Iranian Parliament Upbeat On Nuclear Talks

The rial was trading just below 300,000 in Tehran’s unofficial exchange market for the first time since mid-May. The rial had fallen to as low as 330,000 a few weeks ago as hopes for a nuclear agreement with the United States were fading.

Iran responded to a European Union proposal to resolve the nuclear issue on Monday, in what seemed to offer the best chance since March to reach an agreement.

Iran’s currency began falling in early 2018 when signs emerged that former President Donald Trump was planning to withdraw from the 2015 nuclear agreement and possibly impose sanctions on Iran.

Once the US announced its withdrawal and imposed crippling oil export and banking sanctions, the currency gradually fell ninefold by 2021.

The rial has fallen 4,500-fold since the 1979 revolution that toppled the monarch. The currency was trading at 70 against the dollar in 1978 compared with 3,300 in 2017 and around 300,000 now.

Economists in Tehran have said in recent days that even if a nuclear deal is reached, the rial will not recoup most of its losses and will probably trade at around 240,000 to the dollar, because of serious structural economic issues.

Mohammad Marandi, who has been advisor-cum-spokesman for Iranian negotiators, spoke to both al-Jazeera and CNN television channels. Fars News, affiliated to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, topped its site with Marandi’s words to Jazeera that “economic guarantees means protecting foreign companies and supporting them against American sanctions.”

Iran International had reported earlier Tuesday that Tehran, in a written response late Monday to European Union proposals made August 8, had said its search for economic guarantees had not been satisfied. The August 8 text, circulated by EU mediator Enrique Mora to bridge differences between the United States and Iran, had reportedly proposed a one-year respite from US sanctions for third parties trading with Iran should Washington again leave the Iran 2015 nuclear agreement, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), as it did in 2018 under President Donald Trump.

EU spokesperson Nabila Massrali confirmed Tuesday that the EU had passed on the Iranian response to the August 8 text. “We are studying, and consulting with the other JCPOA participants and the US on the way ahead,” she said.

Bloomberg Tuesday cited “an official familiar with the diplomatic efforts” that the EU saw the Iranian response as “constructive.”

‘That’s what we want’

In a briefing for journalists Tuesday, US State Department Spokesman Ned Price defended the Biden administration’s efforts to restore the JCPOA as an agreement restricting Iran’s nuclear program under international monitoring. “We don’t have that now – that’s what we want,” Price said. “We would prefer to have those permanent, verifiable limits…the deal that has been on the table since March is better than the status quo.”

Price refused to be drawn over Iran’s response to the EU text. “When we have more to say we’ll share that,” he said. “These are not simple issues that can be entertained, or tabled without the consultations we’ve had with the EU…where the parties have had an opportunity to ask questions of the coordinator, to seek additional information…these are complex issues.”

The semi-official Iranian news agency ISNA reported Tuesday that Iran expected a US response within two days, while the English-language Tehran Times called the Iranian input of Monday “a complete package” that had been agreed by an extraordinary meeting of the Supreme National Security Council chaired by President Ebrahim Raisi Monday afternoon.

The Tehran Times also reported that Iran had not included its previous demand that the International Atomic Energy Agency close enquiries into unexplained uranium traces found in sites linked to nuclear work before 2003.

Three differences – including nuclear guarantees

In remarks to journalists Monday, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said messages were being exchanged with the US – presumably via the EU – on three issues. The foreign minister said Washington had expressed “verbal flexibility” on two, something Iran needed confirmed in writing, and that flexibility was still needed on “the third issue and guarantees.”

In a tweet Monday, Marandi also referred to three issues. In a separate tweet, he suggested Iran needed a route to rapidly restoring its nuclear program should the US again leave the JCPOA, so confirming that ‘guarantees’ sought by Tehran were not solely over sanctions.

One of the issues dogging 18-month talks has been agreeing exactly how the Iranian nuclear program, expanded since 2019, should be returned to JCPOA limits. Tehran has reportedly argued that it should store rather than scrap advanced centrifuges, which enrich uranium more efficiently and quickly. Barred under the agreement and have been gradually introduced by Iran since 2011.

After Iran responded Monday evening to the European Union – mediating indirect United States-Iran discussions – to proposals circulated August 8 by EU official Enrique Mora, US State Department spokesman Ned Price said he was “not going to get into the specifics of any language that may or may not result from this.”

Information gleaned by Iran International suggests Iran has eased its demands, especially in accepting the ‘language’ in the EU text over the status of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) enquiries into unexplained uranium traces found at sites not declared as nuclear-related. Tehran has publicly demanded the IAEA drop the probe.

Remaining issues, Iran International has reported, concern ‘guarantees’ Iran seeks over its access to world markets under terms specified by the 2015 deal, the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action). According to Iran International, Iran has not accepted as sufficient a clause in the EU text offering Tehran and entities dealing with Iran, once the JCPOA was restored, a one-year respite from US sanctions should the JCPOA again fall away, presumably by Washington leaving the deal as it did in 2018 under President Donald Trump.

The long-running talks – Iran and six world powers in Vienna April 2021-March 2022; Iran-US bilaterally in Doha in June, and Vienna August 5-8 – have survived apparent setbacks including the change of president in Iran and the Ukraine crisis.

