NCRI – Abbas Araqchi, clerical regime’s Deputy Foreign Minister and senior nuclear negotiator, speaking on August 1 about regime’s agreements in the nuclear talks, said: “Any agreement about Arak or Fordow is denied. No agreement has so far been reached about the issues under discussion, including these two sites, and the differences still remain.”
He insisted that the regime is looking for its nuclear rights to be recognized and that the regime’s only criterion in making decisions will be its needs.
These statements were made following remarks by Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman in hearings before the U.S. House and Senate on July 29, in which she outlined certain American positions regarding an acceptable agreement.
Regarding Fordow, Sherman declared that the site must not remain an enrichment site. She also re-emphasized that the U.S.’s final objective in negotiations is to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon and to cut off the various pathways through which it could do so, including both uranium and plutonium pathway. I emphasize that United States shall not allow the Iranian regime to acquire the nuclear weapon, Sherman said. This policy had been in place prior to these talks and is still in place and is among our serious commitments.
Elaborating upon the position described by Deputy Foreign Minister Araqchi, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, Chair of Committee on National Security and Foreign Policy in the regime’s parliament, explained that Iran has every intention of continuing the ballistic missile development that could be used as a delivery system for a nuclear weapon. Speaking to the state news agency, the Young Journalists Club, Boroujerdi said, “The U.S. should know that Iran’s missile discussions will never be on the agenda of negotiations with the P5+1”. He went on to add that regime’s missile program “is not the business of the U.S. or any other country”.
This also contradicts Ms. Sherman’s statements to the U.S. Congress, which explicitly stated that the Iranian regime’s missile program will be raised as an issue in the nuclear talks.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
August 5, 2014
