Iranian Foreign Minister Sees Possibility to Resurrect JCPOA if West Negotiates on 'Equal Terms'

Sputnik News

20240916

Noting that a number of provisions of the nuclear deal are outdated and need to be changed, Iran's foreign minister claimed the JCPOA still represents "an appropriate form that can direct us to a new agreement."

TEHRAN (Sputnik) - Participants in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as the Iran nuclear deal, may resume talks based on "trust in exchange for lifting sanctions" but progress depends on whether the two sides can negotiate on equal terms, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Sunday.

A new government headed by President Masoud Pezeshkian came to power in Iran in early August. Pezeshkian's cabinet includes the JCPOA authors: Mohammad Javad Zarif became vice president and Abbas Araghchi became the country's foreign minister. The latter, according to the ISNA agency, recently stated that the JCPOA in its current form could not be restored but did not rule out new talks on the deal, which would involve changing some parts of the agreement.

"First, a suitable basis must be created to resume negotiations, then we will hold talks based on the formula applied in the JCPOA in the past. Building trust in exchange for lifting sanctions [imposed by the West]. We can return to this formula again," Araqchi said.

Noting that a number of provisions of the nuclear deal are outdated and need to be changed, the foreign minister claimed the JCPOA still represents "an appropriate form that can direct us to a new agreement."

However everything depends on whether the parties can find a platform for mutual understanding in order to resume negotiations on equal terms, Araqchi claimed.

In 2015, the United Kingdom, Germany, China, Russia, the United States, France, and Iran concluded a nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which allowed for the lifting of sanctions in exchange for curbs on Iran's nuclear program. The United States under President Donald Trump withdrew from the JCPOA in May 2018 and reimposed sanctions on Tehran. In response, Iran announced a gradual reduction in its commitments under the deal, abandoning restrictions on nuclear research, centrifuges, and uranium enrichment levels.

In December 2021 Iran voluntarily allowed the IAEA to reinstall cameras at the Karaj nuclear facility, but the agency was not given access to install surveillance cameras or confirmation that the facility had not resumed production of centrifuge rotor tubes and bellows. At the same time, Tehran said it would provide surveillance camera data from the Karaj nuclear facility only after all US sanctions were lifted.

In early June Moscow, Tehran and Beijing said in a joint statement issued as part of the agenda of the sixth meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors that they were convinced that the time had come for Western countries to take steps to restore the nuclear deal agreement, with Russia, China and Iran being ready to do so.

© Sputnik