Iran says U.S. drags feet on nuclear deal, U.S. denies delaying

Iran accused the United States on Monday of procrastinating in indirect talks aimed at reinstating Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal - a charge quickly denied by Washington - and said a U.S.-Iranian prisoner swap was not linked to the talks.

Iran accused the United States on Monday of procrastinating in indirect talks aimed at reinstating Tehran's 2015 nuclear deal - a charge quickly denied by Washington - and said a U.S.-Iranian prisoner swap was not linked to the talks. After 16 months of fitful, indirect U.S.-Iranian talks, with European Union officials shuttling between the sides, a senior EU official said on Aug. 8 it had laid down a final offer and expected a response within a "very, very few weeks".

Iran last week responded to the EU's text with "additional views and considerations", while calling on Washington to show flexibility to resolve three remaining issues. The EU's foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said on Monday he hoped the United States would respond positively as early as this week to the bloc's proposal. Tehran had given a "reasonable" response to it, he said.

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Nasser Kanaani, said Tehran wanted a sustainable deal that would preserve Tehran's legitimate rights. "The Americans are procrastinating and there is inaction from the European sides ... America and Europe need an agreement more than Iran," Kanaani told a news conference.

State Department spokesman Ned Price denied that, telling reporters in Washington: "The notion that we have delayed this negotiation in any way is just not true." He said Washington was encouraged that Tehran seemed to have dropped demands such as the removal of its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organization list.

"That's part of the reason why a deal is closer now than it was two weeks ago. But the outcome of these ongoing discussions still remains uncertain as gaps do remain," Price said, adding the United States was working as quickly as possible to provide its response. The United States has repeatedly called on Tehran to release Iranian-Americans held in Iran on security charges. Iran has demanded several Iranians detained on charges linked to U.S. sanctions to be freed.

"The exchange of prisoners with Washington is a separate issue and it has nothing to do with the process of negotiations to revive the 2015 pact," Kanaani said, saying Tehran was ready to swap prisoners. In 2018, then-President Donald Trump reneged on the deal reached before he took office, calling it too soft on Iran, and reimposed harsh U.S. sanctions, prompting Tehran to begin breaching the pact's nuclear curbs.

"We seek a good agreement which would ... be long-lasting," Kanaani said. "We won't be bitten twice." The 2015 agreement appeared near revival in March after 11 months of indirect U.S.-Iran talks in Vienna.

But talks broke down over obstacles such as Tehran's demand Washington provide guarantees that no future U.S. president would abandon the deal. Biden cannot provide such ironclad assurances because the deal is a political understanding rather than a legally binding treaty.

In Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid told French President Emmanuel Macron by telephone that Israel objected to a revived pact and would not be bound by it should one reached. Israel - widely believed to have its own nuclear arsenal - has made veiled threats to take preemptive military action against Iran if diplomacy fails. (Additional reporting by Christina Thykjaer and Inti Landauro in Madrid and by Simon Lewis, Humeyra Pamuk and Costas Pitas in Washington; Writing by Parisa Hafezi and Arshad Mohammed Editing by Toby Chopra, Angus MacSwan and Catherine Evans)