Nothing in Final Iran Nuclear Deal to Be Open-Ended: Negotiator
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A senior Iranian negotiator asserted on Tuesday that a possible final nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers will have a specific duration without anything permanent, a reaction to a US diplomat’s interpretation of perpetual commitments in the accord.
“The final agreement, if ever reached, will have a specific duration and none of its expected requirements will be permanent,” Abbas Araqchi said on Tuesday.
His comments came in response to remarks by US Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who said a final Iran nuclear deal “will not expire.”
“There will not be a so-called ‘sunset.’ Different requirements of the deal would have different durations, but some –including Iran’s commitment to all of the obligations of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, including the obligation not to build a nuclear weapon, as well as the tough access and monitoring provisions of the Additional Protocol– those would continue in perpetuity,” Blinken said in an address to the American Jewish Committee’s Global Forum in Washington on Monday.
Elsewhere, Iran’s Araqchi made it clear that the country will naturally continue to stick to its commitments under the international treaties, such as the NPT.
“Americans’ resort to such kind of commitments, which have internal consumption or is something to appease the allies, is nothing but a cheap fallacious argument,” the Iranian negotiator pointed out.
Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and Germany) are in talks to finalize the text of a lasting accord that would end more than a decade of impasse over Tehran's civilian nuclear program.
On April 2, Iran and the sextet reached a framework nuclear agreement in Lausanne, Switzerland, with both sides committed to push for a final deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), until the end of June.
