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Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Sunday that the United States had started communicating with Iran over the detention of American citizens, calling the issue “total outrage”.
Iran has arrested dozens of binationals, including several Americans, in recent years, mostly for espionage. Human rights activists accuse Tehran of trying to use the detentions to gain concessions from other countries, a charge it rejects.
Sullivan told CBS’s Face the Nation that it was an “important priority” to get these Americans “safely home.”
“We have started to communicate with the Iranians on this issue,” Sullivan said. “We will not accept a long term proposal where they continue to detain Americans unfairly and illegally.”
The issue represented a “humanitarian catastrophe,” he said.
Sullivan added that Biden was “determined” to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, and diplomacy was the best way to do it.
The United States said last week that it was ready to talk to Iran about the two countries returning to a 2015 deal, abandoned by the Trump administration, that sought to prevent Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons while by lifting most international sanctions.
“Iran has yet to respond,” Sullivan said.
Any communication between Tehran and Washington regarding US citizens detained in Iran had been conducted through the Swiss embassy, which looks after US interests, rather than direct contact, an Iranian news site reported.
“The Iranian government has not discussed the American prisoners with Washington,” an anonymous source told the website, which is affiliated with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council. “All messages were exchanged via the Swiss Embassy in Tehran.”
The two countries disagreed on who should take the first step to revive the deal. Iran’s foreign ministry reiterated on Sunday that the United States will not be able to join the pact before lifting sanctions. Washington says Tehran must first return to respect.
Sullivan also told CBS that the United States would respond to the SolarWinds hack that hit several government agencies last year in “weeks, not months,” as it investigates the alleged Russian cyberattack. He said the response will include a mix of seen and unseen tools, and will not simply consist of sanctions.
“We will make sure that Russia understands where the United States draws the line on this type of activity,” Sullivan said.
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