Partial Progress Made in Talks to Revive Iran Nuclear Deal, Iranian Envoy Says

Partial progress has been made in the Vienna talks on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, an Iranian Foreign Ministry official said on Monday. The Iranian diplomat, who spoke to the official Islamic Republic News Agency on condition of anonymity, said that four rounds of “intensive negotiations” had been held in the last few days.

The Spanish diplomat Enrique Mora, who is the European Union envoy coordinating talks with Iran on reviving the nuclear deal, on Monday proposed to the relevant parties some ideas on the outstanding issues based on the latest discussions, and Iran has “conveyed our initial response and considerations as soon as we received the ideas, but the ideas naturally require comprehensive studies,” said the Iranian official. Tehran, he said, would express its final views to EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and the other sides.

Iran signed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with the P5+1 group of world powers – the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, the UK, and the US) plus Germany – in July 2015. The agreement calls for Iran to curb its nuclear program in return for the removal of sanctions on the country. Many of the agreement’s provisions, including the limits set on Iran’s enrichment of uranium, were to expire after 15 years. Former US President Donald Trump pulled Washington out of the agreement in 2018 and reimposed sanctions on Tehran, prompting the latter to violate its own commitments under the pact. Talks on reviving the agreement began in April 2021, were suspended in March 2022 over disagreements between Tehran and Washington, and then started up again on Thursday.