Iran’s Shamkhani: West Continuing Its Initiative Show to Evade Commitments

In a tweet on Sunday night, Shamkhani pointed to his phone call with Iran’s chief negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani, saying, “Tonight’s phone call with @Bagheri_Kani confirmed 2 statements in my mind about #ViennaTalks: 1. Increasing difficulty of Iranian negotiators task to advance the logical and legal instructions of Tehran 2. Continuation of initiative “show” by Western parties to evade commitments.”

Earlier, Iran’s security chief Shamkhani warned the United States against putting up a “show” of lifting the sanctions rather than actually removing the bans.

“Real, effective and verifiable economic benefit for Iran is a necessary condition for the formation of an agreement,” he wrote, adding, “The show of lifting sanctions is not considered constructive,” wrote Shamkhani in a tweet after Washington restored a number of sanctions waivers instead of practically removing any of its coercive economic measures targeting Iran.

The eighth round of talks on the removal of all anti-Iranian sanctions kicked off on Dec. 27 in the Austrian capital of Vienna and is one of lengthy rounds of talks. These days, participants are busy active drafting the text of the agreement and deciding on some controversial issues.

The Islamic Republic of Iran has always stated that it is seeking a stable and reliable agreement and the US sanctions need to be removed in a verifiable manner, as well as Washington should provide guarantees that it will not pull out again.