Core challenges

But the core challenges have remained agreeing which US sanctions are incompatible with the JCPOA and how exactly the Iran nuclear program, refined and expanded since 2019, should be returned to JCPOA limits. On the latter, there have been reports Iran has tried to gain acceptance for some of its nuclear developments, for example by keeping in storage rather than decommissioning advanced centrifuges barred under the 2015 deal.

Both the US and Iran have outwardly placed the onus on the other. “In return for Iran placing verifiable and permanent limits on its nuclear program, we would lift sanctions on that nuclear program,” Price said Monday. In Tehran Monday, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Iran’s foreign minister, said Iran wanted “a good, sustainable and strong agreement,” and awaited US “flexibility.”

Throughout the 16-month talks, there have been many reports of single issues supposedly blocking agreement. These have included the US listing of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) as a ‘foreign terrorist organization,’ which Washington argues is unrelated to the JCPOA while Iran argues the listing was specifically linked by the Trump administration to ‘maximum pressure.’

Likewise, while the US – along with the three European JCPOA signatories, France, Germany and the United Kingdom – have argued the IAEA probe into uranium traces is a matter of Iran’s basic ‘safeguards’ commitments under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iranian officials have argued the agency’s enquiries were revived only after ‘politically-motivated’ allegations in 2018 by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

‘Nothing is agreed…’

But whatever possible concessions either the US or Iran have floated, “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed,” as US special envoy Rob Malley has put it, most recently in a PBS interview August 12.The fate of the JCPOA now hangs on whether negotiators can find a written text acceptable to all concerned.

Amir-Abdollahian said Monday that while “the coming days” were “very important,” it was possible that “we will need more efforts and talks ... to resolve the remaining issues.”

Ellie Geranmayeh, deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the European Council for Foreign Relations, said Monday that if Iran wanted further talks on the Mora text, the US and Europeans would face a crucial choice in judging“how many amendments Iran seeks and how substantive they are…”

The diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity, also told Iran International’s Ahamd Samadi that the US is prepared to continue negotiations on changes in the form of the text proposed last week by the EU coordinator in the Vienna nuclear talks.

Diplomats met and discussed the restoration of the 2015 nuclear deal, the JCPOA from August 4-8 in Vienna after talks had stalled in March. The EU proposed a text based on the negotiations to Iran and the US for their final agreement. Washington has said it is ready to proceed based on the proposal, while Tehran is set to send its response midnight Monday.

The diplomat maintained that “If Iran wants to make major changes in the draft, the United States will clearly reject it.”

State Department spokesperson Ned Price in his Monday briefing announced that the US will “privately” share its views on EU’s final draft with the bloc’s High Representative Josep Borrell.

Answering questions at length, Price added that the US agrees “with his fundamental point that what could be negotiated has been negotiated, and that is why the High Representative took it upon himself to propose a text that is substantially based on the March proposal that has been in play for some time.”

Price’s comment was further proof that Washington does not want to reopen major negotiations with Iran after 16 months of exhausting indirect talks. Iran has refused to directly meet with American diplomats.

Price also underlined that President Joe Biden is adamant not to allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.

“We will use all tools available to deter, to contain and otherwise counter dangerous Iranian activities in the region and in some cases well beyond, not the least of which as we’ve all been discussing in recent days is the plotting against former US officials and mental threats to American citizens,” he maintained.

Price was referring to cases that US authorities have said Iranian agents were behind plots to kill former national security adviser John Bolton and other Trump administration officials, and the arrest of an armed man outside to home of an Iranian activist, Masih Alinejad, in Brooklyn, NY. Moreover, the serious attack on renowned author Salman Rushdie last week has also led many to blame Iran for having condemned him to death and maintaining a bounty on more than $3 million on his head.

Many have since expressed outrage and dismay that the administration is still willing to conclude a new nuclear deal with Iran and provide sanctions relief.

However, Price reiterated the administration’s position that diplomacy is the best way to put Iran’s nuclear program back into JCPOA limits. He also added that if Tehran refuses to reach a deal on JCPOA, Washington is “equally prepared to continue the vigorous enforcement of our sanctions in the imposition of other diplomatic pressure.”

Price also insisted that contrary to media reports, the US is not about to lift sanctions imposed on Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

In response to Iran International’s question at the briefing, Price reiterated that Iran has to drop all demands “beyond the scope of the JCPOA.”

Referring to President Biden’s position, the spokesperson said, “We have long called these demands extraneous, they have no place in Vienna, they have no place in the discussions regarding a potential return to compliance with the JCPOA.”

Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said on Monday, “We have not offered our final conclusion to the opposite side yet. We will relay our final conclusion on the outstanding issues to the EU coordinator in writing by midnight today to see what feedback it will have and what reaction the US will show.”

Reiterating calls on the US to take “a realistic and flexible approach” to Tehran’s offer, he added that “The American side has orally agreed to two proposals offered by Iran,” and that Washington's oral acceptance of the Iranian offers "must turn into a text and it must show flexibility on one issue."

“However, the US ... wants to get more concessions and does not show flexibility. We must talk more and those parties that are trying to get our positions closer should [try to] get the Americans closer to our logical viewpoints,” he said, hinting that Iran will try to make the talks on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) linger on. 

Emphasizing the significance of the “upcoming days,” the Iranian foreign minister stressed that Tehran is ready to reach a conclusion through a foreign ministerial meeting and announce the final agreement if its views are accepted and its redlines are respected. 

Amir-Abdollahian’s remarks and statements by other officials show that Tehran is not yet satisfied with the EU offer on the table and expects more negotiations.