of us knew how this process would evolve, but over
:04:49. > :04:54.the two years, the number of people of course grew, that were directly
:04:55. > :04:58.involved in the process, because we had to expand the team according to
:04:59. > :05:06.the needs. But it is also part of our daily bread in terms of the
:05:07. > :05:11.policies and offices Switzerland has provided for the past 150 years, so
:05:12. > :05:15.it is also in edgings. Each time a minister arrived in Geneva, the
:05:16. > :05:21.chief of protocol in Geneva and myself were at the airport greeting
:05:22. > :05:28.the Minister, and our minister always welcomed him with a personal
:05:29. > :05:33.letter and some Swiss chocolate. Obviously when you start to welcome
:05:34. > :05:38.these dignitaries, and the amount of security and the amount of cars that
:05:39. > :05:41.arrived when I was standing in front of the hotel, for some minute you
:05:42. > :05:51.feel like you are looking at a Hollywood movie and being part of
:05:52. > :05:56.it. It all started at the beginning around 17 rooms, bearing in mind
:05:57. > :06:04.that a hotel has 168 rooms. At the end of the talks, the hotel was
:06:05. > :06:09.fully booked. This was the working room, the heart of operations, but
:06:10. > :06:16.also my personal room, because one person had to stay all of the time,
:06:17. > :06:21.24 hours, in this hotel. We kept only one room. I had to transform
:06:22. > :06:25.this room and the working room into the heart of operations. There were
:06:26. > :06:30.about ten persons in this room for the meetings, but also my team came
:06:31. > :06:37.for the day, and they worked day and night in this room. It was a
:06:38. > :06:42.relatively small room for a relatively big group of people, with
:06:43. > :06:49.many computer screens on the table, pizza boxes everywhere. At the end
:06:50. > :07:33.of the day, it felt more like a student's home than a luxury hotel.
:07:34. > :07:39.We weren't surprised at all Wii with the target of intelligence agencies.
:07:40. > :07:42.We used to joke the number of bugs in a room would cancel each other
:07:43. > :07:47.out. Everybody wants to learn about the other side's table before they
:07:48. > :07:51.enter a game, as well as countries interested in the outcome of the
:07:52. > :07:56.process. We knew about the sensitivity of the negotiations, for
:07:57. > :08:00.example, when I had my meetings with my own team, which we had every
:08:01. > :08:04.morning, I asked everyone to put their iPhone in the fridge.
:08:05. > :08:11.Allegations were made, and these allegations are investigated by our
:08:12. > :08:13.federal prosecutor office. And this investigation is still ongoing, so I
:08:14. > :08:44.cannot talk here on the detail. I think it certainly made doing
:08:45. > :08:47.business much more difficult to have social media everywhere, and to have
:08:48. > :08:54.our every movement recounted on Twitter. My wife was always
:08:55. > :09:02.e-mailing me to ask why I was eating pizza on a random Friday night and
:09:03. > :09:06.not getting on a plane home. In Lausanne, the talks were dragging on
:09:07. > :09:11.and on, so once when a European diplomat was coming back to the
:09:12. > :09:18.hotel, I him and said for heavens sake, please told me how many more
:09:19. > :09:21.days you think we might be here --I grabbed him. He came back with a bag
:09:22. > :10:15.People ask whether I got to know the Iranians. We all got to know the
:10:16. > :10:19.Iranians. And whether we started to really understand each other. I have
:10:20. > :10:25.no doubt we understand each other better. You can't spend that many
:10:26. > :10:30.hours with each other and not. We certainly got to know each other's
:10:31. > :10:36.lives. We both became grandparents during this time. And so we shared
:10:37. > :10:42.videos of our grandchildren. That did not change how tough we were
:10:43. > :10:46.with each other in the negotiations, because he had a responsibility to
:10:47. > :10:48.the national interest of his country, and I had a responsibility
:10:49. > :10:54.to the national interest of my country.
:10:55. > :10:59.I got a tipoff from a source that meet the Iranians Foreign Minister
:11:00. > :11:05.had arranged the US counterpart to go and dying in this Persian and
:11:06. > :11:11.strong, experienced Iranians food -- dying. I rushed to that restaurant
:11:12. > :11:20.and sneaked into the place, and guess who I saw? The top brass of US
:11:21. > :11:27.negotiating team in that restaurant dining and eating Persian food.
:11:28. > :11:33.We had the full delegation, John Kerry, we had a phone call saying
:11:34. > :11:34.they were coming to our place, we receive them and they had dinner
:11:35. > :11:44.here. He was leaving. I asked him the
:11:45. > :11:47.population of Iran, they are waiting for this negotiation, I hope you
:11:48. > :11:54.will get success from this negotiation. He told me did you say
:11:55. > :12:00.this to Mr Zarif? I said I didn't, I'm telling it to you. So he said I
:12:01. > :12:02.will call him and tell him what you told me.
:12:03. > :12:09.There were two Mac dining rooms, one for the P5 plus one and the European
:12:10. > :12:14.Union, one for the Iranians, that was in part because our dining room
:12:15. > :12:19.had alcohol. And the Persian dining room did not. But as the talks went
:12:20. > :12:24.on, our Minister Zarif invited several of us to dine with the
:12:25. > :12:27.Iranians team, which was a very good thing to do, and the food was
:12:28. > :12:33.fantastic! And those times of eating together,
:12:34. > :12:38.breaking bread together, always are useful in building the relationships
:12:39. > :12:47.you need when you're in the mixed of such a tough, tough negotiation.
