Politics

EU’s Borrell says talks to salvage nuclear deal to resume in coming days

Tehran, Jun 25 (EFE).- The European Union’s top diplomat said Saturday that talks to save the 2015 Iran nuclear deal would resume in the coming days after months of stagnation.

The EU’s foreign policy chief arrived in Iran Saturday to salvage the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which was penned in 2015 between Iran and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to restrict Iran’s nuclear enrichment program for sanctions relief.

“We expect to resume talks in the coming days and break the impasse,” Josep Borrell told a news conference with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

The EU diplomat added that the deadlock that had kept negotiations paralyzed since March meant all parties needed to “accelerate the work.”

Abdollahian confirmed the resumption of talks to save the nuclear deal and said that Iran was preparing for negotiations in the coming days.

The minister urged the United States to do its undertakings in a realistic way to reach a deal, the IRNA news agency reported.

“There are points of disagreement and we hope to be able to iron out these differences,” he added.

Borrell arrived in Tehran Friday night with “one main objective: to give new momentum to the negotiations and bring the nuclear deal back on track,” the minister tweeted.

The European Union is coordinating talks in Vienna between Iran and the P5 (Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Russia, China, and the US).

In 2018, then-US President Donald Trump abandoned the deal and slapped stiff sanctions on Iran.

Tehran retaliated a year later by ramping up its nuclear enrichment program.

One of the main hurdles in negotiations is Iran’s insistence Washington lifts terrorism sanctions on Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

In recent weeks, tensions have flared over Iran’s nuclear program after the International Atomic Energy Agency raised concerns over a lack of transparency.

Tehran responded by shutting down 27 surveillance cameras at different nuclear facilities. EFE

ar-jlr/ch

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