Iran will not compromise its national security but is open to talks aimed at reaching a “peaceful” nuclear deal with the United States, Iranian deputy foreign minister, Saeed Khatibzadeh, said on Tuesday.
The U.S. and Iran held several rounds of negotiations early this year, before the U.S. bombed Iranian nuclear sites in June.
Throughout the talks prior to the bombings, Iran’s uranium enrichment efforts were a major sticking point, with the U.S. insisting that enrichment is a “very, very clear red line.”
Iran, for its part, has insisted that enrichment “is a national achievement from which we will not back down.”
This major gap in positions hasn’t been closed since the June bombings, which also halted the indirect U.S.-Iran negotiations.
The Trump Administration is sending contradictory messages to Tehran about nuclear talks through third countries, Iran’s Khatibzadeh said at an event in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday, as carried by Reuters.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader who has the ultimate say on foreign policy, last week said Tehran would not negotiate under threat with the U.S.
The biggest European powers which are party to the so-called Iranian nuclear agreement of 2015, or the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as it is officially known, reinstated UN sanctions on Iran at the end of September.
The 2015 JCPOA agreement contained a provision—known as the “snapback” mechanism—allowing any JCPOA participant to re-impose UN sanctions in the event of “significant non-performance” by Iran.
The U.S., which pulled from the JCPOA during President Donald Trump’s first term in office in 2018, has ramped up pressure and sanctions on Iran and its oil exports during the first months of the U.S. President’s second term, under the so-called “maximum pressure” campaign to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Despite the U.S. sanctions, Iran has continued to export nearly all of its oil to China in recent years.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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