Diplomats to meet in Vienna for more Iran nuclear talks

President Hassan Rouhani, left, and President-elect Ebrahim Raisi, who is current judiciary chief, talk during their meeting in Tehran. Photo / AP

Further talks between Iran and global powers were planned on Sunday to try to negotiate and restore a landmark 2015 agreement to contain Iranian nuclear development that was later abandoned by the Trump administration.

Senior diplomats from China, Germany, France, Russia, and Britain were due to meet at a hotel in the Austrian capital.

Top Russian representative Mikhail Ulyanov wrote in a tweet on Saturday that the members of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, "will decide on the way ahead at the Vienna talks. An agreement on restoration of the nuclear deal is within reach but is not finalised yet".

The US does not have a representative at the table in Vienna because former US President Donald Trump unilaterally pulled the country out of the deal in 2018. Trump also restored and augmented sanctions to try to force Iran into renegotiating the pact with more concessions.

However, the administration of US President Joe Biden has signalled willingness to rejoin the deal under terms that would broadly see the United States scale back sanctions and Iran return to 2015 nuclear commitments. A US delegation in Vienna is taking part in indirect talks with Iran, with diplomats from the other world powers acting as go-betweens.

Sunday's meeting is the first since Iran's hardline judiciary chief won a landslide victory in the country's presidential election earlier this week.

The election of Ebrahim Raisi puts hardliners firmly in control across the government at a time when Tehran is enriching uranium at its highest levels ever, though still short of weapons-grade levels. Tensions remain high with both the US and Israel, which is believed to have carried out a series of attacks targeting Iranian nuclear sites as well as assassinating the scientist who created its military atomic programme decades earlier.

Raisi has become the first serving Iranian president sanctioned by the US government even before entering office, over his involvement in the 1988 mass executions, as well as his time as the head of Iran's internationally criticised judiciary — one of the world's top executioners.