Iran says next nuclear talks with US set for Saturday in Rome, Gets cranky with Paris

Iran says next nuclear talks with US set for Saturday in Rome, Gets cranky with Paris
by AFP Staff Writers
Tehran (AFP) April 30, 2025

Iran and the United States will hold a fourth round of talks on the Islamic republic's nuclear programme in Rome on Saturday, Iran's foreign minister said.

The longtime adversaries have held three rounds of talks aiming for a deal on the programme, which the West believes is intended to develop nuclear weapons -- an allegation Tehran denies.

The talks, which began on April 12 and are mediated by Oman, are the highest-level contact in years between the two sides.

"The next round of negotiations will take place in Rome," Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said after a cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

The top diplomat said Iranian officials would also meet on Friday with representatives from Britain, France and Germany -- all parties to the 2015 nuclear deal.

The deal called for the lifting of sanctions in exchange for curbing Iran's nuclear activities, but fell apart when Washington withdrew from it in 2018 during Donald Trump's first term as US president.

After France threatened that the European trio could reimpose sanctions, Iran's UN mission said that "threats and economic blackmail" were "entirely unacceptable".

"Genuine diplomacy cannot proceed under threats or pressure," the diplomatic mission said in a letter carried Wednesday by Iran's ISNA news agency.

Trump sent a letter in March to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urging talks and warning of possible military action if Iran refused.

Since he returned to office in January, Trump revived his "maximum pressure" sanctions campaign, mirroring his approach during his first term.

Tehran has insisted that the ongoing talks should be solely focused on the nuclear issue and the lifting of sanctions.

During the last round in the Omani capital Muscat on Saturday, both sides reported progress.

Iran blasts French 'threats' of new sanctions
Tehran (AFP) April 30, 2025 - Iran's UN mission has slammed "threats" by France to reimpose sanctions lifted under a landmark 2015 deal on Tehran's nuclear programme, media in the Islamic republic reported on Wednesday.

France on Monday said that along with Germany and Britain, it "will not hesitate for a single second to reapply all the sanctions" scrapped a decade ago if European security is threatened by Iran's nuclear activities, as Tehran and Washington are engaged in negotiations for a new agreement.

"Resorting to threats and economic blackmail is entirely unacceptable," Iran's mission to the UN said in a letter carried by the country's ISNA news agency.

France, Germany and Britain, along with China and Russia, are parties to the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran, which the United States withdrew from three years later during President Donald Trump's first term in office.

Under the agreement, the parties can trigger the "snapback" mechanism, which would automatically reinstate UN sanctions on Iran over its non-compliance, an option that expires in October.

Longtime foes Iran and the United States have been engaged since April 12 in their highest-level talks in years targeting a new deal that would stop Tehran developing nuclear weapons -- an objective it denies pursuing -- in return for relief from sanctions.

Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said last week he was willing to visit Germany, France and Britain for talks.

The Iranian UN mission said in its letter that "genuine diplomacy cannot proceed under threats or pressure".

"If France and its partners are truly interested in a diplomatic resolution, they must abandon coercion."