On Monday, the United States ruled out taking any unilateral steps to push Iran back to the negotiating table on reviving the nuclear agreement, while the Director of the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Tehran for talks with senior officials in the country.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price said that Washington will not take unilateral steps with Iran only to ensure a return to the negotiating table.

Price added that his country is constantly calling for the return of diplomacy to determine whether it is possible to reach a solution to the outstanding issues, and this will be left to negotiations in Vienna, as he put it.

In this context, the Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, arrived in Tehran on Monday to discuss differences over technical terms in the nuclear agreement concluded in Vienna in 2015. 

Grossi is scheduled to meet with Mohammad Eslami, head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, on Tuesday, before meeting for the first time with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian.

Last week, Grossi complained about restrictions on the IAEA's work in Iran, and that IAEA inspectors have been subjected to excessive body searches by Iranian security forces for months.

In addition, Grossi said that Iran had violated an agreement to monitor a workshop for modern centrifuges, adding that he would like to discuss these problems with the Iranian leadership in the hope of finding solutions.


victim offender

Iran refused to criticize Grossi, and Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said, "We must not forget who is the perpetrator and who is the victim."

He added that it was the United States, not Iran, that withdrew from the Vienna Agreement, thus violating its terms.

On Monday, Tehran reiterated its demand to lift sanctions and ensure that the United States does not withdraw from the nuclear deal again.

The Iranian position came before the Vienna talks scheduled at the end of this month.

In a related context, Zadeh stressed that the dialogue with the Arab countries in the region will be about regional files only.