Leaders of US, Germany, France, UK to hold meeting on Iran

The leaders of the US, France, Germany and the UK will hold a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rome on October 30 to discuss the resumption of talks on the Iranian nuclear deal, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said at a briefing October 28, Report informs referring to the White House website.

“He will also have the opportunity to meet with the E3 - the leaders of Germany, France, and the UK - on Iran to touch base on where things stand right now with respect to trying to resume negotiations for a return to the JCPOA,” Sullivan said at a briefing aboard the plane of the US chief of staff who flew to Europe to attend the G20 summit in Rome and the 26th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP26) in Glasgow.

“With respect to the E3+1 - there’s always got to be some new configuration - it’s an opportunity to closely coordinate with our key European partners, at the leader level, on a joint negotiating position as we work towards a resumption of negotiations.

It’s also an opportunity to level-set on our understanding of Iran’s progress on the nuclear program since they left the JCPOA. And obviously, we all have deep concerns about the forward progress of that program since the lid was lifted and they began to operate outside of the constraints of the JCPOA,” he added.

“It’s not entirely clear to me yet whether the Iranians are prepared to return to talks. We have heard positive signals that they are, but I think we have to wait and see when and whether they actually show up at the negotiating table. And we’re prepared to negotiate in good faith for a return to mutual compliance with the JCPOA. We hope they are as well,” Sullivan said, when asked whether the US believes that Iran is ready to return to talks and if they have any preconditions that they’ve laid out.