European diplomat: Space for negotiating Iran deal revival ‘almost exhausted’
Iran nuclear negotiator says Iran has its “own ideas…to conclude the negotiations, which would be shared.”
European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned Tuesday that the space for further negotiations on restoring the 2015 Iran nuclear deal is almost exhausted, and said it is now time for swift political decisions to conclude the deal.
“After 15 months of intense, constructive negotiations in Vienna…., I have concluded that the space for additional significant compromises has been exhausted,” Borrell wrote in the Financial Times Tuesday (July 26).
“I have now put on the table a text that addresses, in precise detail, the sanctions lifting as well as the nuclear steps needed to restore the JCPOA,” he wrote, referring to the acronym for the formal name of the deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. “It is now time for swift political decisions to conclude the Vienna negotiations on the basis of my proposed text and to immediately return to a fully implemented JCPOA.”
Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator and Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri-Kani said Tuesday he had had conversations with other JCPOA counterparts and the EU coordinator Enrique Mora about the EU’s ideas for how to conclude the negotiations, but that Iran had its own ideas about how to conclude the talks and would share them.
“Had serious and constructive exchanges with other sides in the course of the past week on Vienna negotiations,” Bagheri wrote on Twitter July 26. “The Coordinator has shared his ideas to conclude the negotiations. We, too, have our own ideas, both in substance and form, to conclude the negotiations, which would be shared.”
A European diplomat, asked if Borrell’s message in the oped suggested that a kind of ultimatum had been issued to Iran about answering whether it agrees to the draft text on the table, said there was no ultimatum.
“Not [an] ultimatum, but a clear message that space for negotiations [is] almost exhausted,” the European diplomat said.
A senior US diplomat said he was also not aware of a specific deadline by which Iran was being asked to respond, adding, “but of course this can’t be open ended.”
French President Emmanuel Macron urged Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in a phone call on Saturday (July 23) to make a “clear choice” to revive the deal, and said he was convinced that a deal was still possible, but that a decision should take place “as soon as possible,” according to reports citing a French presidential readout of the call.
The State Department said Monday it is up to Iran to demonstrate if it wants to move forward on the draft agreement on reviving the deal that is on the table after almost fifteen months of negotiations. Then US President Trump quit the deal in 2018 and reimposed harsh sanctions on Iran. Iran since 2019 has been progressively exceeding the deal’s nuclear limits to protest the lack of sanctions relief.
“The onus is on Iran to come forward to make clear that Tehran is ready to engage constructively, to put aside extraneous issues, and to talk in good faith about the deal that has been on the table for some time,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told journalists at the State Department press briefing Monday (July 25).
“The fact is that we have made a political decision:… that if Iran were to re-enter the JCPOA, we would do the same,” Price said. “After months of painstaking discussions, there is an agreement that has been on the table … The Iranians, if they are serious about a mutual return to compliance – which they may not be – … the onus is now on them to take that deal.”
“The Iranians certainly haven’t done anything in recent weeks to suggest that they are eager to re-enter the deal,” Price said.
Separately, the Iranian mission to the United Nations said late Monday that Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian had canceled tentative plans to attend the NPT review conference being held in New York the first week of August. Amwaj media reported that Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs Reza Najafi would go in his stead.
Former Iranian Supreme National Security Council official Saeed Iravani has been selected to be Iran’s next ambassador to the UN, succeeding Majid Ravanchi, Iranian media reported. Iravani previously served as SNSC deputy secretary for nine years, and before that as Iran’s charge d’affaires in Iraq. He has more recently represented Iran at Iran-Saudi talks in Iraq.
An Iranian official said late Monday that he did not yet know when Iravani would arrive in New York.
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