TEHRAN – The United States is not in a position to assess whether Iran has complied with a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and major world powers, an Iranian official at the United Nations said on Tuesday.

The official, Alireza Miryousefi, said that the U.S. has nothing to do with assessing Iran’s compliance with the nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

“Iran is still a participant member of JCPOA, but the U.S. is not. It’s not up to the United States to assess whether Iran -- which we’ve said can very quickly reverse its remedial measures -- has made good on its obligations,” Miryousefi, who is the spokesman for Iran’s mission to the UN, told NBC News.

Miryousefi also said that other issues apart from Iran’s nuclear program were not part of the negotiations leading up to the 2015 nuclear deal, and as a result, “our defensive missile program is not up for negotiation.”

Responding to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s remarks on Americans imprisoned in Iran, Miryousefi said Iran has offered to discuss an exchange of Americans held in Iran and Iranians detained in the United States.

Miryousefi’s remarks came in response to Blinken’s recent interview with NBC News in which he called for a deal with Iran that would encompass other non-nuclear issues.

The top U.S. diplomat pointed out that the new Biden administration is willing to return to compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal if Iran does and then work with U.S. allies and partners on a “longer and stronger” agreement encompassing other issues.

Blinken also said the U.S. is going to work to ensure that Americans imprisoned in Iran come home one way or another.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has recently proposed the idea of Tehran and Washington synchronizing their actions aimed at reviving the JCPOA under a process choreographed by EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

“JCPOA has a mechanism built into the deal that is the Joint Commission. And the Joint Commission has a coordinator. The coordinator has two hats – it used to be Federica Mogherini now it is Josep Borrell. He has two hats; One hat is he is the high representative of the European Union for foreign defense policy. The other hat is the coordinator of the Joint Commission. He can put his hat as the coordinator of the Joint Commission and sort of choreograph the actions that are needed to be taken by the United States and the actions that are needed to be taken by Iran,” Zarif said in a Tuesday interview with CNN.

SM/PA