Negotiations to revise the Iran nuclear deal have entered a “critical” stage throughout which some key issues still want to be resolved, Tehran’s high diplomat said on Wednesday.
The 2015 accord had offered Iran sanctions relief in coming back for curbs on its nuclear program, but the US unilaterally withdrew in 2018 under then-president Donald Trump.
Western powers that have been locked in nuclear talks with Iran have said within the past week that a deal was inside reached while stressing the ball was in the Islamic republic’s court.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said on Wednesday that the negotiations had “reached an essential and vital stage”.
“We tend to hope that some sensitive and vital problems remaining within the negotiations will be resolved in the coming days with realism from the Western side,” he said at a joint press conference with his Oman counterpart Sayyid Badr al-Busaidi.
Amir-Abdollahian said he was “optimistic” regarding a deal while insisting Iran wouldn’t provide up its “red lines” within the negotiations. He failed to elaborate.
The Vienna talks, which involve Iran also Britain, China, France, Germany, and Russia directly, and therefore the United States indirectly, resumed in November.
In recent days, progress in the negotiations has been reported by France, Germany, the United States and even Iran.
Signs of an agreement returning together emerged over the past week, with France warning that Iran has just days left to simply accept a deal.
“It’s not an issue of weeks, it’s a matter of days,” said its Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.
“We tend to need political decisions from the Iranians. They have a very clear selection,” he told the French Senate on February sixteen.
Two days later, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said the process had reached “the moment of truth”.
He said there “was the prospect to achieve an agreement that will allow sanctions to be lifted” but additionally warned that the talks may still collapse.
Most recently, Iran’s sworn enemy Israel said on Sunday that a deal might be agreed soon whereas warning that it would be “weaker” than the initial 2015 agreement.
