TEHRAN – New Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi told his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron on Monday that negotiations with world countries to revive the 2015 nuclear deal must guarantee Tehran’s “rights.”
“In any negotiation, the rights of the Iranian people must be upheld and the interests of our nation ensured,” Raisi said in an hour-long phone call to discuss matters of mutual interest as well as the revival of Iran’s nuclear deal.
He touched on frequent U.S. violations of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and the European signatories’ lack of commitment to their obligations.
“By imposing new sanctions, the Americans clearly violated their obligations and even extended new sanctions to cover humanitarian articles as well,” he said.
Both the United States and European countries must fulfill their obligations as per the nuclear deal, Iran’s president said.
“The rights of the Iranian nation must be guaranteed in any negotiations and the interests of our nation must be met.”
The JCPOA was reached between Iran and six world powers, including the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China.
Since April, representatives from Iran and the remaining signatories to the JCPOA have been holding face-to-face talks in the Austrian capital aimed at bringing the U.S. back to compliance and putting the deal back on track.
So far, six rounds of negotiations have been held in the Austrian capital, but disagreements have persisted over a number of issues, including how to sequence the U.S. sanctions removal, with Tehran arguing that since Washington was the party that violated the terms of the agreement, it should take the first step back into compliance with the deal by removing its unilateral sanctions.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Raeisi said, “The Islamic Republic is very serious about ensuring security and maintaining deterrence in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman, and will counter any party that would try to undermine security in the region.”
Tensions simmer in the region in the wake of a recent suspected drone attack on an Israeli-managed tanker -- Mercer Street -- off the Omani
coast, where two crew members were killed. With no evidence, the United States, the Zionist regime and Britain blamed Iran for the incident.
The French president, for his part, congratulated Raeisi on his election as Iran’s new president, wishing him success during his term in office.
Macron said cooperation between Tehran and Paris could be instrumental in establishing peace and stability in the region.
He pointed to the unilateral U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA and expressed his country’s determination to find a solution to the issue.
“We hope to come up with a solution for this problem and are hopeful that negotiations [on the revival of the JCPOA] would be restarted,” the French president said.
He also called for the continuation of dialogue between Tehran and Paris to further strengthen the two countries’ relations.