Iran nuclear talks to continue next week after breakthrough
Talks on the terms for the US and Iran to come back into compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal are to resume next week after making sufficient progress since Tuesday’s breakthrough agreement on a roadmap for both sides.
The US has not been in direct talks with the Iranian delegation in Vienna this week but is relaying messages mainly to European members of the body that oversees the deal.
Iran is insisting all sanctions imposed by the US since 2016, including those classified by the US as non-nuclear-related, must be lifted, and it is not clear whether Iran will take its steps to come back into compliance until it is satisfied that the lifting of the sanctions has had a practical impact on its ability to conduct business, including exporting its oil.
The Trump administration imposed a wall of sanctions on Iran before and after it left the deal in 2018. The US has in the past drawn a distinction between its willingness to lift nuclearrelated sanctions and to retain those not linked to the nuclear deal, such as human rights or terrorism-related sanctions.
“Lifting all US sanctions imposed under the previous US president is a necessary step in reviving the joint comprehensive plan of action [the Iran deal], and only after verifying the lifting of those sanctions Iran will be ready to stop its remedial actions and return to full implementation of the deal,” Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Seyed Araghchi, said at the end of the talks on Friday.
Full-scale talks at the level of foreign ministry deputies will recommence on Wednesday, with technical talks between officials continuing in the interim.
Araghchi said there would be no point in continuing the talks unless there was seriousness on the US side.
“In our view, America has to take its actions in one step, then we’ll verify, and then Iran will follow with its own actions. How verification will happen is another point of our discussion.”
Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency and a member of Iran’s delegation to the talks, said the verification test to satisfy Iran that sanctions had been lifted in practice was that “the Islamic Republic should be able to conclude its oil contracts and export its oil. Or in the banking sector, it can perform its financial transactions through various financial channels.”
Russian and Chinese ambassadors present at the talks spoke of progress at the talks and the need to maintain momentum.
Iran began to scale down its nuclear compliance under the deal after Trump ordered the US withdrawal and what it said was the remaining parties’ failure to protect it from US sanctions.
Under a law passed by the parliament in Tehran last December, the Iranian administration started to produce and store enriched uranium with a 20% purity level, breaking the 3.67% enrichment parameter set by the 2015 nuclear agreement. However, Tehran has repeatedly said its measures will be reversed as soon as Washington removes its sanctions.
In a largely opaque statement, the joint commission, the body that oversees the deal, said: “Participants took stock of the discussions held at various levels since the last joint commission in view of a possible return of the US to the [deal] and discussed modalities to ensure the return to its full and effective implementation.
“The joint commission was briefed on the work of the two expert groups on sanctions lifting and nuclear implementation measures and participants noted the constructive and results-oriented exchanges.”