Andrea Mitchell: Iranians ‘Running Circles Around’ Obama Admin. in Nuke Talks

MITCHELL: "I think they're going to finish today but, as Richard was just pointing out, what we're being told is it may be less than what was hoped for. Let's take it back for a moment. Only the Iranians are speaking substantively, Zarif and his deputy foreign minister. They're the only people coming out and saying things other than what you get from an occasional British, German or French foreign minister -- you know, the last ten meters are the hardest. The U.S. is not talking at all, is not briefing, off the record, on the record.

So the bottom line is that the Iranians are running circles around the Americans here in terms of public diplomacy. They're setting the expectations. All the world media is now hinged on what Zarif Javad might say going in or out of breakfast. Today going into breakfast, he said that there has been he believes a substantial progress. At this hour as I just left the building right across from here, the P5+1, the global leaders plus Europe, are all meeting and discussing what was on the table between Zarif and Kerry until 6:05 this morning.

They went all day and all night with the European Union representative Helga Schmid in the middle of this. They're talking about sanctioning. They're talking about whether the EU the unilateral American sanctions that have been imposed mostly under this administration, under Tim Geithner in '09 and 2011, whether those sanctions should be lifted -- not the UN sanctions as the Iranians said late last night -- but the unilateral sanctions; should they be phased out, should they be suspended.

Also talking about the fact that as Zarif said today to all the reporters at breakfast, it looks like what will be announced is less than -- just what has been agreed to, what has not been agreed to and what still needs to be done by June. As you're pointing out, it is self-imposed. They made this deadline because of Congress and now they're stuck with it."