Iran, P5+1 to resume nuclear talks in Vienna next Tuesday

Iran and the P5+1 countries agree to resume a fresh round of talks to continue drafting a final agreement on Tehran’s nuclear program in the Austrian capital of Vienna next week, a senior Iranian negotiator says.

Representatives of Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany would resume nuclear negotiations in Vienna next Tuesday, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs Abbas Araqchi, who is also a senior Iranian nuclear negotiator, said on Friday.

He added that the two sides are writing the draft of the final nuclear deal at a “very slow” pace as the talks are extensive and complicated.

He pointed to the latest round of expert-level talks in Vienna and said, “Over the past three days, the sides worked on writing the original text [of the final agreement] and its annexes at two political and expert levels.”

Araqchi noted that experts of Iran and the six countries also held discussions on Iran's nuclear issue as well as sanctions imposed on the country.

Iran and the P5+1 group of countries wrapped up their latest round of talks in Vienna on Friday in another effort to narrow down remaining differences and pave the way for a possible final deal.

During the three-day talks, Iranian deputy foreign ministers Araqchi and Majid Takht-e-Ravanchi sat down with the deputy foreign policy chief of the European Union (EU), Helga Schmid, who represents the P5+1.

Iran and the P5+1 group – the US, Britain, France, China and Russia plus Germany – are currently working to reach a final accord on Iran’s nuclear program by the end of June.

The two sides reached a mutual understanding on the parameters of a comprehensive agreement on Tehran’s nuclear program in the Swiss city of Lausanne on April 2.