Top Iran Hardliner Writes To Khamenei, Urges Withdrawal From JCPOA

The latest talks in Vienna were "among the most intensive that we had to date" on returning to the 2015 deal formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which former President Donald Trump abandoned in 2018, a State Department official said, according to Reuters.

Iran has refused to hold direct talks with the United States, which is present on the sidelines of negotiations between Iran and other world powers in Vienna.

"We made progress narrowing down the list of differences to just the key priorities on all sides. And that's why now is the time for political decisions," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to brief reporters.

US President Joe Biden came into office a year ago promising to re-enter the deal, but Iran has continued work on its nuclear program and a deal has remained elusive.

While Iran suspended negotiation for five months in 2021, it continued uranium enrichment to up to 60-percent purity, closing the time gap to accumulate enough fissile material for a bomb. In the meantime, it increased oil exportsas the Biden Administration enforced US sanctions less vigorously.

The official said Washington has already laid out what it was prepared to do in terms of lifting sanctions that are inconsistent with the nuclear deal and that the ball was more in Tehran's court.

"Now is the time... for Iran to decide, whether it is prepared to make those decisions necessary for a mutual return to compliance with the JCPOA."

"We are in the final stretch," the official added. "Given the pace of Iran's advances, its nuclear advances, we only have a handful of weeks left to get a deal."

In the event of no deal with Iran, the official said Washington would have to step up pressure - "economic, diplomatic and otherwise" - in the face of Tehran's unconstrained nuclear program.

Washington and its European have been warning Tehran for months to speed up talks and threatened to resort to other means if agreement could not be reached, but they did not give Iran a clear deadline.

The official repeated Washington's willingness to engage with Iran through direct talks, saying it would be very much in the interest of the process given the limited time frame but added that there was no sign that they were close to doing that.

"We have not met directly yet. We have no indication that's going to be the case when we reconvene," the official said.

Iran has said it will meet with the US if it sees a clear indication that a final agreement is within reach.

Critics have saidthat the Biden Administration has not responded to Iranian provocations in the past one year and is too eager to reach an agreement rather than keep the pressure of sanctions that have put Iran in a difficult economic situation.

Israel has said it will not be restricted by any agreement that falls short of blocking all pathways to nuclear weapons for Iran, and it will reserve the right to take action.

With reporting by Reuters

The reason was not immediately clear. The IAEA said Monday it had placed seals on machines at the TESA Karaj plant and removed its cameras there as production at Karaj had "ceased."

Fars news agency reported Monday that production in the TESA Karaj plant, where Iran manufactures centrifuges, would be moved to a new “location” in Esfahan. The agency did not explain if this was part of the site where Iran converts raw uranium into feeder gases for uranium enrichment, which takes place at Ferdow and Natanz.

Fars and Reuters both reported that IAEA surveillance equipment including cameras had already been installed at the new site − Reuters dated this to January 24 – although production had not yet begun. Tehran and the IAEA have been at odds over access to monitoring equipment across the nuclear sites since early last year, when Tehran reduced its co-operation with the agency to that required by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and a particular dispute over Karaj was resolved only a month ago.

Under the NPT safeguards, the IAEA does not have automatic access to the manufacturing process. Under current arrangements covering nuclear sites, Iran is storing data from cameras and other monitoring equipment but has said the agency will not have access to the data until and unless the current Vienna talks agree a way to restore the 2015 nuclear deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action).

An IAEA report cited by Reuters said that Iran had informed the agency on January 19 that it intended to “produce centrifuge rotor tubes and bellows at a new location in Esfahan, instead of at the centrifuge component production workshop at the TESA Karaj complex, and that the Agency could adjust its surveillance and monitoring measures accordingly.”

Fars reported that Iran had not allowed the IAEA to replace equipment at Karaj, which was agreed in December, until Tehran had carried out “technical and security checks” on new cameras. Last June the site was apparently hit by a drone strike, widely attributed to Israel.

Fars noted that the movement of manufacturing took place against the background of the Vienna talks, which may resume later this week, but gave no explanation of the rationale for the shift.

