MESOP MIDEAST WATCH : Council on Foreign Relations  – Daily News Brief – Iran Makes Maximalist Demands in New Round of Nuclear Talks

November 30, 2021   Iran called for an immediate lifting of U.S. sanctions (NYT) against it in negotiations yesterday with other parties to the 2015 nuclear deal, European Union delegate Enrique Mora said, a demand the United States is unlikely to accept. While Mora called the talks “extremely positive” (Reuters) and said they built on previous negotiations, Iran’s top nuclear negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani, told Iranian state television that everything previously discussed was a “draft” (AP).

Talks continue today with a working group on U.S. sanctions and tomorrow with a working group on Iran’s nuclear activities. UN nuclear inspectors remain unable to fully monitor Iran after Tehran limited their access earlier this year.

“These negotiations will yield little, no matter how much money Washington releases or how ardently [Joe] Biden administration officials describe any follow-on talks as important steps toward a diplomatic solution,” CFR’s Ray Takeyh and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Reuel Marc Gerecht write for the Wall Street Journal.

“Close cooperation with U.S. allies in the region to put pressure on Iran won’t produce a fundamentally different result than what the [Donald] Trump administration attempted and produced the worst of all words: an Iranian nuclear program that is now closer to nuclear weapons than ever and an Iran that is more aggressive in the region and more repressive at home,” the International Crisis Group’s Ali Vaez tells the Hill.