WASHINGTON: The European Union and United States said on Tuesday they were studying Iran’s response to what the EU has called its “final” proposal to save a 2015 nuclear deal after Tehran called on Washington to show flexibility.
A US State Department spokesperson said the United States was sharing its views on Iran’s response with the European Union after receiving Tehran’s comments from the bloc.
“For the moment, we are studying it and we are consulting with the other JCPOA participants and the US on the way forward,” an EU spokesperson told reporters in Brussels, referring to the nuclear deal by the official abbreviation JCPOA.
She declined to give a time frame for any reaction from the EU.
After 16 months of fitful, indirect US-Iranian talks, with the EU shuttling between the parties, a senior EU official said on Aug. 8 the bloc had laid down a “final” offer and expected a response within a “very, very few weeks.”
Iran responded to the proposal late on Monday but none of the parties provided any details.
Earlier on Monday, Iran’s foreign minister called on the US to show flexibility to resolve three remaining issues, suggesting Tehran’s response would not be a final acceptance or rejection.
Washington has said it is ready to quickly seal a deal to restore the 2015 accord on the basis of the EU proposals.
Diplomats and officials have told Reuters that whether or not Tehran and Washington accept the EU’s “final” offer, neither is likely to declare the pact dead because keeping it alive serves both sides’ interests.
The stakes are high, since failure in the nuclear negotiations would carry the risk of a fresh regional war, with Israel threatening military action against Iran if diplomacy fails to prevent Tehran from developing a nuclear weapons capability.
Iran, which has long denied having such ambitions, has warned of a “crushing” response to any Israeli attack.
In 2018, then-President Donald Trump reneged on the nuclear deal reached before he took office, calling it too soft on Iran, and reimposed harsh US sanctions, spurring the Islamic Republic to begin breaching its limits on uranium enrichment.
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EU, US say they’re studying Iran’s response to nuclear proposal
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EU, US say they’re studying Iran’s response to nuclear proposal
- US State Department: US is sharing views on Iran’s response with EU after receiving Tehran’s comments from bloc
Virtual museum preserves Sudan’s plundered heritage
CAIRO: Destroyed and looted in the early months of Sudan’s war, the national museum in Khartoum is now welcoming visitors virtually after months of painstaking effort to digitally recreate its collection.
At the museum itself, almost nothing remains of the 100,000 artefacts it had stored since its construction in the 1950s. Only the pieces too heavy for looters to haul off, like the massive granite statue of the Kush Pharaoh Taharqa and frescoes relocated from temples during the building of the Aswan Dam, are still present on site.
“The virtual museum is the only viable option to ensure continuity,” government antiquities official Ikhlass Abdel Latif said during a recent presentation of the project, carried out by the French Archaeological Unit for Sudanese Antiquities (SFDAS) with support from the Louvre and Britain’s Durham University.
When the museum was plundered following the outbreak of the war between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in April 2023, satellite images showed trucks loaded with relics heading toward Darfur, the western region now totally controlled by the RSF.
Since then, searches for the missing artefacts aided by Interpol have only yielded meagre results.
“The Khartoum museum was the cornerstone of Sudanese cultural preservation — the damage is astronomical,” said SFDAS researcher Faiza Drici, but “the virtual version lets us recreate the lost collections and keep a clear record.”
Drici worked for more than a year to reconstruct the lost holdings in a database, working from fragments of official lists, studies published by researchers and photos taken during excavation missions.
Then graphic designer Marcel Perrin created a computer model that mimicked the museum’s atmosphere — its architecture, its lighting and the arrangement of its displays.
Online since January 1, the virtual museum now gives visitors a facsimile of the experience of walking through the institution’s galleries — reconstructed from photographs and the original plans — and viewing more than 1,000 pieces inherited from the ancient Kingdom of Kush.
It will take until the end of 2026, however, for the project to upload its recreation of the museum’s famed “Gold Room,” which had housed solid-gold royal jewelry, figurines and ceremonial objects stolen by looters.
In addition to the virtual museum’s documentary value, the catalogue reconstructed by SFDAS is expected to bolster Interpol’s efforts to thwart the trafficking of Sudan’s stolen heritage.
At the museum itself, almost nothing remains of the 100,000 artefacts it had stored since its construction in the 1950s. Only the pieces too heavy for looters to haul off, like the massive granite statue of the Kush Pharaoh Taharqa and frescoes relocated from temples during the building of the Aswan Dam, are still present on site.
“The virtual museum is the only viable option to ensure continuity,” government antiquities official Ikhlass Abdel Latif said during a recent presentation of the project, carried out by the French Archaeological Unit for Sudanese Antiquities (SFDAS) with support from the Louvre and Britain’s Durham University.
When the museum was plundered following the outbreak of the war between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in April 2023, satellite images showed trucks loaded with relics heading toward Darfur, the western region now totally controlled by the RSF.
Since then, searches for the missing artefacts aided by Interpol have only yielded meagre results.
“The Khartoum museum was the cornerstone of Sudanese cultural preservation — the damage is astronomical,” said SFDAS researcher Faiza Drici, but “the virtual version lets us recreate the lost collections and keep a clear record.”
Drici worked for more than a year to reconstruct the lost holdings in a database, working from fragments of official lists, studies published by researchers and photos taken during excavation missions.
Then graphic designer Marcel Perrin created a computer model that mimicked the museum’s atmosphere — its architecture, its lighting and the arrangement of its displays.
Online since January 1, the virtual museum now gives visitors a facsimile of the experience of walking through the institution’s galleries — reconstructed from photographs and the original plans — and viewing more than 1,000 pieces inherited from the ancient Kingdom of Kush.
It will take until the end of 2026, however, for the project to upload its recreation of the museum’s famed “Gold Room,” which had housed solid-gold royal jewelry, figurines and ceremonial objects stolen by looters.
In addition to the virtual museum’s documentary value, the catalogue reconstructed by SFDAS is expected to bolster Interpol’s efforts to thwart the trafficking of Sudan’s stolen heritage.
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