Abbasi’s comment comes as several lawmakers have lately supported the idea of holding direct talks with the United States,

Abbasi said in an interview with Asr Iran website, "holding direct talks with America is not in our interest as long as the United States has not acknowledged that Iran is a world power."

Critics mocked Abbasi for this statement on social media. Iranian Twitter user Mohammad Hossein Karimipour wrote in response: "A country whose military budget is less than 0.5% of the rest of the world and has no air force and a seaworthy naval force fit for the oceans, and a country that cannot have financial transactions with the world, cannot be a world power. This boastful gang suffering from delusions has taken the nation hostage!"

Other critics charged that true nature of individuals such as Abbasi will be revealed only if the Russian embassy in Tehran is seized, and secrets come out. This comment implicitly referred to the seizure of the US embassy in 1979 and documents discovered.

Another critic said "These individuals benefit from Iran’s current situation. They benefit from the lack of transparency and plunder taking place in the country."

Abbasi harshly criticizing the previous government said, "While the former nuclear negotiating team led by Foreign Minister Javad Zarif believed that I am an uneducated person, the current lead negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani usually comes to the parliament and speaks with me as an expert on the nuclear issue."

Abbasi also claimed that "in order to be able to get results in the nuclear negotiations, we first need to liberate the Golan heights at the Syrian-Israeli border."

Abbasi also claimed that the current negotiations in Vienna between Iran and world powers are not about the nuclear issue. All the negotiations have been already done and their outcome is the nuclear deal called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), he said. He added that Iran's previous government failed to have the sanctions lifted although it had promised that with JCPOA economic restrictions would be removed.

"The current negotiations are about lifting the sanctions. There is no discussion about the nuclear issue. The dossier of the nuclear talks has been closed and the other side should now fulfil their commitments under the nuclear deal," Abbasi said, adding that "No other matter including discussions about the region, our exit from the region or the issue of Iran's missile programs can be discussed as part of the Vienna negotiations."

Abbasi reiterated that Iran will enter direct talks with the United States only after Washington “treats us in the same way it deals with Russia and China,” but if Washington wants to talk with Iran from a position of power without acknowledging it as a world power, it will not be in our interest to talk with the US.

Asked if an agreement made in Vienna needs to be ratified by the Majles (parliament), Abbasi said the legislature has already approved the JCPOA. The current negotiations are not over a new agreement.

Abbasi's statement about Iran respecting its commitments under the nuclear deal is contrary to facts on the ground that indicate Iran has more centrifuges than allowed by the JCPOA and has boosted Uranium enrichment far beyond the level allowed by the nuclear deal.

Abbasi also insisted that the JCPOA's opponents have not changed their mind. This comes while some hardliner members of the parliament, particularly at the National Security and Foreign Relations Committee have recently expressed support for direct talks with the United States.

Peyman Shahbaz, a Twitter user said Abbasi was overwhelmed by his own delusion and added jokingly that "Let him be a world power for two minutes!"

With Iran’s talks with world powers in the Austrian capital paused Friday for political consultations in the various capitals, Saeed Khatibzadeh told reporters at his weekly press briefing that there would be “no need for forged deadlines if the right response is given to what are Iran's natural rights, the texts it has offered, and Iran's lawful demands.”

A “lasting agreement" was possible, the spokesman insisted, "the day after" delegations returned to Vienna as long the right decisions were taken by world powers, especially the United States. Khatibzadeh reiterated that Iran should not be asked to agree to anything beyond the 2015 nuclear agreement, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

The required decisions, Khatibzadeh said, concerned the "considerable issues” remaining over lifting US sanctions and in reaching "acceptable progress” over Iran’s request for both verification over lifting sanctions and guarantees that Washington would not again renege on the JCPOA.

"We are past the stage of ideas,” Khatibzadeh said. “The Iranian delegation in the past three weeks constructively put everything down in writing. We are now awaiting the response of the other sides."

In a speech Sunday, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei quoted US State Department spokesman Ned Price to bolster his argument that Iran had beaten US sanctions, an “economic assault” that had harmed Iranians, he said. “But production did not buckle, and the spokesman of America’s foreign ministry a few days ago candidly and unequivocally announced that the maximum pressure policy has turned into a humiliating defeat for America.”

