Saudi Press

Saudi Arabia and the world
Sunday, Sep 07, 2025

Iran Agreement With UN Watchdog Raises Hopes For New Nuclear Talks With US

Iran Agreement With UN Watchdog Raises Hopes For New Nuclear Talks With US

Western powers have urged Iran to return to negotiations and said time is running out as its nuclear programme is advancing well beyond the limits set by the 2015 nuclear deal.

The UN atomic watchdog reached an agreement with Iran on Sunday to solve "the most urgent issue" between them, the overdue servicing of monitoring equipment to keep it running, raising hopes of fresh talks on a wider deal with the West.

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi obtained the agreement in a last-minute trip to Tehran he called "constructive" before a meeting of his agency's 35-nation Board of Governors this week at which Western powers were threatening to seek a resolution criticising Iran for stonewalling the IAEA.

A resolution risked an escalation with Tehran that could kill the prospect of resuming wider, indirect talks between Iran and the United States on reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, aimed at keeping Iran at arm's length from being able to develop a nuclear weapon if it chose to. It denies ever wanting to do so.

Those talks stopped in June, and Iran's hardline president, Ebrahim Raisi, took office in August.

Western powers have urged Iran to return to negotiations and said time is running out as its nuclear programme is advancing well beyond the limits set by the deal, which Washington abandoned in 2018.

"This is not a permanent solution, this cannot be a permanent solution. This has always been seen, for me at least, as a stopgap, as a measure to allow time for diplomacy," Grossi told reporters at Vienna airport after his trip.

He added: "We managed to rectify the most urgent issue: The imminent loss of knowledge we were confronted with until yesterday. Now we have a solution."

The coordinator of the now-stalled nuclear talks, European Union political director Enrique Mora, said on Twitter that the agreement "gives space for diplomacy", adding that it was crucial for the talks to resume as soon as possible.

The 2015 agreement introduced monitoring of extra areas of Iran's nuclear programme beyond those supervised under Iran's core legal obligations to the IAEA. Iran said in February it was abandoning that monitoring, which covers areas like the making of parts for centrifuges - the machines that enrich uranium.

Concerned that without monitoring of those areas, Iran could secretly siphon off unknown quantities of equipment and material that could potentially be used to make a nuclear weapon, Grossi had previously reached agreement with Tehran for it to keep servicing the equipment, although Iran later abandoned that too.

That equipment must be serviced every three months to make sure its memory cards do not fill up and there are no gaps in the monitoring. With three months having passed more than two weeks ago, the agreement came as time was running out.

Grossi stopped short of saying that so-called continuity of knowledge had been maintained but said the agreement gave the IAEA the technical means it needed.

"The reconstruction and the coming together of the jigsaw puzzle will come when there is an agreement at the JCPOA level, but at that time we will have all this information and there will not have been a gap," he said, referring to the 2015 deal by its full name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

The servicing of the monitoring equipment will start "within a few days", Grossi said, adding that even cameras damaged and removed from a centrifuge workshop that was the victim of suspected sabotage in June would be replaced.

More Problems Ahead


The agreement did little to resolve another issue between the IAEA and Iran - Tehran's continued failure to explain uranium traces found at three undeclared former sites. Grossi said Iran had invited him to return soon and he expected to meet the country's "highest authorities".

"This may take time. It's not heroic but it's much better than any alternative," he said of efforts to resolve that issue.

Diplomats said the United States and its European allies had not yet decided whether to seek a resolution against Iran at the IAEA Board of Governors meeting, which starts on Monday.

