“If the P5+1 countries seek to make serious progress in the negotiations and reach a comprehensive solution with Iran, they should honor the obligations in the Geneva deal which include goodwill and the spirit of understanding and cooperation,” Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister and top nuclear negotiator Abbas Araqchi said in a televised interview on Friday.
He made the comments after the administration of US President Barack Obama on Thursday issued new sanctions against more than a dozen companies and individuals for “providing support for” Tehrran’s nuclear program.
The US Treasury Department said it was freezing assets and banning transactions of entities that attempt to evade the sanctions against Iran.
“The US government claims that these individuals and companies have violated previous sanctions and that [Washington] is allowed to add them to the list of sanctions, but we believe the move definitely runs counter to the spirit of the Geneva agreement,” Araqchi said.
Parties to the Geneva deal agreed to proceed with the talks in an atmosphere based on goodwill and cooperation, the senior member of Iran’s nuclear negotiating team added.
“We strongly criticize the [US] move which is not consistent with the goodwill needed for a bilateral agreement,” he stated.
Araqchi warned that such “unconstructive” measures would hinder the nuclear talks.
The new US sanctions came despite the nuclear deal inked between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council - Russia, China, France, Britain and the US - plus Germany in the Swiss city of Geneva on November 24 in a bid to set the stage for the full resolution of the West’s decade-old dispute with Iran over the country’s nuclear energy program.
Under part of the Geneva deal, It was agreed that no more sanctions would be imposed on Iran in six months.
Araqchi further expressed dissatisfaction with the “very slow” pace of expert-level talks between Iran and the six powers in the Austrian capital, Vienna.
“We came to the conclusion that our experts had better return to Tehran for more consultations and further interaction on the details [of the talks], so that expert-level negotiations will continue after adequate assessment and a better logic,” the Iranian official said.
Iran and the six powers ended four days of intense expert-level negotiations in Vienna on Thursday.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif had earlier warned that the Geneva nuclear deal will be “dead” if the US imposes further sanctions against the Islamic Republic.