President Donald Trump introduced ‘maximum pressure’ sanctions in 2018 as he withdrew the US from the JCPOA while setting a range of demands including that Tehran end all uranium enrichment, stop its missile defense program, and break its regional alliance. In response after 2019, Iran extended its nuclear program beyond JCPOA limits.

In a telephone talk Saturday, President Ebrahim Raisi reiterated Tehran’s position that removal of sanctions, verification, and credible guarantees were basic requirements for agreement in Vienna.

A senior US official last week argued that the other five world powers − China, France, Germany, Russia, and the United Kingdom − had joined the US in rejecting proposals made by new Iranian negotiators appointed by Raisi, who took office in August, and that talks had returned to the stage reached in June. Iran's delegation met with the Chinese and Russian delegations just before the break in talks announced Friday.

But whatever technical issues remain, US, Iranian and other representatives last weekall stressed the need for political decisions. The Russian envoy to the talks, Mikhail Ulyanov, said the talks had reached an advanced stage requiring political choices.

Ulyanov said the break would not be very long. The eighth round of talks in Vienna, which began on December 27, are to resume sometime this week.

Talk of an ‘interim deal’, steps towards reviving the JCPOA, has subsided at least in public. The idea floated around for months that the US might ‘allow’ the ‘unfreezing’ of Iranian assets held in Asian banks in return for caps on Iran’s nuclear program short of the JCPOA limits.

In his Monday briefing, Khatibzadeh criticized officials in South Korea, which reportedly holds $7 billion of Iranian funds, owed mainly for past oil purchases. “Unfortunately, we don't have a good experience of what Korean officials say,” the spokesman noted.

According to the Kayhan, "the growth in Iran's trade transactions and the boost in oil sales during the past few months have given the upper hand to Iranian negotiators in Vienna…and they insisted on the Iranian nation's essential demands and conditions."

The Kayhan, affiliated with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s office, quoted Raisi as having said on social media: "Although hard work to eliminate the sanctions are seriously on the government's agenda, efforts to annul the sanctions are not limited to negotiations. Our oil sales have increased to such an extent that we have no financial concerns as the oil money is being repatriated."

The article appeared the same day when Khamenei delivered a speech to manufacturers, saying Iran has defeated the US sanctions and quoted the State Department spokesman to drive home his message.

In mid-January, Oil minister Javad Owji reaffirmed President Ebrahim Raisi's claim that Iran is exporting 40 percent more oil since August and is able to receive the money.

However, Iran’s oil exports had dropped to around 200,000 barrels per day in 2019 when the United States imposed full sanctions. But in late 2020, as former US President Donald Trump lost the election Tehran increased its sales through illicit channels. China is the biggest buyer, with shipments disguised as imports from other countries. Nonetheless, the increase can be hardly attributed to the Raisi administration's effort.

The daily also added that some US senators were annoyed by the development and called on the US President to take firm action against Iran by implementing the sanctions more rigorously.

The Kayhan was referring to a report that said ten Republican Senators wrote to President Joe Biden telling him he is endangering US national security by not enforcing Iranian oil export sanctions. The Senators, including Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) and Ted Cruz in their letter dated January 28 told Biden that a growing fleet of non-Iranian oil tankers and buyers such as China are not afraid of US retaliation any longer and are trading in hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude oil a day.

The senators had reminded Biden that an increase in Iran's oil export will weaken the United States leverage in the nuclear negotiations in Vienna.

The Kayhan further claimed that it was Raisi's policy of expanding ties with Iran's neighbors and boosting the relations with Russia and China that has led to an increase in oil export. The daily also claimed that now it is Iran that is exerting maximum pressure on the United States. According to Kayhan, "Iran is not waiting for the JCPOA and the train of Iran's diplomacy has not stopped in Vienna."

Meanwhile, reformist daily Sharq during the week questioned the Raisi administration's "success" in boosting oil export and wrote: "As there are no official statistics about Iran's oil sales, it is not clear that the 40 percent rise in oil sales is in comparison to which period. Is it 40 percent more than last year? Or more than the same period in the previous year or more than all figures in the history of the oil industry?" Sharq also noted it is not clear how the oil money is being repatriated, "In dollars, in Euros in yens? And how and through which financial channels?"