TEHRAN – New Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said in a televised program on Friday night that reviving the 2015 nuclear deal is not possible in its current form.

The nuclear agreement, officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), was signed between Iran and the 5+1 group (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany) in July 215 and went into force in January 2016. However, former U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew Washington from the agreement and re-imposed sanctions against Iran in line with his “maximum pressure” policy against Iran.

Araqchi, who acted as Iran’s senior negotiator in crafting the nuclear deal during the Barack Obama administration, said parts of this agreement should be “changed” if it is going to revitalized.

He said the text of the agreement and the former negotiations can serve as a “guide for us” but it cannot be revived in its current form because many things have changed.

“New negotiations should take place” and Iran will make endeavors in this regard.

The foreign minister said When Joe Biden was elected President in the U.S. his administration was willing to return to the JCPOA, but Iran set certain conditions for resuscitating it.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Araqchi said Iran is seeking to “manage animosity” with the United States and not “ending” them because the source of certain tensions between Tehran and Washington are rooted in principles and actually there is not “benefit” in settling the disputes with the United States.

Araqchi, who served as deputy foreign minister for political affairs when Mohammad Javad Zarif was the chief diplomat, added “national interests”, “national security”, and “national dignity” form the cornerstone of Iran’s foreign policy.

“We seek to meet the national interests of the country, and these interests are chiefly economic,” he explained.