US-Iran 'Disagreements' Remain in Return to JCPOA, US Official Says
The U.S. has made “some progress” in its discussions to return to the Iran nuclear deal but expects a lengthy process involving multiple rounds of talks with European partners, a State Department Official told reporters this week. After speaking with the United Nations Security Council, the official said, the U.S. and Iran both have a “better idea” of what they need to do to fully rejoin the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. But “clarification doesn’t necessarily mean consensus,” the official said April 21. “There still are disagreements” and “the distance that remains to be traveled is greater than the distance that we’ve traveled so far.”
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The official said the U.S. has given Iran examples of “the kind of sanctions that we believe we would need to lift” and not lift to rejoin the deal, but the process has been complex. Donald Trump's administration “deliberately and avowedly imposed sanctions by invoking labels – terrorism labels and other labels even though it was done purely for the purpose of preventing or hindering a return to the” JCPOA the official said. ‘That has made it more difficult. We have to go through every sanction to look at whether they were legitimately or not legitimately imposed.” The official declined to say which sanctions it may lift. “It’s already a complicated negotiation enough without adding to the complexity by negotiating it in public,” the person said.