The US says it will only renew the Iran nuclear deal if Tehran abandons “Extraneous” demands
Iran must abandon its “extraneous” demands on treaty partners if it wants to resuscitate the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, US State Department spokesman Ned Price declared on Monday, insisting that Tehran drop “Additional unacceptable demands beyond the JCPOA’s scope are also acceptable.”
The US will provide its response to the “Final” version of the deal text provided by the EU in private, Price said.
Tehran’s response to the latest draft text had been delivered to the EU’s top envoy, Josep Borrell, on Monday night, just ahead of the deadline set by Brussels, according to senior diplomatic sources cited by Politico and Iran’s semi-official ISNA.
The final text supplied by EU negotiators includes a requirement that Iran respond to questions from the International Atomic Energy Agency “These are intended to be clarified” in exchange for the other parties to the deal advising the IAEA to drop a 2019 probe into the discovery of uranium particles at a location not previously declared as a nuclear site.
Learn more
EU proposal to curb Iran sanctions revealed – Politico
While Iran had attempted to make concluding the probe part of the negotiations since March, the US and EU had previously argued they couldn’t negotiate on behalf of the IAEA, insisting it was a separate issue unrelated to the JCPOA. Rafael Grossi, the head of the IAEA has pledged to continue the investigation until Iran provides information about where and when it came from.
Iran demanded, until recently, that the US remove its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from the Foreign Terrorist Organizations List in any renewal of the nuclear agreement. Although Washington had been reported to be considering this request, the Iranians demanded security concessions in exchange. In the end, the unit was kept on the blacklist.
Learn more
Moscow speaks out on ‘Plan B’ for Iran nuclear deal
The initial nuclear deal signed in 2015 by Iran, the US, UK, France, and Germany – as well as Russia, China, and the EU – involved Tehran agreeing to certain restrictions on its nuclear industry in exchange for the easing of economic sanctions and other incentives.
Trump unilaterally pulled out from the deal in May 2018. However, Trump claimed that it was fundamentally flawed. Iran began to reduce some of the commitments it made under the agreement, including the amount of enriched-uranium produced. This could have the potential of Iran building an atomic bomb. According to the Iranian authorities, however, this “This is not the agenda.”