:12:48. > :12:55.In Lausanne, the talks broke for a few days because the Iranians
:12:56. > :13:00.President's mother passed away. The president's brother was a key member
:13:01. > :13:06.of the Iranians negotiating team all throughout the negotiations. On the
:13:07. > :13:11.morning of that day, the US team went to the Iranians counterparts,
:13:12. > :13:46.headed by John Kerry, to consult the president's brother.
:13:47. > :13:54.March, 2015 was a turning point because it was now or never. It took
:13:55. > :14:03.place in Lausanne. We had the framework agreement. But I think
:14:04. > :14:07.Lausanne, where the agreement was in a way crystallised, framed, and then
:14:08. > :14:13.negotiations and the endgame... It was step-by-step.
:14:14. > :14:18.I think what was the hardest part of Lausanne were those last two days
:14:19. > :14:24.when we were trying to drive to a conclusion, no one had any sleep. We
:14:25. > :14:29.thought we might not get there. We thought we were close so we all
:14:30. > :14:35.agreed to stay one more day. And indeed we then got to the parameters
:14:36. > :14:43.that became the basis for the final 27 days in Vienna.
:14:44. > :14:55.I will never forget the moment where the EU told me that they need to
:14:56. > :15:02.organise and go ahead with the press conference. We were waiting for 72
:15:03. > :15:08.hours for this moment. It was a very emotional moment behind the curtain.
:15:09. > :15:22.And then came the moment when they asked me to open the curtain.
:15:23. > :15:30.Today we have taken a decisive step, we have reached solutions on keeper
:15:31. > :15:36.amateurs of a joint comprehensive plan of action.
:15:37. > :16:37.We will make progress, we have made progress and we will make progress.
:16:38. > :16:42.Progress was made on the way forward. We believe we have made
:16:43. > :17:09.progress. We had to make substantial further progress. -- hope to.
:17:10. > :17:15.When Federico Motta in Ewa was chairing a round with the ministers
:17:16. > :17:20.in Vienna during the endgame, when she had a heated argument with the
:17:21. > :17:24.UN Foreign Minister and he said, never threaten an Iranian and the
:17:25. > :17:28.Russian Foreign Minister came in, nor a Russian! Then things calmed
:17:29. > :17:34.down very easily, but we had similar kinds of exchanges. -- Federica
:17:35. > :17:39.Mogherini. We also had walkouts when I stood up and said I'm not going to
:17:40. > :17:43.continue for the day, but then we resumed early the next day. Allows
:17:44. > :17:49.Arif, are you going to have a deal? Are you going to have a deal? We
:17:50. > :17:54.have made progress today. Progress is being made. We are making
:17:55. > :18:20.progress, we need to make more progress.
:18:21. > :18:28.In Vienna, the talks were dragging on and on. They had to write the
:18:29. > :18:32.text of the final deal. And it was proving to be far more difficult
:18:33. > :18:37.than they had anticipated. So they missed the deadline of July the
:18:38. > :18:42.first, then they extended it to July the seventh, then July the 10th.
:18:43. > :18:43.They ended up on a rolling deadline basically.
:18:44. > :18:55.Just before midnight when the Iranians negotiator posted something
:18:56. > :18:59.on his Instagram, the picture of Iranians supreme leader's hand as if
:19:00. > :19:05.he's signing of something -- Iranians. There is no commentary.
:19:06. > :19:07.But that picture was speaking for itself. That's when we thought there
:19:08. > :19:15.might be a deal. Later on our cameraman caught the
:19:16. > :19:21.Iranian negotiating team late night in their room. They were very
:19:22. > :19:24.relaxed, happy and smiley, going through that text, which ended up
:19:25. > :19:34.being the deal. For sure that the deal was done
:19:35. > :19:39.three o'clock in the morning on the 14th of July. This is actually when
:19:40. > :19:43.we finalised the texts. I felt tremendously relieved at that
:19:44. > :19:46.moment. It was so overwhelming that I can't even say it was happy, it
:19:47. > :20:57.was just relief it was done. I think that the Iranians nuclear
:20:58. > :21:02.deal made a huge contribution to solve the nuclear problem in a
:21:03. > :21:09.peaceful way -- Iranians. I'm strongly convinced if we had not
:21:10. > :21:15.reached this solution in summer of 2015 then we would have been
:21:16. > :21:18.confronted with a very difficult situation, including a discussion on
:21:19. > :21:35.military options. When we reached success and it was a
:21:36. > :21:39.private moment for everyone to reflect on what we had done, and
:21:40. > :21:45.each of the ministers made a statement, and every statement was
:21:46. > :21:52.truly eloquent. And Secretary Kerry was the last person to speak. And he
:21:53. > :21:57.recounted that when he was 21 he went off to war in Vietnam. He made
:21:58. > :22:02.a commitment that he would do whatever he could in his life to
:22:03. > :22:11.make sure that there was never wore ever again. And that's what he was
:22:12. > :22:19.about in this negotiation. The room was absolutely still. There was
:22:20. > :22:26.quiet. And then everyone, including the Iranians, applauded. Because I
:22:27. > :22:30.think for all of us we understood that what we had done was to try to
:22:31. > :23:18.ensure peace, not war. A mixed weekend of whether coming
:23:19. > :23:21.up, warm and muddy for some, much pressure for others, wet for a few.
:23:22. > :23:22.It