State Department spokesperson Ned Price clarified on Monday that Washington is prepared to walk away from the effort to revive the 2015 nuclear deal if Iran displays intransigence.
"We are prepared to walk away if Iran displays an intransigence to making progress," Price told reporters, according to Reuters.
He stressed that the United States and its allies and partners will pursue "alternatives" if Iran is "unwilling to engage in good faith."
Earlier on Monday, Iran described attempts to return to the 2015 nuclear deal as succeeding only if the United States agreed to Tehran’s remaining demands.
According to Reuters, Iran’s foreign ministry outlined the remaining hurdles to an agreement as including the degree to which sanctions would be removed, safeguards that the US would not leave the deal again, and the unresolved issue of traces of uranium found at undeclared sites in Iran.
An Iranian diplomat described the current talks, which have been ongoing for 10 months, at a “now or never” impasse. “If they cannot reach a deal this week, the talks will collapse forever.”
Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said on Saturday his country was studying a rough draft of a deal to revive the 2015 agreement which was hammered out during the Vienna talks.
Iran is “seriously reviewing (the) draft of the agreement,” Amir-Abdollahian said on Twitter, adding he had spoken by phone with the European Union’s top diplomat Josep Borrel.
We are “all trying to reach a good deal,” he wrote. “Our red lines are made clear to Western parties. Ready to immediately conclude a good deal, should they show real will.”
Iran has gradually scaled back its compliance with the 2015 deal, in response to former US President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement in May of 2018.
It has held several rounds of indirect talks with the US under the Biden administration, which have been mediated by the European parties to the 2015 deal.
Amir-Abdollahian said last week that the talks had reached “a critical and important stage”.