EU official’s trip to Tehran / What is Enrique Mora looking for? Mehr News Agency Iran and world’s news
Mehr News Agency, International Group: The English-language Tehran Times reports on the visit of Enrique Mora, the EU coordinator in the Borjam talks, and writes that his visit was aimed at examining how to continue the negotiation process, the two-month break of which is a warning sign of a possible failure of the talks. The details of this report are overlooked;
Mora’s visit to Tehran came as EU foreign policy chief Joseph Borrell called for a speedy resumption of the Vienna talks on reviving the 2015 BRICS agreement. “We can not continue like this forever,” he said, adding that the current interruption of the talks could not continue.
In an attempt to restart the Vienna talks, Borrell called Mora’s deployment to Tehran his last resort. In an interview with the Financial Times, he said he was looking for a middle ground to remove the IRGC from the US list of foreign terrorist organizations.
At the last round of talks in Vienna, which ended almost two months ago, Iran also demanded that the IRGC be removed from the terrorist list. The United States opposed the request and negotiations stalled.
The European Union is making every effort to find a middle ground for removing the IRGC from the list of terrorist organizations, Borrell said. According to the Financial Times, Borrell’s proposed scenario is to remove the Revolutionary Guards from the list, but other parts of the organization would remain on the list.
During his visit to Tehran, Mora is said to be launching a new initiative to break the deadlock over the IRGC’s withdrawal from the US terrorist list. According to the Qatari newspaper Al-Arabiya Al-Jadeed, Mora’s trip to Tehran was supposed to take place a few weeks ago, but there was not enough willingness on the part of Tehran to do so.
The Arab newspaper quoted Iranian sources as saying that Mora’s visit to Tehran was confirmed after the Europeans announced the existence of a European-American initiative to advance the Vienna talks to resolve the remaining issues.
According to the Arabic newspaper, the reason Tehran agreed to Mora’s visit was that Iran was trying to revive the stagnant Vienna talks and reach a strong agreement.
According to them, the EU Coordinator’s visit to Tehran will continue until Friday, during which he will hold intensive talks with Iranian officials, including Iran’s chief negotiator, Ali Bagheri Kani, and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdullahian.
The secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, said on Tuesday that Iran would move forward with the lifting of sanctions in line with the Vienna talks, and that Mora’s visit to Tehran was in line with that goal.
Noor News, a news site close to the Supreme National Security Council, described Mora’s visit to Tehran as a step forward and wrote that an agreement could still be reached. According to Noor News: Achieving a strong, lasting and credible agreement is possible, but it requires Washington’s realism and learning from the mistakes that have led to the complex situation.
However, the success of Mora’s trip largely depends on the plans she will present during her stay in Tehran. Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said this week that Mora’s main task was to convey messages from Iran and the other parties to the Vienna talks.
According to Khatibzadeh in his last press conference, it can be said with almost certainty that one of these messages could be Borrell’s proposal to resolve the issue of removing the IRGC from the terrorist list. But the proposal, which apparently does not meet Iran’s demands, does not seem to help advance the talks.
Referring to Iran’s commitment to conclude the talks, he added: “If the United States returns what it took from us and accepts the violated rights of the Iranians, we can sign the agreement one day after Mora’s return to Vienna.” Mora’s trip could get these talks back on track.
It is not yet clear whether Mora’s efforts can help break the ice in the negotiations. Over the past two months, he has established close contacts with Iran’s senior negotiator, Bagheri Kani. So now there must be an important issue that Mora personally traveled to Tehran. Mora was scheduled to meet with Bagheri Kenny as scheduled, but has also called for meetings with officials outside the Foreign Ministry, one of whom may be the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, Supreme Shamkhani. However, as of this writing, it is not yet clear whether Mora will meet with other officials besides Bagheri Kenny.