Macron’s Adviser in Iran for Talks on Regional Tensions

The senior French diplomat, Emmanuel Bonne, has traveled to the Islamic Republic on Wednesday.

“The diplomatic adviser did indeed travel to Iran on June 19…to hold high-level talks with the objective of contributing to a de-escalation of tensions in the region,” a French presidency official said, confirming information from two diplomatic sources.

Bonne has been based in Iran in the past, and is a Middle East expert, Reuters reported.

The visit follows reports that Britain, France and Germany are planning a new push to keep Iran in the 2015 nuclear deal.

Diplomats said the three EU parties to the JCPOA would intensify diplomacy in the coming days, including with talks among the E3 and EU political directors in Brussels on Thursday.

In comments on Wednesday morning, the president of Iran said Tehran’s legitimate decision to scale back commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal could be reversed, provided that the other parties fulfill their undertakings and meet a 60-day deadline that started on May 8.

Iran and the Group 5+1 (Russia, China, US, Britain, France, and Germany) on July 14, 2015, reached a conclusion over the text of the 2015 nuclear deal.

The accord took effect in January 2016 and was supposed to terminate all nuclear-related sanctions against Iran all at once, but its implementation was hampered by the US policies and its eventual withdrawal from the deal.

On May 8, 2018, US President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the nuclear accord. Afterwards, Iran and the remaining parties launched talks to save the accord.

However, the EU’s failure to ensure Iran’s economic interests forced Tehran to stop honoring certain commitments under JCPOA in May 2019.

For the first step, Iran has ceased to observe the limits on uranium enrichment and begun to produce an unlimited amount of heavy water at the Arak nuclear facility during the 60-day deadline.