TEHRAN, June 21 (Xinhua) -- The spokesman for Iran's Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Monday that Tehran has demanded the guarantees from Washington on the stability of the 2015 nuclear agreement in order to revive it.
"The United States once showed during the Trump era that it can defiantly ignore the interests of other nations. They have to provide assurances in this regard," Saeed Khatibzadeh said at a weekly press conference, official IRNA news agency reported.
Khatibzadeh said he could not go into the details of the request for U.S. guarantees concerning the agreement, formally known as Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
On Sunday night, Iranian chief nuclear negotiator Abbas Araqchi told Iran's state TV in the Austrian capital of Vienna that it is Iran's "natural request" that Washington guarantees that it will not withdraw again from the JCPOA and re-impose sanctions on the country.
"It is impossible for us to return to the JCPOA without such a guarantee," Araqchi said after the sixth round of meetings of the Joint Commission of the JCPOA.
Khatibzadeh, in his press briefing, dismissed rumors about a transfer of the negotiations over the revival of the nuclear agreement to the team of Iran's new president-elect Ebrahim Raisi after the June 18 election.
The spokesman stressed that the Iranian negotiating team has been working "without wasting time," in conformity with the policies set by Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
It is "not unlikely" that the next round of talks may be the last one, Khatibzadeh said.
A "clear draft concerning all matters" has been achieved in the negotiations and now a "political decision" must be taken "by all parties," he added.
The U.S. government under former President Donald Trump withdrew from the JCPOA in May 2018 and unilaterally re-imposed sanctions on Iran. In response, Iran gradually stopped implementing parts of its commitments related to the agreement from May 2019.
The JCPOA Joint Commission began to meet offline on April 6 in Vienna to continue previous discussions about a possible return of the United States to the deal and how to ensure the full and effective implementation of the JCPOA. Enditem