Arab Press

بالشعب و للشعب
Friday, Aug 08, 2025

Iran Agreement With UN Watchdog Raises Hopes For New Nuclear Talks With US

Iran Agreement With UN Watchdog Raises Hopes For New Nuclear Talks With US

Western powers have urged Iran to return to negotiations and said time is running out as its nuclear programme is advancing well beyond the limits set by the 2015 nuclear deal.

The UN atomic watchdog reached an agreement with Iran on Sunday to solve "the most urgent issue" between them, the overdue servicing of monitoring equipment to keep it running, raising hopes of fresh talks on a wider deal with the West.

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi obtained the agreement in a last-minute trip to Tehran he called "constructive" before a meeting of his agency's 35-nation Board of Governors this week at which Western powers were threatening to seek a resolution criticising Iran for stonewalling the IAEA.

A resolution risked an escalation with Tehran that could kill the prospect of resuming wider, indirect talks between Iran and the United States on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, aimed at keeping Iran at arm's length from being able to develop a nuclear weapon if it chose to. It denies ever wanting to do so.

Those talks stopped in June, and Iran's hardline president, Ebrahim Raisi, took office in August.

Western powers have urged Iran to return to negotiations and said time is running out as its nuclear programme is advancing well beyond the limits set by the deal, which Washington abandoned in 2018.

"This is not a permanent solution, this cannot be a permanent solution. This has always been seen, for me at least, as a stopgap, as a measure to allow time for diplomacy," Grossi told reporters at Vienna airport after his trip.

He added: "We managed to rectify the most urgent issue: The imminent loss of knowledge we were confronted with until yesterday. Now we have a solution."

The coordinator of the now-stalled nuclear talks, European Union political director Enrique Mora, said on Twitter that the agreement "gives space for diplomacy", adding that it was crucial for the talks to resume as soon as possible.

The 2015 agreement introduced monitoring of extra areas of Iran's nuclear programme beyond those supervised under Iran's core legal obligations to the IAEA. Iran said in February it was abandoning that monitoring, which covers areas like the making of parts for centrifuges - the machines that enrich uranium.

Concerned that without monitoring of those areas, Iran could secretly siphon off unknown quantities of equipment and material that could potentially be used to make a nuclear weapon, Grossi had previously reached agreement with Tehran for it to keep servicing the equipment, although Iran later abandoned that too.

That equipment must be serviced every three months to make sure its memory cards do not fill up and there are no gaps in the monitoring. With three months having passed more than two weeks ago, the agreement came as time was running out.

Grossi stopped short of saying that so-called continuity of knowledge had been maintained but said the agreement gave the IAEA the technical means it needed.

"The reconstruction and the coming together of the jigsaw puzzle will come when there is an agreement at the JCPOA level, but at that time we will have all this information and there will not have been a gap," he said, referring to the 2015 deal by its full name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

The servicing of the monitoring equipment will start "within a few days", Grossi said, adding that even cameras damaged and removed from a centrifuge workshop that was the victim of suspected sabotage in June would be replaced.

More Problems Ahead


The agreement did little to resolve another issue between the IAEA and Iran - Tehran's continued failure to explain uranium traces found at three undeclared former sites. Grossi said Iran had invited him to return soon and he expected to meet the country's "highest authorities".

"This may take time. It's not heroic but it's much better than any alternative," he said of efforts to resolve that issue.

Diplomats said the United States and its European allies had not yet decided whether to seek a resolution against Iran at the IAEA Board of Governors meeting, which starts on Monday.

"Clearly a resolution is less likely now," one Vienna-based diplomat said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Arab Press
0:00
0:00
Close
British Labour Government Utilizes Counter-Terrorism Tools for Social Media Monitoring Against Legitimate Critics
WhatsApp Deletes 6.8 Million Scam Accounts Amid Rising Global Fraud
Texas Residents Face Water Restrictions While AI Data Centers Consume Millions of Gallons
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
China Tightens Mineral Controls, Curtailing Critical Inputs for Western Defence Contractors
JPMorgan and Coinbase Unveil Partnership to Let Chase Cardholders Buy Crypto Directly
British Tourist Dies Following Hair Transplant in Turkey, Police Investigate
WhatsApp Users Targeted in New Scam Involving Account Takeovers
Trump Deploys Nuclear Submarines After Threats from Former Russian President Medvedev
Germany’s Economic Breakdown and the Return of Militarization: From Industrial Collapse to a New Offensive Strategy
Germany Enters Fiscal Crisis as Cabinet Approves €174 Billion in New Debt
IMF Upgrades Global Growth Forecast as Weaker Dollar Supports Outlook
Politics is a good business: Barack Obama’s Reported Net Worth Growth, 1990–2025
UN's Top Court Declares Environmental Protection a Legal Obligation Under International Law
"Crazy Thing": OpenAI's Sam Altman Warns Of AI Voice Fraud Crisis In Banking
Japanese Prime Minister Vows to Stay After Coalition Loses Upper House Majority
President Trump Diagnosed with Chronic Venous Insufficiency After Leg Swelling
Man Dies After Being Pulled Into MRI Machine Due to Metal Chain in New York Clinic
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
Iranian President Reportedly Injured During Israeli Strike on Secret Facility
Kurdistan Workers Party Takes Symbolic Step Towards Peace in Northern Iraq
BRICS Expands Membership with Indonesia and Ten New Partner Countries
Elon Musk Founds a Party Following a Poll on X: "You Wanted It – You Got It!"
AI Raises Alarms Over Long-Term Job Security
Russia Formally Recognizes Taliban Government in Afghanistan
Saudi Arabia Maintains Ties with Iran Despite Israel Conflict
Mediators Edge Closer to Israel-Hamas Ceasefire Agreement
Germany Seeks Taliban Deal to Deport Afghan Migrants
Emirates Airline Expands Market Share with New $20 Million Campaign
Robots Compete in Football Tournament in China Amid Injuries
China Unveils Miniature Insect-Like Surveillance Drone
Marc Marquez Claims Victory at Dutch Grand Prix Amidst Family Misfortune
Iran Executes Alleged Israeli Spies and Arrests Hundreds Amid Post-War Crackdown
Trump Asserts Readiness for Further Strikes on Iran Amid Nuclear Tensions
Qatar Airways Clears Backlog of Passengers Following Missile Threats
Iran's Parliament Votes to Suspend Cooperation with Nuclear Watchdog
Trump Announces Upcoming US-Iran Meeting Amid Controversial Airstrikes
Trump Moves to Reshape Middle East Following Israel-Iran Conflict
NATO Leaders Endorse Plan for Increased Defence Spending
U.S. Crude Oil Prices Drop Below $65 Amid Market Volatility
“You Have 12 Hours to Flee”: Israeli Threat Campaign Targets Surviving Iranian Officials
Oman Set to Introduce Personal Income Tax, First in Gulf
Germany and Italy Under Pressure to Repatriate $245bn of Gold from US Vaults
Trump Praises Iran’s ‘Very Weak’ Response After U.S. Strikes and Presses Israel to Pursue Peace
WATCH: Israeli forces show the aftermath of a massive airstrike at Iran's Isfahan nuclear site
We have new information and breaking details to share about what is shaping up to be a historic air campaign tonight
Six Massive Bombs Dropped on Fordow; Trump: 'A Historic Moment for the U.S., Israel, and the World'
Fordow: Deeply Buried Iranian Enrichment Site in U.S.–Israel Crosshairs
×