Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Photo: www.sajed.ir via Wikimedia Commons.

JNS.org – Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday that despite the securing of enough U.S. Senate votes to guarantee approval of the recently reached nuclear deal in Congress, “there will be no deal” for Iran if sanctions are only suspended rather than lifted.

Khamenei said that while some U.S. lawmakers have referred to the “suspension” of sanctions, Iran has “insisted that sanctions ought to be lifted, not suspended,” the Associated Press reported, citing the Iranian Tasnim news agency.

“Otherwise, there would be no need for us to take part in the negotiations. We could continue our work and could increase the number of our centrifuges to 50,000 to 60,000 from the current 19,000 in a short while and continue 20-percent [uranium] enrichment, and speed up research and development,” said Khamenei.