TEHRAN (Dispatches) -- Iran on Monday reiterated that the U.S. has to lift its inhuman sanctions on the Islamic Republic before the two sides could engage in any negotiations.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh repeated a three-step pathway that Tehran has devised for Washington before the latter could find its way back to any negotiation featuring the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
Referring to Trump successor Joe Biden’s administration, Khatibzadeh said, "The course that the U.S. has to take should feature putting the wrong policies of the previous administration behind.”
He regretted that to date, the Biden team has not affected any changes in his predecessor’s approach.
"We respond to measures with measures, and actions with actions. We respond to positive measures with positive measures, and will respond proportionately if we see a different behavior on the part of the U.S. and Europe,” he said.
Khatibzadeh said Biden has even did worse than Trump in certain areas. "It is a source of great regret that Biden and his administration have gotten off to a very hopeless start,” he said.
The spokesman further addressed recent remarks by Benjamin Netanyahu, in which he tried to implicate Iran in an explosion featuring an Israeli-owned vessel in the Sea of Oman, and the Israeli prime minister’s rehashing of his claim that he was determined to prevent Tehran from acquiring "nuclear weapons.”
"Such a blame game only serves the Zionist regime’s corrupt prime minister,” Khatibzadeh said, noting that Netanyahu was afflicted with "a pathological mental obsession with Iran that is nothing new”.
The Zionist premier’s claim "reflects the confusion that emanates from the regime’s adventurist behavior both inside and outside the occupied territories,” the spokesman said.
Khatibzadeh, meanwhile, reiterated that nuclear weapons have no place in the Islamic Republic’s doctrine.
"Unfortunately, it is the Western world and the U.S. that have closed their eyes to the Zionist regime’s stockpiled weapons and nuclear bombs,” he added.