EU Awaits ‘Swift’ Response on Nuclear Deal ‘Final Text’

The hotel where Iran nuclear deal negotiations took place (AFP)
The hotel where Iran nuclear deal negotiations took place (AFP)
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EU Awaits ‘Swift’ Response on Nuclear Deal ‘Final Text’

The hotel where Iran nuclear deal negotiations took place (AFP)
The hotel where Iran nuclear deal negotiations took place (AFP)

Iran’s Kayhan newspaper, which is closely affiliated to the cleric-led country’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has protested the final text submitted by the European Union (EU) at the end of the round of negotiations aimed at reviving the nuclear agreement.

The latest round of talks for rebooting the nuclear deal had concluded in Vienna last Monday.

Hossein Shariatmadari, the managing editor of Kayhan, said that the EU’s proposal for brokering a deal is “catastrophic” and “damaging,” adding that talks “have yet to yield a result that Iran wants.”

In the newspaper's editorial, Shariatmadari wrote that negotiations have failed to reach results that guarantee the interests of Iran, especially in terms of rising to fulfill the country’s economic benefits.

Iran's Nournews website, affiliated with the country's Supreme National Security Council that makes the decisions in the nuclear talks, had protested the EU proposal as well on Tuesday.

The website said the EU as the coordinator of the talks lacked the authority to “present its proposals as the final text.”

Despite Iranian outlets insisting that the EU proposal was not in the benefit of Iran, no official statement has been made by the Iranian government and its diplomatic cable regarding the draft.

Ibrahim Azizi, the vice-chairman of the Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, said that the Commission has yet to receive any final text or draft from the negotiations.

“The final text must provide for our national interests and the strategic goals of the regime,” said Azizi, adding that Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian and his deputy will attend a meeting for the National Security parliamentary committee.

On Tuesday evening, the EU said that it expected Iran to respond “very quickly” to the “final text” that has emerged to revive a crippled nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers.

“There is no more space for negotiations,” Peter Stano, a foreign policy spokesman for the EU, told journalists in Brussels on Tuesday.

“We have a final text. So it's the moment for a decision: yes or no. And we expect all participants to take this decision very quickly.”



Bodies of Four Migrants Found as Boat Sinks off Greek Island of Lesbos

A dinghy transporting dozens of refugees and migrants is pulled towards Greece's Lesbos island after being rescued by a war ship during their sea crossing between Türkiye and Greece on February 29, 2020. Aris Messinis, AFP/File picture
A dinghy transporting dozens of refugees and migrants is pulled towards Greece's Lesbos island after being rescued by a war ship during their sea crossing between Türkiye and Greece on February 29, 2020. Aris Messinis, AFP/File picture
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Bodies of Four Migrants Found as Boat Sinks off Greek Island of Lesbos

A dinghy transporting dozens of refugees and migrants is pulled towards Greece's Lesbos island after being rescued by a war ship during their sea crossing between Türkiye and Greece on February 29, 2020. Aris Messinis, AFP/File picture
A dinghy transporting dozens of refugees and migrants is pulled towards Greece's Lesbos island after being rescued by a war ship during their sea crossing between Türkiye and Greece on February 29, 2020. Aris Messinis, AFP/File picture

The bodies of four migrants - one boy, one girl and two women - have been recovered from a sinking boat off the Greek island of Lesbos while another 23 migrants were rescued, Greece's coastguard said on Thursday.

The boat was detected by a patrolling coastguard vessel at about 2 a.m. (2300 GMT). A search and rescue operation was still ongoing, a coastguard official said. It was not immediately clear how many people may have been on the boat, Reuters reported.

Greece, in the southeast corner of the European Union, has long been a favored gateway to Europe for migrants and refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia. In 2015 nearly 1 million people landed on its islands.

Last year, about 54,000 migrants reached Greece, the second largest number in southern Europe behind Italy. The vast majority of them arrived by sea, according to data from the UN refugee agency UNHCR.