The Iranian Foreign Ministry on Tuesday rejected media reports claiming that direct talks on the revival of a 2015 nuclear deal and removal of the sanctions would start between Tehran and Washington in the upcoming weeks.
In a statement published on its website, the ministry said such media claims were intended to create a certain political atmosphere and did not have any credibility.
A number of Iranian media outlets on Tuesday reported that Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Ali Bagheri Kani would meet Brett McGurk, deputy assistant to U.S. President Joe Biden, in Oman in the upcoming weeks to hold direct negotiations on the revival of the nuclear deal.
Iranian officials have in the past repeatedly rejected the possibility of holding direct talks with the United States, but said indirect exchange of messages had continued with the United States through mediators over the past months.
Iran signed the nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), with world powers in July 2015, agreeing to put some curbs on its nuclear program in return for the removal of sanctions on the country. The U.S., however, pulled out of the deal in May 2018 and reimposed its unilateral sanctions on Tehran, prompting the latter to drop some of its nuclear commitments under the deal.
The talks on the revival of the JCPOA began in April 2021 in Vienna, Austria. Despite several rounds of talks, no significant breakthrough has been achieved since the end of the last round in August 2022.
