Iran, Russia to hold talks on nuclear deal in Moscow

Tehran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian will head to Moscow on Tuesday for talks, his ministry says, days after negotiations on an Iran nuclear deal broke down in the wake of new Russian demands.

Ten months of talks in Vienna have brought major powers close to renewing a 2015 agreement on Iran’s nuclear program.

But the negotiations were halted again after Russia demanded guarantees that Western sanctions imposed following its invasion of Ukraine would not damage its trade with Iran.

Until that demand, the revived deal, which would bring back the US and Iran to the 2015 nuclear accord, was said to be nearly complete and accepted by most parties.

The US unilaterally abandoned the deal in 2018 under then-President Donald Trump, and Iran has been publicly scaling up nuclear activity, including enrichment, ever since. Israel has publicly said it is opposed to the deal, and additionally will not allow Tehran to obtain nuclear weapons.