President, Foreign Minister Repeat Iran's Tough Conditions For A Deal

Iran's president and foreign minister have reiterated that for an agreement in nuclear talks Washington must remove all sanctions and guarantee the deal.

In a phone conversation with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron on Saturday, the Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi reiterated that any deal for the restoration of the deal, Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), must include the lifting of sanctions, convincing guarantees that Washington will not renege on the deal in the future as former US President Donald Trump did in 2018, and "an end to political issues and claims".

In his hour and half-long phone talk with Macron, Raisi also said Iran is under certain "political pressures or claims aimed at maintaining the leverage of pressure" that "undermine the prospect of reaching an agreement in Vienna".

It is not clear what pressures Raisi was referring to, but Iran has made advances in its nuclear program that must be addressed by any agreement if JCPOA is to be restored. One issue is advanced uranium enrichment machines it has deployed since 2020 and the stockpile of highly enriched uranium these centrifuges have produced. Beyond nuclear issues, the US is demanding the release of American and possibly other Western citizens held in Iran on trumped-up charges, Iran’s ballistic missiles and its aggressive regional policies.

"President Macron stressed the need to conclude an agreement while there was still time for this. He also expressed his conviction that the discussions, which are being conducted with the active participation of France and its partners, make it possible to arrive at a solution that takes into account the fundamental interests of all parties,” the Elysee Palace said in a short communiqué according to France 24. “This would help avoid a major nuclear crisis,” the statement said.

“What we are considering seems absolutely reasonable and fair: the removal of all sanctions inconsistent with the JCPOA, verification of sanctions removal, and presentation of absolutely necessary objective guarantees for the fulfilment of commitments,” Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said in an address at the Munich Security Conference Saturday evening and added that Western powers will be responsible if the nuclear talks in Vienna fail because Tehran wants "a good deal".

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Thursday accused Western powers of seeking to deprive Iranians of peaceful nuclear energy and reiterated that Iran has never sought nuclear weapons but gave no indication in his speech as to whether he thought a revived deal, restoring limits on Tehran’s nuclear program, was likely.

‘Tangible good will’

Amir-Abdollahian also reiterated that Tehran wants the US to show “tangible steps of goodwill," in a possible reference to freeing Iran's blocked funds abroad.

When asked about prospects of direct negotiations between Tehran and Washington at a panel at the Munich Security Conference Saturday, the Iranian foreign minister did not rule out the possibility but said Washington should show tangible goodwill gestures including the release of Iran's assets frozen in other countries under the US sanctions before even considering to directly negotiate with the US in Vienna.

European powers have in the past few days warned that time for reaching an agreement with Tehran was quickly drawing to an end, but Tehran continues to blame the other parties and says the deadlines set by them are "fake".

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said Saturday that Tehran has already made its "serious decisions" and demonstrated its seriousness all along during the talks. "To reach the final agreement, it is now up to the E3 and the US to do the same, urgently," he tweeted.

Amir-Abdollahian on Saturday also said Tehran is ready for an "immediate" prisoner swap with the US. “We believe prisoner swap is a humanitarian issue ... unrelated to the nuclear accord. We can do it immediately,” he told the panel at the Munich Security Conference.

Tehran has refuted a Reuters report Friday that claimed a prisoner swap was part of the talks.

Tehran is holding at least four Iranian-American nationals as well as several with citizenship of European countries including France, Britain, Germany, and Sweden who were arrested by the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) and sentenced by Revolutionary Courts to prison terms.

The US Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley said on January 24 that a nuclear agreement with Tehran was unlikely without the release of Americans detained in Iran.