2 yıl önce

Iran nuclear talks unblocked, final deal within reach: EU

Josep Borrell, the EU’s high representative for foreign policy, said an EU envoy visited Tehran this week for talks that had “gone better than expected”.

AFP

Borrell said "disagreements on what to do about the Revolutionary Guards" had hampered progress in the talks for two months.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said stalled negotiations over Iran's nuclear programme have been unblocked after fresh talks in Tehran, and a final deal is within reach.

A mission by EU envoy Enrique Mora this week to help revive the 2015 nuclear pact between Iran and world powers had gone "better than expected", Borrell said on Friday on the sidelines of a G7 meeting in Germany.

"The negotiations had stalled and now they have been reopened," Borrell said, adding that "There is a perspective of reaching a final agreement."

Mora held two days of meetings with Iran's chief negotiator Ali Bagheri in Tehran this week.

The emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, meanwhile met Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Ebrahim Raisi on Thursday to push for progress.

Main sticking point

The 2015 deal gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme to guarantee that it could not develop a nuclear weapon, something Tehran has always denied wanting to do.

Formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the agreement was left on life support in 2018 by then-US president Donald Trump's unilateral decision to withdraw and impose punishing sanctions.

This prompted Iran to begin rolling back its own commitments. But the departure of Trump from office has restarted bids to revive the accord, with Mora playing a key role during a year of on-off talks in Vienna.

Among the main sticking points in the negotiations has been Tehran's demand for the US to remove Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from a designated list of terrorist groups.

Borrell said "these disagreements on what to do about the Revolutionary Guards" had hampered progress in the talks for two months.

He said Mora had taken the EU's message to Tehran "that we couldn't continue like this".

"The answer has been positive enough," Borrell said.

"These kind of things cannot be solved overnight. Let's say things were blocked and they have been deblocked."

SOURCE: AFP