"Clearly a resolution is less likely now," one Vienna-based diplomat said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Saudi Press
0:00
0:00
Close
Gold Could Reach Nearly $5,000 if Fed Independence Is Undermined, Goldman Sachs Warns
Uruguay, Colombia and Paraguay Secure Places at 2026 World Cup
Trump Administration Advances Plans to Rebrand Pentagon as Department of War Instead of the Fake Term Department of Defense
Tether Expands into Gold Sector with Profit-Driven Diversification
Trump’s New War – and the ‘Drug Tyrant’ Fearing Invasion: ‘1,200 Missiles Aimed at Us’
At the Parade in China: Laser Weapons, 'Eagle Strike,' and a Missile Capable of 'Striking Anywhere in the World'
Information Warfare in the Age of AI: How Language Models Become Targets and Tools
Israeli Airstrike in Yemen Kills Houthi Prime Minister
After the Shock of Defeat, Iranians Yearn for Change
YouTube Altered Content by Artificial Intelligence – Without Permission
Iran Faces Escalating Water Crisis as Protests Spread
More Than Half a Million Evacuated as Typhoon Kajiki Heads for Vietnam
HSBC Switzerland Ends Relationships with Over 1,000 Clients from Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Qatar, and Egypt
Sharia Law Made Legally Binding in Austria Despite Warnings Over 'Incompatible' Values
Dogfights in the Skies: Airbus on Track to Overtake Boeing and Claim Aviation Supremacy
Tim Cook Promises an AI Revolution at Apple: "One of the Most Significant Technologies of Our Generation"
Are AI Data Centres the Infrastructure of the Future or the Next Crisis?
Miles Worth Billions: How Airlines Generate Huge Profits
Zelenskyy Returns to White House Flanked by European Allies as Trump Pressures Land-Swap Deal with Putin
Beijing is moving into gold and other assets, diversifying away from the dollar
Cristiano Ronaldo Makes Surprise Stop at New Hong Kong Museum
Zelenskyy to Visit Washington after Trump–Putin Summit Yields No Agreement
High-Stakes Trump-Putin Summit on Ukraine Underway in Alaska
Iranian Protection Offers Chinese Vehicle Shipments a Cost Advantage over Japanese and Korean Makers
Saudi Arabia accelerates renewables to curb domestic oil use
Cristiano Ronaldo and Georgina Rodríguez announce engagement
Asia-Pacific dominates world’s busiest flight routes, with South Korea’s Jeju–Seoul corridor leading global rankings
Private Welsh island with 19th-century fort listed for sale at over £3 million
Sam Altman challenges Elon Musk with plans for Neuralink rival
Australia to Recognize the State of Palestine at UN Assembly
The Collapse of the Programmer Dream: AI Experts Now the Real High-Earners
Armenia and Azerbaijan to Sign US-Brokered Framework Agreement for Nakhchivan Corridor
British Labour Government Utilizes Counter-Terrorism Tools for Social Media Monitoring Against Legitimate Critics
WhatsApp Deletes 6.8 Million Scam Accounts Amid Rising Global Fraud
Nine people have been hospitalized and dozens of salmonella cases have been reported after an outbreak of infections linked to certain brands of pistachios and pistachio-containing products, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada
Texas Residents Face Water Restrictions While AI Data Centers Consume Millions of Gallons
Tariffs, AI, and the Shifting U.S. Macro Landscape: Navigating a New Economic Regime
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
China Tightens Mineral Controls, Curtailing Critical Inputs for Western Defence Contractors
OpenAI’s Bold Bet: Teaching AI to Think, Not Just Chat
BP’s Largest Oil and Gas Find in 25 Years Uncovered Offshore Brazil
JPMorgan and Coinbase Unveil Partnership to Let Chase Cardholders Buy Crypto Directly
British Tourist Dies Following Hair Transplant in Turkey, Police Investigate
WhatsApp Users Targeted in New Scam Involving Account Takeovers
Trump Deploys Nuclear Submarines After Threats from Former Russian President Medvedev
Germany’s Economic Breakdown and the Return of Militarization: From Industrial Collapse to a New Offensive Strategy
IMF Upgrades Global Growth Forecast as Weaker Dollar Supports Outlook
Politics is a good business: Barack Obama’s Reported Net Worth Growth, 1990–2025
×