Iran nuclear deal ‘off the table’, US says

Reviving the Iran nuclear deal remains off the Biden administration’s agenda, a US State Department spokesman said on August 26, as Tehran called for “new negotiations” to update the accord before it could be revived.

Iran’s new foreign minister, Abbas Araqchi, said last week that the deal “cannot be revived in its current form” because of sunset clauses that have expired and insisted that new talks are needed to revive the deal.

However, a State Department spokesman told RFE/RL that the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as the 2015 nuclear deal is formally known, “is not on the table at this time.” The United States unilaterally withdrew from the agreement in 2018 under then-US President Donald Trump.

“The United States will ensure one way or another that Iran never has a nuclear weapon, and we are prepared to use all elements of national power to ensure that outcome,” the spokesman said.

Still, Washington sees “diplomacy as the best way to achieve a lasting and effective solution,” the spokesman said.

During a televised interview, Araqchi admitted that renegotiating the deal would be a challenge.

“This document definitely needs to be reopened and parts of it need to be changed. This is not an easy task because once you reopen a document, putting it back together will be a challenge,” he said in a live television interview.

Further complicating matters are November’s presidential election in the United States and the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

Araqchi said the war in Ukraine has “profoundly influenced the way Europeans look at security”, while the conflict in Gaza has “completely changed the situation in the region”.

The minister, who was one of the architects of the deal between Iran and six major world powers, said the 2021 format for talks to revive the accord could no longer work.

“New negotiations are needed,” Araqchi added.

The deal curbed Iran’s nuclear program and capped uranium enrichment at 3.67 percent. In return, the United States lifted sanctions that have stifled Iran’s economy and energy sectors.

But Trump withdrew the United States from the deal in 2018 and reimposed sanctions that had been lifted under its terms. Iran has retaliated by gradually reducing its commitments and is currently enriching uranium by 60%.

Araqchi, then deputy foreign minister, led Iran’s negotiating team when Tehran and Washington began indirect talks in April 2021 to restore the deal. Negotiations broke down when hardline President Ebrahim Raisi came to power in Iran and a new team of negotiators entered the fray.

But the talks were suspended in September 2022 following nationwide protests that have rocked Iran for months. Hundreds of people were killed during the unrest as authorities cracked down on the demonstrations.

Iran’s new president, Masud Pezeshkian, who succeeded Raisi after he died in a helicopter crash earlier this year, has vowed to engage the West.

But the most important decision-maker in Iran is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has praised conservative efforts to expand the country’s nuclear program.

Via RFE/RL

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