Iran agrees to negotiate nuclear program … with the Europeans

Iran will hold talks Friday in Istanbul, Turkey, regarding its nuclear program with European nations as it faces the threat of restored sanctions, The New York Times reported Monday.

The Islamic Republic agreed to a new round of talks as France, Germany and the U.K. all threatened to reimpose sanctions on the nation, a spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry said on state television, according to the NYT. The European nations warned that they will restore the sanctions if there is no movement on a deal regulating Iran’s nuclear enrichment program, which was heavily damaged by U.S. and Israeli strikes in June.

Iran has been reluctant to negotiate with the U.S. since the strikes, and it is also attempting to rearm its proxy militias such as the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in a Sunday letter to the United Nations that the re-imposition of sanctions would violate the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the Obama-era nuclear deal of which the European nations are still signatories. Iran said in 2020 that it would not comply with the JCPOA after the U.S. killed Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Gen. Qassem Soleimani.

President Donald Trump said on June 27 that he had halted negotiations with Iran, writing in a Truth Social post that he wished that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would “realize that you often get more with HONEY than you do with VINEGAR.” Trump was reportedly considering giving Iran aid to rebuild its civilian nuclear capabilities, but such a development has yet to materialize.

The preponderance of intelligence reports from various nations indicates that Iran’s nuclear program was severely set back by U.S. strikes in June, which used “bunker buster” bombs to target nuclear sites at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan.

The U.S. already has a slew of sanctions on Iran as part of President Donald Trump’s revival of the “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran and its affiliates.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

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