Zarif: Iran, World Powers Narrowing Differences, Getting Ready to Draft Final Accord

(FNA)- Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said both Iran and the six major world powers are doing their best to remove all obstacles in the way of reaching a final agreement, and expressed the hope that the present talks in Vienna would lead to the start of drafting a final deal in the next round of the negotiations.

“This round of talks is probably the last time (we) review important issues....,” Zarif wrote on his Facebook page on Tuesday after holding talks with representatives from the world powers – the United States, France, Britain, Russia, China and Germany.

“From the next round, we will start drafting a final agreement which will be a complicated, tough and slow process,” he added.

Zarif said he has set up a committee of prominent experts to help Iranian negotiators in drafting the final deal.

In relevant remarks on Tuesday, senior Iranian negotiator Seyed Abbas Araqchi voiced satisfaction in the progressive trend of the third round of talks between Iran and the Group5+1 (the five Permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany) in Vienna. 

“Discussions were useful, constructive and were made in good atmosphere,” Araqchi said at the end of the first day of talks with the Sextet of the world powers in Vienna.

Araqchi went on to say that there are different viewpoints regarding the time frame for the completion of the talks but a final agreement is possible in less than six months.

Representatives of Iran and the G5+1 started the third round of talks on a comprehensive nuclear agreement in Vienna on Tuesday morning. The fresh round of talks comes after a breakthrough temporary deal between Tehran and the sextet in Geneva in November followed by two rounds of talks between experts of Iran and the six power and two sets of meetings between senior negotiators of the seven nations.