Diplomats have engaged in Iran talks in Vienna this week with sending conflicting messages on progress to reach agreement over reviving the 2015 deal. The way the messages were convened, were not so promising at the same time not so gloomy. It was a message of hope at some point, but since the talks have numerous aspects and despite significant progress in the past, had time and again faced a sudden deadlock.
Without doubt, there was some progress in the process. Iranian top advisors to the nuclear negotiating team illuminated that there were no differences between them and Europe or Russia but put the chance of any possible agreement was 50-50 percent.
This simply explains the gravity of the talks which Iran and US still need to elucidate because the remaining issues are now between the two capitals.
While Russia’s ambassador Mikahil Ulyanov expressed optimism, right the way US envoy Rob Malley painted a gloomy picture of the talks, expressing disappointment. Meanwhile Iran urged Washington to be flexible and have some seriousness in the process.
After six months of negotiations that ended in an anonymous way, Iran and US officials have indirectly engaged in talks to salvage the 2015 pact. The negotiations to revive the deal began in April 2021, before coming to standstill in March.
The trust deficit
Relations between Iran and the US have never been cordial and the US is using every tool to force Tehran to do what Washington says. Despite severe sanctions, the US had signed an agreement with Israel, the most arch-enemy of Iran, where both the countries pledged to use all elements of national power to ensure that Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon. The same promises were made with Saudi Arabia, but Iran doesn’t consider the Kingdom as a hostile nation compared to Israel.
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, the US did not lift its sanctions affecting medicine, rather threatened Iran that epidemic won’t save it from sanctions. In a blatant move, it has blacklisted companies based in the UAE, three in China, three in Hong Kong and one in South Africa for trade in Iran’s petrochemicals and Iran considered these pressures as a crime against humanity.
Iran had called for a good deal all the time. The country’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has already issued a religious decree on prohibition of using nuclear weapons, assuring that nuclear arms have no place in Iran’s doctrine and are against its policy and beliefs. Iran’s chief negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani has left Vienna and will fly back to Tehran for political consultations, where Khamenei would have the final say on any deal. It is not clear how long the political consultations over the draft text would last, because Washington also needs to have its final say.
Iran wants deal to help remove sanctions
Iran, which is more interested in the deal as it sees it as the final approach to get rid of current sanction, has expressed seriousness in clenching a strong and double agreement, but not at all cost. Iran is exercising extreme caution in dealing with the US and seeking guarantees. The mistrust is due former President Donald Trump’s one-sided withdrawal from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal in 2018. This was the moment when trust-deficit reached its boiling point.
One of the sticking point is that how US would deal with Iran’s request to remove Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from its “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” list, as one of the key demands by Iranian officials.
