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President Barack Obama in the Oval Office. Evan Vucci/AP hide caption

President Barack Obama in the Oval Office.

President Obama says reaching a long-term deal with Iran is the best way to assure that the country does not attain a nuclear weapon.

Obama made the comments in interview with Reuters, just a day before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to speak to a joint meeting of Congress in which he will lay out his reasons for opposing a diplomatic deal with its enemy.

The wire service reports:

"'If, in fact, Iran is willing to agree to double-digit years of keeping their program where it is right now and, in fact, rolling back elements of it that currently exist ... if we've got that, and we've got a way of verifying that, there's no other steps we can take that would give us such assurance that they don't have a nuclear weapon,' he said.

"The U.S. goal is to make sure 'there's at least a year between us seeing them try to get a nuclear weapon and them actually being able to obtain one,' Obama said."

As we've reported, Netanyahu's speech has become greatly controversial. The White House said it was left out of its planning and eventually said Obama would not meet with Netanyahu because it did not want to appear like it was meddling with the country's upcoming elections.

Obama's National Security Adviser Susan Rice called the speech "destructive to the fabric of U.S.-Israeli ties."

Reuters asked Obama about that line.

Originally posted here:
Obama Says Iran Should Commit To 10-Year Freeze Of Nuclear Program