Is delisting Iran's IRGC as terror group back on the table? - analysis

WASHINGTON – State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Monday that while the US is “prepared for a return to full JCPOA implementation,” commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal, it is also “prepared for broader diplomatic efforts to resolve issues outside of the JCPOA and this specific nuclear file. We’re not going to negotiate in public, but what we can say is that if Iran wants sanctions-lifting that goes beyond the JCPOA, they’ll need to address concerns of ours that go beyond the JCPOA,” the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

Delisting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from the Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) list remains the only major stumbling block between the US and Iran in their mutual efforts to revive the 2015 nuclear agreement. The IRGC designation was not a part of the original nuclear agreement, and would require the US and Iran to agree on that separately from the JCPOA itself, which is an agreement between the Islamic Republic and the superpowers.

“This is a statement that suggests that the Biden administration will not delist the IRGC,” said Dennis Ross, distinguished fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. READ MORE