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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iran seeks to strengthen regional cooperation that cannot be hindered by “foreigners”, the country’s foreign minister said on Tuesday after speaking to several regional counterparts.
“I talked with my brothers, the foreign ministers of Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Oman, and Iraq earlier. Consulting on regional and international issues and examining solutions to develop relations is one of the requirements of the neighborhood policy,” Hossein Amir-Abdollahian tweeted.
“Foreigners cannot hinder the process of regional cooperation,” he added.
During his phone calls with the neighboring countries’ foreign ministers, Abdollahian not only called for increased cooperation and trade opportunities but also discussed the latest developments in the nuclear talks saying Iran is ready to achieve a “stable and strong” agreement.
“In these talks, I explained the latest developments in the sanctions lifting negotiations, and referring to the initiatives of the Islamic Republic of Iran to open the window of diplomacy, I said that the final stage of the agreement depends on the two components of realism and flexibility on the American side,” Iranian state media quoted the foreign minister as saying.
Iran and world powers, including the US, have held talks for over a year aimed at reviving the 2015 nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), with Iran insisting that the US must lift its crippling sanctions, including those on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and to provide a guarantee that future US administrations will not be able to withdraw from the deal.
The accord offered Iran sanctions relief in exchange for the curtailment of its nuclear program. Former US president Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the deal in 2018 and imposed biting sanctions on Tehran.
US President Joe Biden is embarking upon the process of rolling back on his former's withdrawal, as he attempts to return to the deal. However, talks have yielded little result.
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson on Tuesday called on the US to prove its commitment to revive the landmark deal.
“The party that needs to prove 'good faith' and 'seriousness' to ‘re-enter' the deal is the US,” foreign ministry Spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said.
During a press briefing on Tuesday, US State Department Spokesperson Ned Price sent a strong message to Iran if they fail to “seize the opportunity”.
“We will reach a point where it is no longer in our interest to pursue a mutual return to compliance,” Price said, adding that “time is of the essence”.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wrote in an opinion piece published in the Financial Times Tuesday that he has “now put on the table a text that addresses, in precise detail, the sanctions lifting as well as the nuclear steps needed to restore the JCPOA.”
Price said that the text Borrell referred to is the “same” as the one that has been on the table since March.
Iran Friday blamed US “indecision” for delaying a return to the nuclear deal.
Qatar in June hosted EU-mediated indirect talks between Tehran and Washington, but the talks made "no progress" according to the US.
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