Nuclear talks with Iran resume in Geneva

Negotiations between Western powers and Iran resumed in Geneva on Monday where experts are discussing how the interim deal reached last month will be implemented. 

Experts from the P5+1 — the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China — and Iran are hammering out the specifics of the agreement, which limits the amount of uranium Iran can enrich and freezes its nuclear program. 

The negotiators aim to present a detailed implementation plan by the end of January, an unidentified source told Iran’s state news agency, IRNA.

{mosads}These talks are only expected to last a day, IRNA reports, and are expected to resume next year.

Experts from the countries last met the week before Christmas. But earlier this month, Iran ended another round of talks because the Obama administration had blacklisted additional individuals and companies under existing sanctions that were connected to Iran’s nuclear program. 

Despite that action, the White House vowed to veto a bipartisan bill a group of senators introduced late this month that would impose new and tougher sanctions against Iran. 

A number of hard-line members of Iran’s parliament, meanwhile, introduced a measure last week that would increase uranium enrichment to 60 percent — enough to produce a nuclear bomb.

The lawmakers oppose President Hassan Rouhani, considered a moderate, who was the first president to open diplomatic channels with the U.S. since the late 1970s.