Iran

Iran nuclear talks to continue till gaps removed: Official

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A senior Iranian negotiator says Iran and the P5+1 countries will continue negotiations until the “brackets” in the first draft of a deal on Tehran’s nuclear program are removed.

Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs Abbas Araqchi made the remarks on the sidelines of the 2015 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in New York.

Iran and the P5+1 countries, represented by European Union (EU) political director Helga Schmid, have officially started drawing up the draft of a final nuclear agreement.

“We have already a draft. Now, we have to work on this draft for the second go, third go, and fourth go as long as necessary in order to remove the brackets one after another and come to a clean text,” Araqchi added.

He also stressed that it takes time to remove the existing gaps in the first draft.

“Still, we [have] a long way to go. Still, the number of brackets are many,” he highlighted.

The senior Iranian negotiator further noted that talks over Iran’s nuclear program will continue on May 12 in the Austrian capital, Vienna.

“We will spend another four days in Vienna next week, trying to somehow make the text cleaner and with less (fewer) brackets,” Araqchi said.

“We have to continue this practice until everything is clear, not only in the text itself but also in the annexes. We will have some annexes which clarify or specify the details of each and every measure that each side should do (take) after the deal,” he stressed.

He also expressed satisfaction with the progress made on the negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program, saying, “We are hopeful. We are doing good progress. Steady but surely.”

Iran and the P5+1 group of countries — the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany — reached a mutual understanding on the parameters of a comprehensive agreement over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program in Lausanne, Switzerland, on April 2.

The two sides held expert-level talks in Vienna, Austria, on April 24. The three-day talks were held in a bid to draft the text of a final agreement based on the mutual understanding reached in Lausanne.

Iran and the six-party group have agreed to finalize a comprehensive deal on Tehran’s nuclear program by the end of June.

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