The European Union is making what has been described as a last-ditch effort to salvage the moribund 2015 Iran nuclear deal, as the Vienna negotiations are treading water.
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Enrique Mora, the EU's coordinator to the nuclear talks will visit Tehran on Tuesday, the Islamic republic's semi-official Nour news agency reported on Saturday, saying, "This trip could be seen as a new step in constructive consultations on the few but important issues that have remained in the Vienna talks."
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell told the Financial Times last week that he was hoping to find a way around the impasse, as concerns rise that the efforts European diplomats have invested in ensuring the US rejoins the deal former President Donald Trump exited in 2018, as well as security Iranian compliance with the West's demand to drastically reduce its nuclear activity, could all be in vain.
Mora's visit to Iran aims to discuss the issue, but Borrell admitted that the ayatollahs were "was very much reluctant" to do so, further describing the diplomatic push as "the last bullet" the EU has.
"We cannot continue like this forever, because in the meantime Iran continues developing their nuclear program," Borrell was cited by the Wall Street Journal as saying. "The file is on the table of President Biden himself. My discussions with [US Secretary of State Antony] Blinken have reached the limit."
The EU's foreign policy chief did, however, say that negotiators would not give Iran an ultimatum, over what is perceived as the West's feat that any ultimatum would spark a new crisis with Iran.
Both Washington and Tehran are interested in a successful negation, Borrell contended, saying, "We Europeans will be very much beneficiaries from this deal, the situation has changed now. For us it was something . . . 'well we don't need it', now it would be very much interesting for us to have another [crude] supplier," he added. "And the Americans need a diplomatic success."
Biden had said that the US wants to restore the 2015 nuclear deal providing Iran complies with it. Tehran's violations of the accords have grown so brazen they have left it hollow.
According to the WSJ, Western diplomats say the revised nuclear deal is "ready to be signed" but the Vienna talks have been stalling since March. The main hold-up at this time is the US's reluctance to remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from its list of foreign terrorist organizations.
Tehran has linked the two issues, while Washington sees them as separate.
"If it matters to the Iranians that we lift it, we are going to need something that addresses our non-nuclear concerns in exchange," the WSJ cited an American official. "If Iran insists the designation has to be lifted and rejects all of the ideas that we put forward, there will be a collapse of the talks."
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