Iran’s Zarif due in Paris for talks with French president

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says he will pay a visit to Paris later this week for talks with the French president and his top diplomat, following a three-nation tour of Scandinavian states.

“I will travel to Paris on Friday to meet French President Emmanuel Macron and Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian,” Zarif said during a gathering of Iranians in the Swedish capital of Stockholm late Monday.

France is a partner to a 2015 nuclear deal on Iran’s nuclear program — officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — and has led European efforts to salvage the landmark accord since US President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew his country from it last year and re-imposed sanctions on Iran.

Zarif’s visit to Paris will follow two phone conversations between Macron and President Hassan Rouhani of Iran regarding the JCPOA on August 6 and July 18.

Based on Iran’s rights under the JCPOA, the remaining signatories — France, Britain, Germany, Russia and China — have the responsibility to protect Tehran against the American sanctions. Tehran, however, complains that the European parties to the deal have failed to abide by that commitment.

In response to Washington’s exit and Europe’s failure to compensate for the US’s absence, Iran has, since May 8, twice suspended some of its commitments under the nuclear deal in a retaliatory step based on articles 26 and 36 of the JCPOA.

Europe has already missed a July 7 deadline set by Tehran for it to meet its end of the bargain. Tehran has said it will go ahead with the third stage of scaling down its nuclear commitments on September 7 if the European side keeps failing.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Zarif added that, prior to his arrival in Sweden, he had held talks with Kuwaiti and Finnish officials in Kuwait City and Helsinki on Sunday and Monday, respectively, and would meet with Swedish, Norwegian and French authorities within the next two days.

The top Iranian diplomat noted that he would also visit China “next week.”

Zarif further played down the sanctions recently imposed by the US on him and said, “America’s sanctions are not pressuring me. They [the Americans] are after sanctioning the [Iranian] people; therefore, we will not use the word ‘sanctions’ anymore, but we will, instead, use the term ‘economic terrorism’” to refer to Washington’s pressure campaign, Zarif said.

The administration of President Trump imposed sanctions on the Iranian foreign minister on July 31 for what Iran calls “great fear” of his eloquent delivery of the Iranian nation’s message to the world.

The move — which sparked international criticisms — came while the US has repeatedly offered negotiations with Iran.

In a joint press conference with Finland’s Foreign Affairs Minister Pekka Haavisto in Helsinki on Monday, the top Iranian diplomat said that the Islamic Republic has no interest in engaging in a fresh round of nuclear talks with the United States.

“Iran is not interested in negotiations with the United States to clinch a new nuclear accord,” Zarif said, adding, “We had detailed negotiations with the United States and it was not us who left the negotiating table.”

Press TV