Iran’s Economic Benefits Must Be Ensured in Vienna Talks: Spokesman
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A major point of discussion in the Vienna talks on the revival of the JCPOA is Iran’s push for the removal of the sanctions that have obstructed its economic benefits, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Saeed Khatibzadeh said.
“The nature of the fundamental discussions that have been brought up between us and the US (in the Vienna talks) is such that the economic benefits for the Iranian people must be observed,” Khatibzadeh said in a gathering of university students in Mashhad.
He emphasized that the sanctions preventing Iran from enjoying the economic advantages of the JCPOA and the entire chain of sanctions on Iran must be terminated as a result of the negotiations in Vienna.
The spokesman said Iran has not held any direct talks with the US in Vienna so far, noting that the whole point of the talks is that Iran does not basically accept the red list of US sanctions.
Iran and the remaining participants to the JCPOA have been holding talks in Vienna since April last year with the aim of reviving the deal by bringing the US into full compliance.
The US left the JCPOA in May 2018 under former president Donald Trump. The Vienna talks began on a promise by Trump’s successor, Joe Biden, to rejoin the deal and repeal the so-called maximum pressure campaign against Iran. Biden, however, has so far failed to undo Trump’s own undoing of Barack Obama’s Iran policy, which led to the JCPOA in June 2015.
The eighth round of the Vienna talks began on December 27 with a focus on the removal of all sanctions that the United States had imposed on Iran after its unilateral withdrawal from the JCPOA. The US is not allowed to directly attend the talks due to its pullout in 2018 from the deal with Iran.
