U.S. disappointed with Iran's latest response on nuclear deal

In the struggle to relaunch the nuclear agreement with Iran, the U.S. has expressed disappointment with the latest response from Tehran. "We can confirm that we have received Iran's response through the EU," a U.S. State Department spokesman said Thursday evening (local time) in Washington. "We are reviewing it and will respond through the EU, but unfortunately it is not constructive."

The EU had submitted what it described as a "final text" for a new agreement with Iran on Aug. 8. Iran had responded with proposed amendments, to which Washington had in turn responded with proposals of its own.

"We have carefully considered the U.S. response to the EU's compromise proposal and conveyed our position on it to the EU," Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said in Tehran on Friday (local time). He did not give details, according to reports in various media outlets. He called the proposal "constructive." The goal, he said, is to reach a final agreement.

This answer was now referred to by the spokesman of the US State Department. In Washington, it was still Thursday due to the time difference of 8.5 hours. The EU foreign representative Josep Borrell had still expressed optimism on Wednesday that a new edition of the nuclear agreement could be concluded "in the coming days."

The 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran was meant to limit Iran's nuclear program and ensure that the country did not build nuclear weapons. It was negotiated by the United States, China, Russia, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and Iran.

However, the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the agreement in 2018 under then-President Donald Trump, after which Iran also gradually withdrew from its obligations under the agreement. Trump's successor Joe Biden is seeking to revive the agreement, but the negotiations are proving extremely complicated.

Image by Akbar Nemati