Foreign Desk Report
CHICAGO: US State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Thursday that Washington will not offer incentives to Tehran for returning to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), otherwise known as the Iran Nuclear Deal.
Price said that Iran must return to JCPOA compliance first and then the US will follow. But there will be no easing on existing sanctions against Iran, which continues to back Houthi strikes against Saudi Arabia from Yemen.
“We will not offer any unilateral gestures or incentives to induce the Iranians to come to the table,” Price said. “If the Iranians are under the impression that absent any movement on their part to resume full compliance with the JCPOA that we will offer favors or unilateral gestures, well, that is a misimpression.”
Price said the US is dug in as Tehran’s possible return to the Iran Nuclear Deal would just be the beginning.
“If Iran returns to its full compliance with the JCPOA, the United States would do the same,” he said.
“As I have said before, that would be a necessary but insufficient development. Insufficient because we would then seek to lengthen and strengthen the terms of that deal, using it as a platform to negotiate follow-on arrangements to address these other areas of profound concern with Iran’s behavior in the region.”
