TEHRAN —
The
EU’s coordinator for talks to restore the Iran nuclear deal, Enrique Mora,
said he was hoping to close gaps in the negotiations ahead of his expected
arrival Saturday in Tehran.
اضافة اعلان
Iran has been
engaged in negotiations to revive the accord with the UK, China, France,
Germany, and Russia directly and the US indirectly since April 2021.
The EU diplomat,
who coordinates talks between Iran and the
US, is due to arrive in Tehran on
Saturday night, state news agency IRNA reported. He is scheduled to meet Iran’s
chief nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri on Sunday.
“Working on
closing the remaining gaps in the
#ViennaTalks on the
#JCPOA,” Mora tweeted
ahead of his trip. “We must conclude this negotiation. Much is at stake.”
Concerned parties
have signaled for weeks that the negotiations are close to an agreement, but
that “political decisions” are required from Tehran and Washington.
Western parties
have been pushing for the talks to be concluded “urgently” given the
accelerated pace of
Iran’s nuclear program.
Following the US’
unilateral withdrawal from the deal in 2018 and the re-imposition of crippling
economic sanctions, Iran began rolling back on most of its commitments under
the accord from 2019.
The negotiations
have been paused since March 11, after Russia demanded guarantees that Western
sanctions imposed on it following its invasion of Ukraine would not damage its
trade with Iran.
Days later,
Russian Foreign Minister
Sergei Lavrov said during a joint news conference with
his visiting Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian that Moscow had
received the guarantees.
Consultations
between
Amir-Abdollahian and his counterparts had continued since delegations
returned to their capitals, IRNA said.
The 2015 agreement
gave Iran much-needed sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear
program that would guarantee that Tehran could not develop a nuclear weapon —
something it has always denied wanting to do.
During the
negotiations, Iran has repeatedly called for guarantees from the US that there
will be no repeat of its 2018 pullout.
That is one of two
key demands that experts believe Iran is holding out for, with other being the
removal of its
Revolutionary Guards from a US terrorist blacklist.
The US said on
Tuesday that it was now up to Iran to make hard decisions in order to restore
the deal.
“The onus is on
Tehran to make decisions that it might consider difficult,” State Department
spokesman
Ned Price said.
“There are a
number of difficult issues that we are still trying to work through.”
Iran’s top
diplomat reiterated on Wednesday calls for the US to take steps to conclude the
deal.
“Although
Americans claim that they are interested in resolving issues and reaching an
agreement, they must also show goodwill in practice,” Amir-Abdollahian said.
Tehran would not
give up its “red lines, which are not sacrificing the interests and rights of
the people”, he added.
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