On Tuesday, the White Officials reportedly said the US is looking to start indirect talks with Tehran. They also announced on Friday that Washington and Tehran would begin indirect talks through intermediaries. It was one of the first signs of tangible progress in efforts to return both Washington and Tehran to the terms of the accord and bounds Iran to restrictions in return for relief from the US and international sanctions. The move came after Iran and the 5 world powers remaining in the accord have planned to meet in Vienna on Tuesday. Point to be noted that then-President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the accord in 2018. He also called a maximum-pressure campaign of stepped-up US sanctions. Iran has been steadily violating the restrictions of the deal, since then.
The recent move from Tehran considered as putting pressure on the other nations in the deal including Russia, China, France, Germany, and Britain to offset sanctions imposed by Donald Trump. President Joe Biden said getting back into the accord and getting Iran’s nuclear program back under international restrictions was a priority. But, Iran and the United States have disagreed over Iran’s demand to lift sanctions before the beginning of talks. It is important that senior foreign ministry officials from the countries are still in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and holding a European Union-chaired meeting Tuesday in Vienna. The US State Department spokesman Ned Price said talks will be structured around working groups that the Europeans will form with the other parties to the accord.
On Monday, Price said the talks are a healthy step forward but added, “We don’t anticipate an early or immediate breakthrough as these discussions, we fully expect, will be difficult. We don’t anticipate at present that there will be direct talks with Iran. Though of course, we remain open to them. And so we’ll have to see how things go starting early this week”. On Friday, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif wrote on Twitter, “No Iran-US meeting. Unnecessary”. The statement issued just after parties to the accord met virtually on Friday. He said the objective of their Tuesday meeting is to clearly identify sanctions lifting and nuclear implementation measures, including through convening meetings of the relevant expert groups.