United States President Joe Biden has expressed his support for reversingthe Trump administration’s withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan ofAction (JCPOA), and officials within the new government are reported toalready be holding quiet discussions with Iranian representatives.
Diplomats from Tehran have spoken to officials within the Bidenadministration over resuming talks on Iran’s nuclear program and havereportedly set out seven preconditions, an unnamed Iranian governmentsource told a Kuwaiti newspaper on Sunday.
Speaking to Kuwait’s al-Jarida newspaper, the anonymous official fromIranian President Hassan Rouhani’s office said that contacts began prior toPresident Joe Biden’s ascension to office, and implied that they arecontinuing but unofficial.
According to the Kuwaiti report, the Iranian ambassador to the UnitedNations Majid Takht Rawanji was called to Tehran to arrange contacts withthe new administration in Washington before returning to New York with aseries of seven conditions for Iran’s involvement in the resumption oftalks over its nuclear program.
The first condition is reportedly that Iran will not accept partialsanctions alleviation, as Tehran considers the Joint Comprehensive Plan ofAction (JCPOA) to be indivisible. The report says that Iran will reaffirmits demands that the US maintain all aspects of the deal, including thetotal lifting of sanctions, as an essential precondition to returning tothe agreement.
Secondly, any disagreements over the accords must be discussed within theframework of the official negotiating committees. One of these anticipateddisagreements is Tehran’s demand for compensation for financial losses itincurred due to the Trump administration’s exit from the deal, notably thefinancial impact of the sanctions.
The third condition, according to the report, is that Tehran will notapprove of using the terms of the nuclear deal to address separate issues,such as its missile program and activities abroad.
As a fourth condition, no new members will be permitted to enter into thedeal aside from the existing P5+1, including any Gulf Arab countries.
Fifthly, concerns over other regional states must be discussed as aseparate matter, and not included in the negotiations over nuclearenrichment. The next point is said to be that despite not being willing todiscuss its missile system, Iran would find it acceptable to talk aboutarms control on a regional level with United Nations supervision, raisingparticular concern over Israel’s missiles and illegally-held nuclearstockpile.
Finally, Iran will not allow a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine,and instead demands a UN referendum that includes Jewish Israelis andPalestinians over the “land” issue. No further details on the content ofthe potential referendum were outlined, according to the report.
Rouhani will be issuing these conditions to the Biden administrationdirectly, the report also said.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a Foreign Affairsarticle on Friday that Iran will not accept any further demands, terms, orstate signatories added to the original deal proposed by Washington in2015. Zarif said that if Washington began by “unconditionally removing,with full effect, all sanctions imposed, re-imposed, or relabeled sinceTrump took office”, Iran would reverse the steps it has taken since the USwithdrew its signature from the deal in 2018.
Channel 12 News reported last week that the Biden administration hasalready begun largely undisclosed talks with Iranian officials over areturn to the agreement and has also updated Israel of their contents.
This comes amid reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu willsend Mossad chief Yossi Cohen to Washington next month to issue Israel’sdemands before any new version of the Iran nuclear deal is agreed to.According to reports, Cohen will be the first senior Israeli official tomeet with President Biden and is also expected to meet with the CIAdirector.
Even before his election last year, Biden openly expressed his desire forthe US to rejoin the accord, while Israel has said that a return to thedeal must include new restrictions on Iran’s ballistic missile program andalleged support for terror activity internationally.
The JCPOA, which limits Iranian development of uranium in return forsanctions relief, was signed by Tehran as well as six world powers in 2015.In 2018, former President Donald Trump withdrew the US signature from thedeal and introduced harsh sanctions against the nation, claiming thatTehran was not in compliance with its terms, despite internationalobservers and the European Union claiming that Tehran was acting in fullaccordance with the treaty. – Sputnik