JEDDAH: Progress in reviving the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran appeared to grind to a halt on Friday amid wrangling between Tehran and Washington over the “final text” of a new agreement proposed by the EU.
The US said Iran’s latest response was “not constructive,” a day after European mediators were hopeful of finally crossing the finish line.
It is the latest in a back and forth via the EU, which in August broke a deadlock after a year and a half of slow-moving negotiations in Vienna.
The aim is to revive the 2015 agreement to curb Iran’s nuclear program in return for the lifting of economic sanctions, which collapsed in 2018 when the US pulled out.
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“We can confirm that we have received Iran’s response through the EU,” the US State Department said on Friday. “We are studying it and will respond through the EU, but unfortunately it is not constructive.”
Analysts at the Eurasia Group consultancy said the chances of reviving the deal this year were about 45 percent, as developments had been primarily about public messaging. “There is less here than meets the eye,” it said.
A revived nuclear deal is also fiercely opposed by Israel, where a senior member of the Knesset said Western powers could obtain a better agreement than what was currently on offer.
“We must draft a much better deal with a much longer stick. And this is what we’re not seeing,” said Ram Ben-Barak, head of the Israeli parliament’s foreign affairs and defense committee.
“What Israel wants is something better in place of this deal. Something better means telling the Iranians,‘Listen, you will not have a nuclear program’,” he said.
