VIENNA (PA) – Officials from five world powers began a new effort on Tuesday to try to bring the United States back to the founding nuclear deal they signed with Iran in 2015, a delicate diplomatic dance that must balance both concerns and interests. of Washington as well as those of Washington. Tehran.
The meeting in Vienna of envoys from Russia, China, Germany, France, Britain and Iran took place as the United States was to begin its own indirect talks with Iran. It would be one of the first signs of tangible progress in efforts to bring both nations back to an agreement, which has restricted Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for exemption from US and international sanctions.
Following closed meetings of the signatories to the agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Action Plan, Russia’s delegate Mikhail Ulyanov wrote on Twitter that the initial talks had been “successful”.
“The restoration of the JCPOA will not take place immediately. It’s going to take some time. While? Nobody knows “, he wrote. “The most important thing after today’s meeting of the Joint Commission is that practical work has begun to achieve this goal.”
In 2018, then-President Donald Trump unilaterally removed the United States from the deal, opting for what he called a maximum pressure campaign involving reinstated and additional US sanctions.
Since then, Iran has consistently violated restrictions in the agreement, such as the amount of enriched uranium it can store and the purity with which it can be enriched. Tehran’s measures were calculated to pressure the other nations in the agreement to do more to offset the strict US sanctions imposed under Trump.
US President Joe Biden, who was vice president under Barack Obama when the initial deal was negotiated, said he wanted to bring the US back to the JCPOA, but that Iran must cancel its violations.
Iran claims that the United States first violated the agreement by withdrawing, so Washington must take the first step by lifting sanctions.
After the meeting in Vienna, Iranian state television quoted Iranian negotiator Abbas Araghchi as reiterating that message during the opening round of negotiations.
“Lifting US sanctions is the first and most necessary action to relaunch the agreement,” Araghchi said. “Iran is fully prepared to reverse its activities and return to full implementation of the agreement as soon as the sanctions lifted have been verified.”
At the meeting, participants agreed to set up two expert groups, one on lifting sanctions and one on nuclear issues, which were “tasked with identifying concrete steps to be taken by Washington and Tehran to restore full implementation.” of JCPOA “, Ulyanov posted on Twitter.
They must start working immediately and report their findings to the main negotiators.
The ultimate goal of the agreement is to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear bomb, which it insists it does not do. Iran now has enough enriched uranium to produce a bomb, but not nearly the amount it had before the nuclear deal was signed.
In the latest announced violation, Behrouz Kamalvandi, a spokesman for Iran’s civilian nuclear program, said officials had begun mechanical testing of a prototype IR-9 centrifuge. The centrifuge would enrich uranium 50 times faster than the IR-1 allowed under the agreement, he said, according to the ISNA semi-official news agency.
The clock ticks in an attempt to bring the US back into agreement in order to bring Iran back into compliance with a number of issues to consider.
In late February, Iran began restricting international inspections of its nuclear facilities, but in a last-minute deal drawn up during a trip to Tehran by Rafael Grossi, the head of the UN-based atomic guard dog in Vienna, some access was retained.
Under the agreement, Iran will no longer share surveillance records of its nuclear facilities with the IAEA, but has promised to keep the tapes for three months. He will then hand them over to the IAEA if he is granted a waiver of sanctions. Otherwise, Iran has vowed to delete the records, narrowing the window for a diplomatic discovery.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in March called on the United States to act quickly, noting that as his country’s elections approach in June, Washington will face a government unable to make progress in nuclear talks.
In addition, one of the main so-called expiration clauses of the JCPOA, the United Nations armed embargo on Iran, expired last year, and others are due to expire in the coming years.
The small window for negotiations will make it even more difficult for the United States to try to bring new concerns to the agreement, such as Iran’s regional influence and its ballistic missile program.
Although he did not take part in the talks with JCPOA, an American delegation led by the administration’s special envoy for Iran, Rob Malley was also in the Austrian capital.
State Department spokesman Ned Price said the delegation was there to hold structured discussions around European working groups.
Price said Monday that the talks were a “healthy step forward”, but added that “we do not anticipate an early or immediate discovery, as these talks, we fully expect, will be difficult”.
“We do not currently anticipate that there will be direct talks with Iran,” he said. “Although, of course, we remain open to them. So we’ll have to see how things go. ”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said on Tuesday that it was useful to have American diplomats on the ground in Vienna, although they would not be in direct talks with Iran.
“I think it’s important to convey to our partners that we believe diplomacy is the best step forward,” Psaki said.
Zarif reiterated Iran’s position on Friday that no further talks are needed on the JCPOA, as its agreement and parameters have already been negotiated.
“No Iran-US meeting. Useless, “he wrote on Twitter.
The JCPOA Joint Committee was expected to meet again on Friday, and in the meantime, Enrique Mora, the European Union official who chaired the talks, said he would contact all parties individually.
“As a coordinator, I will intensely separate contacts here in Vienna with all relevant parties, including the United States,” he wrote on Twitter.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric called for Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ reaction to the meetings, saying: “We welcome all these efforts by JCPOA participants … to have a constructive dialogue. We hope this is the first step in the right direction. ”
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Associated Press writers Geir Moulson in Berlin, Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran contributed.