Many Iranian Cities Are Being Equipped With Civil Defense Systems

General Mahdi Farahi, Deputy Defense Minister of Iran, announced that his country has equipped 51 cities and towns with civil defense systems in anticipation of a foreign attack, while new complications emerged in the nuclear negotiations after the recent Iranian response to the European proposal to renew the 2015 nuclear agreement.

Farahi was quoted by Iranian media as saying that the civil defense equipment enables the Iranian armed forces to "identify and monitor threats using programs that operate around the clock according to the type of threat and danger."

Farahi said that the form of battles is more complex, adding that hybrid forms of warfare, including electronic, biological, and radiological attacks, have replaced classic wars, without referring to the names of countries that could threaten Iran.

The Iranian Deputy Defense Minister's statements come in light of tensions between Iran and Israel and the United States over the nuclear file and other issues.

Iran had accused Israel and the United States of launching cyber attacks in the past years that damaged the country's infrastructure. Tehran accused Tel Aviv of sabotaging several of its nuclear facilities and assassinating nuclear and military scientists.

Nuclear deal

Regarding the developments of the Iranian nuclear file, the head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, Mohammad Eslami, said that Iran's strength in the nuclear industry had a great impact on the course of negotiations, and this opportunity should be used to lift the sanctions, which he described as unjust on the country.

Eslami added that Iran's achievements in the field of uranium enrichment and its implementation of the provisions of the parliament law known as the "Lifting Sanctions and Securing National Interests" law pushed what he described as enemies to decide to return to the nuclear agreement and implement their obligations, as he put it.

On the other hand, the Axios news website quoted a senior European official directly involved in the talks to revive the nuclear agreement with Iran that Iran's response to the European draft agreement reopened the issue of the International Atomic Energy Agency's investigations, which the United States and the European group believed had already been resolved.

The site indicated that the Iranian response can be interpreted that Tehran has no desire to reach an agreement.

Not constructive

In Washington, White House spokeswoman Karen Jean-Pierre refused - on Friday - to link the return to the nuclear agreement and the IAEA's investigations into the effects of uranium that were found at 3 undeclared Iranian sites, and renewed her country's readiness to return to its commitments of the 2015 agreement if Iran did the same thing.

Previously, the United States considered that the latest response provided by Tehran was "not constructive."

In turn, the European Commission said yesterday that it had received a response from Tehran regarding the revival of the nuclear agreement, and clarified that the parties involved in the agreement - Britain, China, France, Germany, and Russia, as well as the United States, which withdrew from it in 2018 - are all studying the Iranian response, and together they will discuss how to move forward.

Bloomberg quoted a source familiar with the Iranian nuclear negotiations saying that Iran's response to the EU draft makes it impossible for the United States to reach an agreement with it.

In the same context, Politico newspaper said that the US envoy to Iran, Robert Malley, will inform members of Congress in a secret session on the status of the nuclear negotiations with Iran on 14 September.

The newspaper added that Congress can play an important role in reviewing any road map to revive the 2015 nuclear agreement and that US lawmakers may make efforts to make a decision to reject reviving the agreement. But this may face a veto from President Joe Biden.

Trumped-up accusations

The adviser to the Iranian negotiating delegation, Muhammad Marandi, told Al Jazeera that what he called the fabricated accusations leveled by the International Atomic Energy Agency against Iran must end until a final text of the nuclear agreement is reached.

Before that, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said the IAEA should close its "politically motivated investigations" into Tehran's nuclear activities.

These investigations constitute a stumbling block to reviving the 2015 agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, under which Iran limited its nuclear program in exchange for easing US, United Nations, and European Union sanctions on it.