Iran's talks with West at stalemate?

The United States must compensate the losses to Iran’s nuclear program incurred by U.S. strikes before Tehran agrees to resume the negotiation process, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in an interview with the Financial Times.

"They should explain why they attacked us in the middle of [...] negotiations, and they have to ensure that they are not going to repeat that. And they have to compensate the damage that they have done," Araghchi said.

The top Iranian diplomat added that the possibility of the talks resuming remains but in Tehran, distrust to U.S. diplomatic initiatives had deepened.

"The road to negotiation is narrow but it’s not impossible. I need to convince my hierarchy that if we go for negotiation, the other side is coming with real determination for a win-win deal," Araghchi said.

According to him, with the Europeans, "there is no reason right now to negotiate because they cannot lift sanctions, they cannot do anything."

"If they do snapback, that means that this is the end of the road for them," Araghchi said.

On July 15, it was reported that the U.S., the UK, Germany and France had agreed to set the end of August as a deadline for reaching a nuclear deal with Iran. Otherwise, the European trio plans to launch the snapback mechanism that will reinstate the UN Security Council’s sanctions against Tehran, which were lifted based on the 2015 agreements.