US envoy reiterate claims on upcoming nuclear talks in Vienna

Although many countries acknowledge that the US policy of maximum pressure and sanction has been failed, Washington continues to insist on this approach.

In an interview with the BBC, Robert Mally, the US special envoy for Iran affairs, threatened that the United States and its partners are likely to exert pressure on the Islamic Republic of Iran.

“If Iran thinks it can use this time to build more leverage and then come back and say they want something better it simply won’t work. We and our partners won’t go for it,” Robert Malley claimed.

He made baseless remarks on Sunday, saying, "If that’s Iran’s approach, which is to try to use the negotiations as a cover for an accelerated nuclear programme, and as I say, drag its feet at the nuclear table, we will have to respond in a way that is not our preference,”

Nobody should be surprised if at that point there is increased pressure on Iran, he also claimed.

Iran and the remaining signatories to the JCPOA known as the P4+1 with the indirect involvement of the United States have held six rounds of talks so far with no results. The Western powers made excessive demands during the talks and the talks were halted amid the change in the government in Iran.

As part of the remedial measures taken by Iran amid the indifference of the JCPOA parties to continued US violations of the JCPOA, Iran halted voluntary implementation of the Additional Protocol, which allows unannounced inspections of its nuclear sites by the IAEA inspectors as per a piece of legislation approved in the Iranian parliament last December as well as the JCPOA itself.

Representatives from Iran and the P4+1 group of countries — Britain, France, Russia, and China plus Germany — are scheduled to hold the seventh round of nuclear talks in Vienna tomorrow.

Ali Bagheri, the Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs, will chair the Iranian negotiation team in the talks.

"We will be seriously participating in the Viena talks, and lifting the sanctions imposed on the Iranian nation will be on our agenda", the Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson said on Friday.

The focus of Iran and the P4+1 is to lift the illegal, unilateral sanctions imposed on Iran by the United States after Trump's withdrawal from the JCPOA, he noted.