US Vice President JD Vance delivers opening remarks at a four-way summit alongside Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani at the Bürgenstock Resort on the shores of Lake Lucerne near Stansstad, Switzerland, on Saturday (local time). [Getty Images]
US Vice President JD Vance delivers opening remarks at a four-way summit alongside Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani at the Bürgenstock Resort on the shores of Lake Lucerne near Stansstad, Switzerland, on Saturday (local time). [Getty Images]

Iran and the United States have agreed to form four working groups to handle key issues including nuclear matters, sanctions termination and reconstruction, a senior Iranian official said Tuesday (local time).

Iran's state-run IRNA news agency, citing Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi, reported that working-level talks with the US held in Switzerland had concluded, according to AFP and EFE.

Gharibabadi said the negotiating teams had agreed to establish "four working groups covering sanctions termination, nuclear issues, reconstruction and economic development, and monitoring and implementation." He added that under a mutually agreed memorandum of understanding, future negotiations would proceed under the oversight of a high-level committee comprising the speaker of the Iranian parliament, Iran's foreign minister, the US vice president, and the prime ministers of Pakistan and Qatar.

However, he did not specify when the next round of talks would take place.

Gharibabadi, who led the Iranian delegation at the working-level talks, also said the two sides had reached agreement on the "immediate" release of $12 billion in frozen Iranian assets, and that the United States had issued licenses permitting the sale of Iranian oil.

The US Treasury Department on Sunday issued licenses authorizing the production, sale, transport and import of Iranian crude oil, petrochemical products and other petroleum products for a 60-day period through Aug. 21.


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