The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden said Thursday it is ready to join talks with Tehran and world powers as it eyes a return to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal that Washington withdrew from nearly three years ago.

State Department officials said the United States "would be there" if it is invited for a meeting by the European Union to discuss a way forward in terms of the nuclear deal, while emphasizing that the move would not guarantee any breakthrough.

"Until we sit down and talk, nothing's going to happen. It doesn't mean that when we sit down and talk we're going to succeed, but we do know that if we don't take that step, the situation's just going to go from bad to worse," one of the officials said.

Antony Blinken. (Kyodo)  

The move came as the United States and Iran remain in a stalemate over the nuclear agreement, despite expectations that the situation could change under the new administration of Biden, who has backed the idea of returning to the agreement.

Under the deal originally struck with six major powers -- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- Iran agreed to curb its nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

But Biden's predecessor Donald Trump criticized the deal as flawed and pulled the United States out of it in May 2018. Iran has countered the U.S. move by increasing its nuclear activities, such as uranium enrichment, beyond the limits set in the deal.

The Biden administration has said that, in order to move forward, Iran first needs to comply with its obligations under what is known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

Iran, however, has insisted that the United States, which was the first to violate the agreement, should act first by removing the economic sanctions.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated the Biden administration's position during a virtual meeting with his European counterparts on Thursday, saying, "If Iran comes back into strict compliance with its commitments under the JCPOA, the United States will do the same."

But he also said he "is prepared to engage in discussions with Iran toward that end."

Meanwhile, Enrique Mora, the EU's deputy secretary general for political affairs, tweeted that he is "ready to invite" the participants of the deal and the United States "to an informal meeting to discuss the way forward."


In a related move, the U.S. State Department announced the withdrawal of the Trump administration's unilateral declaration in September that all previously terminated U.N. sanctions on Tehran under the nuclear deal have been restored.

The previous administration had asserted that it can re-impose international sanctions under a "snapback" mechanism stipulated in a U.N. resolution, citing Iran's failure to commit to the deal, but the move was not supported by the international community.

"That essentially isolated the United States on the Security Council...and weakened our ability to work with our allies and partners on the Security Council to address Iran's destabilizing activity," another State Department official said.

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