From Tehmina Mustapha
TEHRAN: Iran on Wednesday said it had received the US response via the EU and “the careful study of the views of the American side has started.”
“Iran will share its comments with the coordinator upon completion of the review,” Spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said, according to a statement by the Iranian Foreign Ministry.
The US answer was conveyed more than a week after Iran sent its response to what the EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell called “a final text” to restore the nuclear deal. Borrell said Monday that the Iranian response was “reasonable.”
Price on Monday said the US government had been working “as quickly as we can, as methodically as we can and as carefully as we can see to it that our response is complete,” noting it “takes into account the Iranian feedback.”
Biden administration officials have claimed that Tehran dropped a number of demands that were in previous drafts of the text meant to restore the 2015 agreement, including the demand that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) be de-listed as a foreign terrorist organization.
The US State Department also confirmed Wednesday that the United States has sent its response to the European Union on a proposal to try to save the Iran nuclear deal.
“As you know, we received Iran’s comments on the EU’s proposed final text through the EU. Our review of those comments has now concluded. We have responded to the EU today,” State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in a statement.
He did not provide details on the response, but it is not expected that the US will accept what Iran put forward without seeking changes and further negotiations.
US officials had voiced some optimism around the latest efforts to revive the nuclear deal, which the US left in 2018 during the Trump administration and which Tehran has increasingly violated since then. However, they have stressed that gaps remain between the two sides.
It is also expected to face significant domestic opposition from US congressional lawmakers, and has been denounced by Israel, whose prime minister said “will act to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear state.” The negotiations over the nuclear deal are also set against a backdrop of continued concerns about threats from Iranian and Iranian-backed military groups.
EU spokesperson Nabila Massrali confirmed they “received the US response and have transmitted to Iran.”
Earlier in the day, Iran’s Nuclear Chief said Iran will not allow inspections beyond what is in a 2015 nuclear deal.
“We are committed to inspections in the framework of the nuclear deal that are linked to nuclear restrictions which we have accepted in the past. Not one word more, not one word less,” said Mohammad Eslami, head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organisation, according to a video carried by State Media.
Iran has insisted the nuclear pact can only be salvaged if the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) drops its claims about Tehran’s nuclear work. Washington and other Western powers view Tehran’s demand as outside the scope of reviving the deal.
In June, the UN nuclear watchdog’s 35-nation Board of Governors overwhelmingly passed a resolution, drafted by the United States, France, Britain and Germany, which criticized Iran for failing to explain uranium traces found at three undeclared sites. -Agencies
