Iran calls for total lifting of sanctions

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says all sanctions against Iran have to be lifted in the final stage of talks on the country’s nuclear energy program.

On Thursday, Zarif described the talks with the foreign ministers of the 5+1 Group — Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States, plus Germany — to resolve the West’s dispute with Tehran over its nuclear energy program as “very good and substantive” and said the result would have to include “a total lifting” of the international sanctions.
He said: “We hope to be able to make progress to solve this issue in a timely fashion and to make sure there is no concern that Iran’s program is anything but peaceful.”
Iran and the G5+1 have held several rounds of talks on a range of issues, with the main focus being on Tehran’s nuclear energy program.
The two sides wrapped up their latest round of negotiations in April in the Kazakh city of Almaty.
The United States, Zionist regime, and some of their allies have repeatedly accused Iran of pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program and have used the unfounded accusation as a pretext to impose illegal sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
Iran rejects the allegations, noting that as a committed signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it has the right to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.