VIENNA, Nov 24, 2023 (BSS/TASS) - Moscow urges the United States and the E3 group of European nations (France, Germany and the United Kingdom) to return to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on Iran's nuclear program, Russia's envoy to international organizations in Vienna said.

"We call upon the USA and E3, instead of attempts to derail or impede interactions between Iran and the IAEA to focus their energy on restoring JCPOA, which would in its turn create favorable conditions for Tehran to reciprocate," Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the International Organizations in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov said at a session of the IAEA Board of Governors.

Tehran signed the JCPOA in 2015 along with five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany in order to address the crisis over Iran's nuclear research. Under the deal, the sanctions are to be waived gradually in exchange for Tehran's commitment to scale back its nuclear activities.

 In 2018, the former president of the United States, Donald Trump, pulled out of the agreement. The current US leader, Joe Biden, has repeatedly signaled his willingness to bring Washington back into the nuclear deal.

Since April 2021, the P5+1 (Russia, the UK, Germany, China, the US and France) have been holding talks with Iran in Vienna to reinstate the original deal. On November 10, 2022, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, said that another round of talks with Iranian representatives had ended in the Austrian capital city yielding no result.