TEHRAN - Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has said that U.S. sanctions must be lifted to reach an agreement to revive 2015 nuclear deal, noting guarantees must be established to ensure their “lasting removal”.

 “Removal of sanctions should be accompanied with the resolution of safeguards. There are some political and baseless accusations against Islamic Republic of Iran when it comes to safeguard issues,” Raisi told Al Jazeera in the city of Samarkand, where he attended the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting on Thursday.

“So, we should finalize these safeguard issues,” he said.

“Regarding the guarantees, if we have the trustworthy guarantees, and we have the lasting removal of the sanctions, not temporary removal of sanctions, and if there is a lasting solution for the safeguard issues, for sure it is possible to reach agreement,” the president said.

Months of indirect talks between Iran and U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear deal have hit a stalemate.

Former U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the deal under which Tehran had agreed to scale back its uranium enrichment program in return for the lifting of economic and financial sanctions.

The 2015 deal was signed in Vienna by the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Russia, China, the European Union, and Iran. The IAEA had repeatedly confirmed at the time that Tehran was meeting its nuclear commitments fully under the terms of the 2015 agreement.

‘American sincerity’

The Iranian president also said that it was not yet time to have face-to-face talks with the United States and questioned the sincerity of Washington in wanting to reach a deal with Tehran.

Raisi said that Iran “has tried that before, has done that before, and it didn’t work out.”

The president also questioned “American sincerity” in reaching an agreement.

He said that if Americans want to finalize a deal, “why do they impose new sanctions on Iran in the middle of the negotiations?”

The U.S. recently imposed sanctions on the Iranian Intelligence Ministry under the allegation that it was involved in a cyberattack on Albania. Iran has called the allegation baseless and has even said it is ready to participate in launching a probe into the cyberwar.

Iran’s economy and people have been hit hard by decades of international sanctions.

A United Nations rapporteur published a report this week that detailed the effects of decades of embargoes on Iran and called for their removal. The report’s author, Alena Douhan, said that sanctions had affected nearly every aspect of life in Iran.

The provision of medicines and medical equipment to Iran was “severely undermined” by sanctions on finance, trade, shipping, insurance and over-compliance on the part of foreign businesses and suppliers, Douhan said.

“These constitute serious impediments to the enjoyment of the right to the highest attainable standard of health by all Iranians,” she said.

Sanctions have been imposed on Iran since 1979 when the country’s Islamic revolution took place.