Tehran, March 11 (IANS) Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Wednesday that the US should take the first step to return to the 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

"The US itself has left the JCPOA and should take the first step to return to the deal," the Xinhua news agency quoted Zarif as saying.

They should first solve the problem, and then as Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said, Iran will implement the deal, he added.

After Washington left the JCPOA in 2018 and imposed sanctions against Iran, Tehran has gradually quit parts of its commitments under the deal.

--IANS int/rs