Iran won’t back down on red lines in Vienna talks: Raeisi

International Desk

President Seyyed Ebrahim Raeisi said on Tuesday Iran would not back down on its red lines in the Vienna talks aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, officially called the JCPOA.

“The government pursues nuclear negotiations in full accordance with the principles and framework set by the Leader,” Raeisi said, referring to Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei.

“It (the government) has not and will not back down on any of the red lines,” the president told a meeting of the Assembly of Experts, the clerical body responsible for choosing the Leader.

Eleven months of negotiations to resurrect the JCPOA between Iran and Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and China directly, and the United States, indirectly, have now reached their climax.

Iran has sought to remove all sanctions and it wants guarantees from the United States that it will not abandon the deal once more, after then-U.S. president Donald Trump walked out of the accord in 2018 and reimposed “toughest ever” sanctions.

“In the first step, the government has seriously pursued to render sanctions ineffective, and in the second step, it is seeking to lift the sanctions in a very dignified manner,” Raeisi pointed out.

Enrique Mora, the European Union’s political director, who coordinated the talks on Monday, called for a political decision in the next few days to bring the JCPOA back to life.

“There are no longer expert level talks. Nor formal meetings. It is time, in the next few days, for political decisions to end the Vienna talks,” Mora tweeted.

Iran’s top negotiator Ali Baqeri Kani returned to Tehran on Monday for consultations over the possible JCPOA revival.

Diplomats say several differences still need to be overcome in the talks, which also saw a last-minute demand from Russia for a guarantee from the United States that Russian trade, investment and military-technical cooperation with Iran would not be hindered by sanctions over its military operation in Ukraine, Reuters reported.

Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said on Monday that Iran’s ties with any country, including Russia, should not be impacted by sanctions.

“We are against both war and sanctions. Iran’s ties with countries, including Russia, should not be impacted by sanctions,” Amir-Abdollahian told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in a phone conversation.

Lavrov said the JCPOA revival must allow participants unhindered cooperation in all areas without discrimination.

“The JCPOA revival must provide for all participants to have equal rights in relation to the unhindered development of cooperation in all areas without any discrimination,” he said, according to a statement by the Russian Foreign Ministry.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the sanctions imposed on Russia over Ukraine had nothing to do with the JCPOA and the prospects of getting back into that agreement.

“We continue to work to see if we can come back to mutual compliance with Iran on the deal. Russia continues to be engaged in those efforts,” Blinken said.

The United States and its allies are “getting closer” to a nuclear deal with Iran, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Monday, but “important components” still need to be decided, she added.

Source: Iran Daily