He did not elaborate on the response, but the US is not expected to accept what Iran has proposed without seeking changes and further negotiations. US officials had expressed some optimism about the latest efforts to revive the nuclear deal, which the US abandoned in 2018 during the Trump administration and which Tehran has increasingly violated since. However, they have stressed that gaps remain between the two sides. It is also expected to face significant domestic opposition from lawmakers in the US Congress and has been condemned by Israel, whose prime minister has said it will “act to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear state”. The nuclear deal negotiations also come amid ongoing concerns about threats from Iran and Iran-backed military groups. EU spokeswoman Nabila Massrali confirmed that they “received the US response and have forwarded it to Iran.” Earlier on Wednesday, a spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry said they had received the US response through the EU and “the careful study of the US side’s views has begun.” “Iran will share its comments with the coordinator after the review is completed,” Nasser Kanaani said, according to a statement from Iran’s foreign ministry. The US response came more than a week after Iran sent its response to what top EU diplomat Josep Borrell called “a final text” on restoring the nuclear deal. Borrell said on Monday that the Iranian response was “reasonable”. Price said Monday that the U.S. government was working “as quickly as we can, as methodically as we can and as carefully as we can to make sure our response is complete,” noting that it is “taking into account Iranian feedback.” Biden administration officials claimed that Tehran rejected a number of demands that were in earlier drafts of the text aimed at restoring the 2015 deal, including a demand that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) be delisted as a foreign terrorist organization.
Still issues to be resolved
But US officials have said there are issues that need to be resolved before the US agrees to rejoin the deal — officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Iran has increasingly violated its commitments under the deal and has developed its nuclear program since the US withdrawal. “We’ve said all along that if Iran was ready to come back to the JCPOA and if it was willing to drop demands that are foreign to the JCPOA, that means the demands that Iran had previously made are irrelevant. with the Iran deal, then we would be prepared on a mutual basis to go back to the Iran deal,” Price said Wednesday morning in an interview with CNN’s “New Day.” “We’re closer today, but we’re still not there,” he said. The US sent its response to the EU a day after Israeli National Security Adviser Eyal Hulata met with his counterpart Jake Sullivan in Washington. On Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid reiterated his country’s opposition to “this deal, because it is bad.” Lapid called on the US and other parties to the deal to withdraw from the negotiations and claimed that “the negotiators are ready to make concessions”. “We have made it clear to everyone: if an agreement is signed, it does not bind Israel. We will act to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear state,” he said during a news conference in Jerusalem. Biden administration officials have denied making concessions to Tehran and argued that renegotiating the deal is the best way to prevent Iran from ever acquiring a nuclear weapon. A senior administration official said that if the agreement were to be fully reciprocated, some restrictions would be put into effect. They include banning Iran from “enriching and storing uranium above very limited levels,” removing “thousands of advanced centrifuges … including all centrifuges being enriched at the fortified underground facility at Fordow,” and “banning reprocessing and redesigning a reactor which could otherwise be used to produce weapons-grade plutonium’. “Strict limits on Iranian enrichment would mean that even if Iran were to leave the deal to pursue a nuclear weapon, it would take at least six months to do so,” the official said. “In addition to the nuclear restrictions that Iran would have to implement, the IAEA will again be able to implement the most comprehensive inspection regime it has ever negotiated, allowing it to detect any attempt by Iran to covertly pursue a nuclear weapon,” they added. “Much of this international monitoring will remain in place indefinitely.” CNN’s Hadas Gold, Emmet Lyons and Natasha Bertrand contributed reporting.
