“Intensive consultations led to a good result. A temporary technical understanding has been reached. The @IAEAorg will continue its necessary verification and monitoring in #Iran,” IAEA head Rafael Mariano Grossi tweeted.
The renewed talks come as the administration of US President Joe Biden returns to the negotiating table, allowing global powers and Tehran to attempt recuperating the 2015 nuclear deal. Former US President Donald Trump's withdrawal from the deal and imposition of sanctions had prompted Iran to renege on several conditions of the deal.
“The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recalled and reaffirmed the spirit of cooperation and enhanced mutual trust that led to the Joint Statement in Tehran on 26 August 2020, and the importance of continuing that cooperation and trust,” reads a joint statement released to the IAEA website on Sunday evening.
The IAEA will be allowed to conduct “limited” inspections under the temporary agreement.
"What we agreed is something that is viable - it is useful to bridge this gap that we are having now, it salvages the situation now," Grossi told reporters in Vienna, as reported by AFP.
Iran’s parliament previously said that it would suspend IAEA inspections from Tuesday, if the US did not lift sanctions on Iran by Sunday.
Iran's deputy foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said late Saturday that the "IAEA's inspection capability will be reduced by about 20-30 percent after the implementation of the parliament's law."
The IAEA is allowed to conduct inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities under the 2015 nuclear deal.
The landmark 2015 nuclear deal was signed between Iran on the one side and US, Russia, Germany, France, UK, and China on the other. The deal was designed to curb Tehran's nuclear ambitions in return for sanctions relief.
However, the deal began to unravel in May 2018 when US President Donald Trump pulled his country out of the agreement unilaterally, arguing it did not guarantee Iran would not obtain nuclear weapons and that Iran was destabilizing the Middle East through armed proxy groups across the region.
The administration of Joe Biden has said it is prepared to rejoin the deal and start lifting sanctions if Iran returns to full compliance, a precondition disputed by Tehran.
The IAEA recently confirmed that Iran has begun producing uranium metal, a further step away from the deal it signed with several world powers.
