(TheLibertyRevolution.com)- A change in leadership at the White House has not changed how Iran views the United States.
Iran recently rejected an offer from the European Union to arrange direct nuclear talks with America, according to diplomats. For now, Iranian officials have said they won’t attend a meeting with the U.S. in Europe. Before the country does so, they apparently want America to guarantee they’ll lift some of the sanctions they currently impose on the country.
U.S. officials said they would attend talks with Iran, which officials from the EU hoped would happen this week. But, because the Biden administration refused to provide relief on the sanctions before the face-to-face meeting takes place, Iran said it wouldn’t attend.
The two senior Western diplomats cited by Fox News in their recent report said this rejection doesn’t end all hope for direct negotiations with Iran. They believe that Iran’s rejection of a meeting this week could be seen as the country trying to gain leverage in advance of future talks.
The officials also said talks could pick up again sometime before the Iranian new year, which occurs in late March.
The EU has been trying to revive the nuclear deal with Iran that was struck in 2015. The Trump administration withdrew from that deal, though, and Iran breached the limits established in that deal since then.
Officials from both Iran and the Biden administration have said they want to restore the agreement, but for now, it seems each side is waiting for the other to act first.
In the meantime, Germany, France and the U.K. are crafting a resolution to present to the board of the International Atomic Energy Agency next week. That resolution would censure the Iranians for recently expanding their nuclear activities, and for their failure to cooperate with probes into the country’s nuclear work.
Iran has threatened to not allow the international inspections to go on if the censure does go into effect. In early February, Iran struck a deal with the IAEA that allowed for the inspections.
The country has threatened to curtail access by inspectors to their nuclear activities. Iranian officials scaled back that effort once Rafael Grossi, the director general of the IAEA, visited Tehran recently.
If Iran were to follow through and not cooperate with inspectors, Grossi said it would significantly impact his agency’s ability to keep the nuclear program established by Iran in check.
The Biden administration has said it won’t suspend America’s sanctions that are on Iran until they reverse the “multiple steps” they’ve taken to breach that 2015 nuclear deal. That being said, the administration has signaled a willingness and eagerness to rejoin the accord if Iran were to comply.
Some senior diplomats in Europe were hoping for a meeting this week between Iran and the U.S. so that Tehran wouldn’t be as isolated from a diplomatic perspective. But, it seems that Iran was insistent on getting something from the U.S. in advance of those meetings — which just plainly isn’t going to happen.
