Democratic US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton says she is hopeful the United States can reach a “strong verifiable deal” with Iran over its nuclear program by Tuesday deadline.
Clinton was speaking at a July 4th campaign event in northern New Hampshire on Saturday, as representatives from Iran and the P5+1 – the US, Russia, China, Britain, France, and Germany – are engaged in intense negotiations in Vienna to seal the nuclear deal.
The two sides extended their self-imposed end-of-June deadline for a comprehensive agreement to July 7.
On Friday, Clinton said she was hopeful that the P5+1 group of countries would be able to reach a comprehensive agreement with Iran over its nuclear program.
“I so hope that we are able to get a deal in the next week that puts a lid on Iran’s nuclear weapons program because that’s going to be a singular step in the right direction,” Clinton said, referring to Iran’s non-existent nuke program.
Earlier on Saturday, Iran denied a report claiming that it has reached tentative agreement with the P5+1 group of countries on the removal of the sanctions imposed against the Islamic Republic during negotiations in the Austrian capital.
A source close to the Iranian negotiating team said that some sticking points still remained between Iran and its negotiating partners over the issue of sanctions relief.
A report by the Associated Press quoted unidentified diplomats in Vienna as saying that Iran and the P5+1 had reached “tentative agreement” on the thorny issue of sanctions relief.
GJH/GJH