Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian denied that his country had made demands outside the framework of the nuclear agreement, and pointed to guarantees required to revive the agreement, after talks he held in Tehran today, Wednesday, with Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Qatar Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdul Rahman Al Thani.
Abdullahian said, in a press conference with his Qatari counterpart, that contrary to what the United States says, Iran has not demanded anything outside the framework of the 2015 nuclear agreement.
He explained that Iran wants guarantees that it will fully benefit from the economic benefits in any return agreement, and that it has informed the European side that it will reject any proposal that prevents it from benefiting economically from the nuclear agreement.
The Iranian foreign minister indicated that Qatar played a constructive role in the indirect talks with the US side.
A week ago, Doha hosted indirect talks between the United States and Iran mediated by the European Union to break the deadlock in efforts to revive the nuclear agreement.
In his statements today, Wednesday, the Qatari Foreign Minister affirmed that his country supports any negotiations in order to reach a just agreement that takes into account the concerns of all parties.
He stressed the importance of making constructive efforts to make the nuclear agreement a success and to encourage regional dialogue.
Since last week, Iran has questioned the United States' intention to save the deal, while Washington says Tehran has added new demands in the Doha talks.
The American position
"Iran has repeatedly made demands beyond the nuclear deal," State Department spokesman Ned Price said. "Presenting anything beyond the narrow scope of the JCPOA suggests a lack of seriousness and commitment, and this is unfortunately what our team in Doha saw."
"We are disappointed that Iran has again failed to respond positively to the EU's initiative, and no progress has been made," Price added.
The indirect negotiations, which took place in Vienna for nearly a year, yielded consensus on the broad lines of reviving the nuclear agreement, but the talks collapsed last March after Tehran demanded that Washington remove the Revolutionary Guards from the US terrorism list.
The United States refused, arguing that this was outside the scope of reviving the agreement.
Iranian and Western diplomats said the other remaining obstacles to the deal were guarantees that Washington would not withdraw from the deal again and the International Atomic Energy Agency withdrawing its demands over Tehran's nuclear activities.
Iran had reduced its uranium enrichment activities under the 2015 agreement, in exchange for the easing of economic sanctions, but former US President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of the United States from the agreement in 2018 and re-imposed severe economic sanctions, which prompted Tehran to abandon many commitments within the agreement.