Nuclear talks should see all anti-Iran sanctions lifted: MP

A senior Iranian lawmaker says the nuclear talks between Tehran and the P5+1 group should lead to the lifting, and not suspension of, sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

“The Islamic Republic has never accepted the issue of suspension, but the removal of sanctions has been the key issue for us,” said Hossein Sobhani-Nia who sits on the Presiding Board of Iran’s Majlis.

The centerpiece of the nuclear talks is the lifting of all sanctions, said the legislator, adding, “Among the outstanding issues on which the negotiating sides have so far failed to reach a consensus is the question of lifting the sanctions.”

Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council – Russia, China, France, Britain and the US – plus Germany are in talks to work out a final deal aimed at ending the longstanding dispute over the country’s peaceful nuclear activities as a November 24 deadline approaches.

Sources close to the Iranian negotiating team say the main stumbling block in the way of resolving the Western dispute over Iran’s nuclear energy program remains to be the removal of all the bans imposed on the Islamic Republic and not the number of centrifuges or the level of uranium enrichment.

Tehran wants the sanctions entirely lifted while Washington, under pressure from the pro-Israeli lobby, insists that at least the UN-imposed sanctions should remain in place.