For the fourth day, in the Austrian capital Vienna, the work of the fifth round of negotiations aimed at saving the Iranian nuclear deal continues, amid optimism expressed by the various parties that a solution will be found in which Washington and Tehran will return to their commitments.
The delegations participating in the Vienna negotiations hold bilateral meetings and meetings with the aim of overcoming the remaining obstacles to an agreement, and the technical committees continue their meetings that search for practical solutions to the outstanding issues.
For his part, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov suggested that returning to the Iranian nuclear agreement would be one of the issues in which progress could be made during the upcoming summit between Russian Presidents Vladimir Putin and US President Joe Biden.
Ryabkov said that the return of ambassadors between Russia and the United States may be a positive sign of the change in the relationship between the two countries for the better and the success of the Putin-Biden meeting.
Conditional optimism
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that the Vienna talks had reached an understanding on lifting the main sanctions on Iran, but he indicated that there are other sanctions that must be lifted in order for the nuclear deal to be implemented.
In previous statements, Rouhani talked about progress, which he described as remarkable in the talks, revealing that common understandings had been reached on the main points between all parties, but he renewed his adherence to demanding Washington to take the first step and lift the sanctions on his country.
For his part, the head of Iran's delegation to the Vienna negotiations, Abbas Arachichi, affirmed that all the participating parties have demonstrated sufficiently their seriousness and determination to resolve the remaining issues as soon as possible.
Araghchi added that Tehran's goal is not to quickly end the negotiations, but rather to meet its demands, which he described as legitimate, and to preserve the interests of his country.
Washington's position
In the context, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said that her country will review sanctions on Iran upon its return to the nuclear agreement.
The Axios news site quoted American sources as saying that last week's round of indirect talks with Iran in Vienna was the first round to achieve progress in both the path of sanctions relief and the Iranian nuclear program.
The sources added that the negotiations to reduce the sanctions imposed on Iran made progress in the first three rounds, noting that the negotiations on the required nuclear measures from Iran had been suspended due to Tehran's hard-line positions, and the question of what would happen to Iran's new advanced centrifuges.
A meeting without Iran
For his part, the Russian representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, Mikhail Ulyanov, revealed that delegations of the "4 + 1" group (France, Germany, Britain, Russia and China) had met the American delegation in the Austrian capital.
Ulyanov said in a tweet on Twitter that Iran did not participate in this meeting, during which delegations exchanged views on the progress of the negotiations of the fifth round of the Iran nuclear deal talks.
The Russian delegate added that the meeting focused in particular on aspects of implementing what he described as the future agreement, whose preparation has reached advanced stages, as he put it.
Indirect negotiations began at the beginning of last April in the Austrian capital Vienna between the United States and Iran, with the Europeans and the rest of the signatories to the agreement concluded in 2015 with the aim of preventing Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon.
The essence of the nuclear deal is for Iran to commit to taking steps to restrict its nuclear program, making it difficult for it to obtain fissile material for a nuclear weapon in exchange for relief from US and European sanctions, and those imposed by the United Nations.
Tehran has always denied seeking nuclear weapons.