Iran, the US and the EU late on Wednesday said they would send senior representatives to Vienna amid what appears to be a last-ditch effort at reviving talks over Tehran’s tattered 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.
It was not immediately clear whether all other parties to the landmark accord would attend the surprise summit, nor if there had been any progress after a months-long stalemate and a fruitless round of indirect talks between Iran and the US in Doha.
EU mediator Enrique Mora said the negotiations would focus on the most recent draft to restore the agreement, while Iranian lead nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani said he was heading to the Austrian capital “to advance the negotiations.”
Photo: AP
US Special Representative for Iran Robert Malley wrote on Twitter that he was preparing to travel to Vienna for talks.
US “expectations are in check” ahead of the negotiations, he added.
“The United States welcomes EU efforts and is prepared for a good-faith attempt to reach a deal,” Malley said. “It will shortly be clear if Iran is prepared for the same.”
Iranian Ambassador to the UN Majid Takht Ravanchi said Iran has since April last year negotiated “in goodwill” to resume full implementation of the 2015 deal and blamed the US for failing to reach agreement.
“Achieving this objective has been delayed because the United States is yet to decide to give assurances that Iran will enjoy the promised economic benefits in the agreement,” he told a high-level conference reviewing the landmark Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty at the UN headquarters in New York.
“When the US makes the right decision, Iran, in turn, will cease its remedial actions and resume the full implementation of its nuclear-related measures in accordance with the 2015 agreement,” Ravanchi said.
The German Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Berlin would be represented at an “expert level” at the talks, adding that it supported efforts to fully revive the deal “even if hopes are very small.”
It again pushed Iran to conclude the deal and said that would mean “giving up maximalist positions in areas beyond” the nuclear agreement.
Russian Permanent Representative to International Organizations in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov wrote on Twitter that negotiators from Russia, a key signatory of the nuclear deal, “stand ready for constructive talks in order to finalize the agreement.”
The prospects for the deal’s restoration have darkened in the past few months with major sticking points remaining, including Tehran’s demand that Washington provide guarantees that it would not again quit the pact and that it lift terrorism-related sanctions on the paramilitary Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
The abruptly called meeting in Vienna comes after EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell has over the past few weeks repeatedly pushed to break the deadlock and salvage the deal.
Borrell last month wrote in the Financial Times that “the space for additional significant compromises has been exhausted.”
Former US president Donald Trump withdrew the US from the 2015 deal, which lifted most international sanctions on Tehran in exchange for tight restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program.
Since then, Iran has massively expanded its nuclear work and is believed to have enough highly enriched uranium to fuel one nuclear weapon.
However, Iran would still need to design a bomb and a delivery system for it, likely a months-long project.
Iran says its program is for peaceful purposes, although UN experts and Western intelligence agencies say Iran had an organized military nuclear program through 2003.
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