A top Iranian security official said on Saturday that maintaining and expanding the country's peaceful nuclear and defense capabilities are "options that are never removed from the table." 
  
Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), made the remarks in a tweet a day after millions of Iranians celebrated the 43rd anniversary of the victory of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. 
  
The irremovable options included "glorious presence of Iranians in ceremonies in support of the Islamic establishment, maintaining and strengthening Iran's peaceful nuclear capacities and defense capabilities, (as well as) regional security-making policies of Islamic Republic," he tweeted. 
  
The comments came at a time when envoys from Iran and other parties are engaged in negotiations in the Austrian capital of Vienna to restore a 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Under the JCPOA, Iran accepted some restrictions on the development of its nuclear program in return for removal of UN and Western sanctions. However, then U.S. President Donald Trump's administration withdrew from the deal unilaterally in 2018, and reinstated old and new sanctions against Iran. Tehran retaliated by dropping some of its nuclear commitments.   
  
Since April 2021, eight rounds of negotiations have been held between Iran and the remaining parties to the JCPOA, with the U.S. indirectly involved, aimed at removal of sanctions against Iran and the restoration of the pact. 

Though the U.S. said a deal is "in sight," Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi said on Friday Tehran "never" pins hope on the ongoing talks in Vienna. 

"We put our hopes on the east, west, north, south of our country and never have any hope in Vienna and New York," Raisi said in a televised speech commemorating the 43rd anniversary of Iran's Islamic Revolution. 

(With input from Xinhua, Reuters)