Nuclear talks to last several days then pause: EU official

Talks on rescuing Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal will carry on for several days before breaking so that Iranian and US officials can return home for consultations, a European Union official said on Friday.

The EU is chairing meetings in Vienna of the remaining parties to the deal — Iran, Russia, China, France, Germany and Britain. A delegation from the United States is based in a nearby hotel as Iran has refused to hold direct talks. A second round of talks, which involve discussions in various formats as well as formal meetings of all the remaining parties, started on Thursday. The aim is a US return to the deal, lifting sanctions that were reimposed after its pullout, and undoing Iranian breaches of its nuclear restrictions.

Talks will continue “for a few days and then I think the two most relevant delegations will go back home to receive more precise instructions and then, I don’t know when, we will resume,” the EU official told reporters in a phone briefing. “We have this (Iranian) decision to go for 60% enrichment. Obviously this is not making the negotiation easier,” the official said, calling what happened at Natanz “deliberate sabotage”. —

— AFP Members of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an Iranian opposition group, attend a protest outside a hotel in Vienna where diplomats of the EU, China, Russia and Iran hold their talks.