A senior Iranian diplomat reaffirmed that “we will not have any talks with the Americans in Vienna, either directly or indirectly. We will negotiate with the Joint Commission and the P4+1 countries”. “Our demand… is that the U.S. first fulfill all its JCPOA obligations and lift all sanctions, and then we will return after verify [the U.S. moves]”, he remarked, adding: “Our talks with the P4+1 in Vienna are technical and will cover the sanctions that need to be lifted and what needs to be done by the Americans in this regard… We do not accept any step-by-step plans”. Relatedly, a U.S. diplomatic spokesperson indicated that “we’re going to talk about nuclear steps that Iran would need to take in order to return to compliance with the terms of the JCPOA and, we won’t preview any specific sanctions, but we'll definitely say that sanction relief steps that the U.S. would need to take in order to return to that compliance as well, we'll [sic] be up for discussion”. The comment followed remarks by U.S. Special Envoy Robert Malley, who acknowledged that Washington would “have to remove those sanctions that are inconsistent with the deal, if Iran is prepared to… reverse the steps that it is taking in violation of its nuclear commitments”.